Common Interview Questions and Expected Knowledge?

I doubt anyone will quiz you on Ohm's Law. At least no one I know. We interview kids like you all the time. The things I want to know are:

1) What were your lab experiences like? How were your projects assigned, how long did you have to complete each one? What were some of your favorites?

2) Can you solder?

3) If you did any internships, or had any relevant summer jobs, what did you do there?

4) Did you learn VHDL?

5) If someone gave you a design to do that you were clueless about - how would you handle it?

6) What's the next number in this sequence - 1, 11, 21, 1211...

I usually ask #6 first, that gives me a chance to look over the resume.

7) If the resume indicates any hobby EE activities, I'll ask about that.

Frankly, what you've learned is a lot less interesting to me than how you learned, and what you've been exposed to. I look for people who have demonstrated that they can think for themselves - for instance, by doing home projects - and who have gone beyond the classroom to solve problems - for instance, finding an innovative approach to a lab assignment on the internet, or in the library.

Try not to spit when you talk. And wear something that doesn't say "I bought this for my interview."

GOOD LUCK!

Ohhhh, I like that #6.

With my first screening questions I tried to find out "who" the person was.

Can they communicate? Are they forthright or evasive? Could I trust them? Do they have reasonable knowledge of their actual skill level. Do they try to "snow" me with "know-it-all" fresh from school? Your education is just about to begin!

Do they have outside hobbies and interests. Those that had none were duds.

Engineers often progress to management, so various interests, amicable personality, projecting a positive "can do" attitude are very important.

Reasonable marks in school in the right topics show the ability to learn.

If the position involved a requirement for a particular skill set I gave them an exam. Everything from general knowledge to highly technical questions with too much irrelevant information. Just to see if they could think and work under pressure.

I was interviewing for EE's with control theory requirements, so part of the test was Laplace transforms, general electrical questions, and the question with too much information was an electrical-mechanical-process problem. The only person that ever solved it was a medical doctor! He had no knowledge of the electrical control portion so he extracted the answer by using grade school physics information, and some rather eloquent logic.(No, he was not applying for the job, just interested and wished he had done engineering instead of medicine!)

The grad that had many interests, fixed his bicycle, or loved cars, built things, and could talk about them always made it past the first round.

We always found the straight A student that had no interests outside of his course material was always found to be no good in industry. The B to B+ student that had been involved and active in things always worked out better in the long run.

Your interview quiz sounds challenging, are you willing to post it here? Jeff

The last time I gave it was in 1994.

Now I am frustrated, I can't seem to locate it anymore.

(2 jobs later and a move across the continent!)

The teaser was a center Unwind stand for a double drum paper machine winder. I gave the Unwind motor NP Hp, field range, voltage rating, the sheet tension, the sheet width, speed, inertias, drum diameters, diameter range, gear ratios, Drum motor HP's, Drum motor gear in, etc. Then asked for the required Hp and % load on the motor(s).

The answer is actually simple, but they got caught up in the abundance of details.

Given less data, they would get the question.

The Bode plots were a simple PI function and a second order lag. Sketch the plot.

Then there were several questions on simple parallel and series circuits and write the transfer function in the frequency domain. This checked if they could remember some early fundamentals.

(The one no one could answer is "yes or no, have you stopped beating your kids/wife)...just joking.

was interviewing for EE's with control theory requirements, so part of the test was Laplace transforms, general electrical questions, and the question with too much information was an electrical-mechanical-process problem. The only person that ever solved it was a medical doctor!

Its very interesting, But I dont think most of chinese medical doctor cannt reply such basic math and engineering question( except those who learn medical equipmet)

I always told that western schools emphasize practice linking with theory and operation capability. so they will be no problem at answering such question after graduate.

whats matter?

who is right?

I've found a telling question is "Tell me about your thesis project". Some candidates can't even remember what they've spent six months designing and building. Others can describe the salient features, (without getting bogged down on detail), can suggest future improvements/ideas/features/cost savings, described their own mistakes/successes/tradeoffs and generally show they care deeply about what they design. I'll leave you to guess which type gets my recommendation. Jeff

We we interviewing candidates for a computer programming position. It came to a toss up between two people. The guy that won out was the one who was in the reserves and had reached a rank that was higher than one would have expected for his age. He turned out to be a real tiger on the job. The outside interests do count.

In all the job interviews I attended, I was never asked the same question twice, so you dont know what will be asked.

When I interviewed graduates, I took them off some technical questions and asked about their wider experiences. If you are qualified, you are trained to think, so we know all about that. Make sure you have knowledge outside your course work, ie pulling a video recorder or car engine apart. Most graduates today are brilliant at manipulating a computer but hopeless at solving problems so have to be put on simple work until their capabilities are defined, so widen your scope as soon as possible.

Best question I was ever asked was a problem they obviously actually had.

How do we synchronise a video frame store to this flash gun which we are firing?

I paused for a few seconds and said "Don't"....

It got their attention! I then explained how to do it, and landed the job.

Moral, be prepared to think on your feet!

(Don't use the push button to fire the flash at all...use it to tell the frame store you are readty to go....let the frame store fire the flash when it wants. It was for an ophthalmic instrument years ago.)

Thanks to all of you who have already replied to this thread.

"kids like you all the time" <-- My wife (of 7 years) got a kick out of this. I'm not quite a kid. I just got a late start in school.

I am actually looking for an internship right now as opposed to an EE job. I have a little schooling left. I'm an A/B student and do have other interests outside of school. I also like to work on electronics projects outside of class when I get a chance.

I feel like the common message that I'm hearing is that it is not necessarily the knowledge I currently possess that is the key, but the ability to learn quickly and tackle a challenge head on. I feel like that is definitely a strength of mine. I have no problem doing research and learning about new hardware, software, or concepts. I often end up as the group leader for school projects because of this.

I definitely do not come across as a know-it-all. There is always something new to learn. I am willing to ask for help and am always looking for ways to improve.

Thanks again for all the helpful hints!

Aaron

Look 'em in the eye, give them a firm handshake, a quick smile, and the job is yours!

You're hired! Be here at 0800 Monday.