I initially got approached for a Data Science Manager position by facebook recruiter. I work in machine learning and software engineering. Due to the engineering background they thought i would be a good fit for data engineering. I decline but the recruiter ( misinformed or in a typical sales fashion ) said its heavily AI based. So i decided to have an initial screen with the hiring manager in the USA over videoconference. The guys was really nice, humble and overall gave me a great impression. We agreed that i'm more into machine learning and software engineering than Data engineering. The guy really impressed in his questioning and trying to get the best info out of someone. He was looking for talent rather than faults. I then had an unofficial chat with an old colleague , who now work as a data science manager at facebook, of mine which spoke highly of facebook and working there. The recruiter also kept on pitching to me how i would be able to move onto more software engineering and machine learning roles. With all this information, and the given the manager was seemed such a great guy, i thought i would progress it. Managers do make careers and he was the main reason i progressed. Second interview with a Data engineering manager in London over video conference. He didn't want to video conference as he said he would be just taking notes. It seemed very mechanical. The interview was a bit mechanical rather than a fluent conversation. The question asked were over leadership , technical and Sql. The Technical questions weren't hard but i did have a brain fail in one. My fault i should have prepped, rather than turning up for a technical interview without prep. But i did get all the coding exercises right just that in one of them he had to prompt me to come up with a simpler solution. The recruiter had told me that the technical interview was going to be 15 mins and the leadership would be 45 mins. Long story short, I was told that i didn't make their leadership test. I feel the same as the review left by someone on "23 Mar 2018" . My hunch is that this particular interviewer wants to hear particular answers to general questions on leadership. When i ask him what his progression looks like, he gave an answer which started by " I really believe facebook is changing the world". This gives insight that he wants to hear particular answers rather than approaching it that there might be many right answers. Having said this i wouldn't change what and how i answered stuff. It good not go to place where you might not fit especially when you career is going into a different direction.

Started off with the recruiter screening - basic background, process overview, and prep tips. The recruiter was super helpful and gave solid advice, especially around focusing on STAR format for behaviorals and brushing up on SQL for the technicals. Pre-screens included a leadership behavioral round (mostly about team challenges, conflict resolution) and a technical screening. The technical one was SQL-heavy with some pseudocode—things like data modeling and basic algorithms. The onsite loop had five rounds: two technical ones (one on metrics + schema design with SQL, and another brainstorming data problems), system design (measuring customer satisfaction for a food delivery app — schema management and trade-offs were key), leadership (a mix of team management and mentoring stories), and ownership (basically stakeholder management and prioritization). Honestly, the leadership and system design rounds felt like the biggest tests. Spent a lot of time practicing on LC and running mock interviews with Meta coaches on Prepfully, which really helped. Process was long but no complaints though. Recruiters kept me in the loop, and feedback came quickly after each round; TC was also great - inline with the expectations.