Phone interview, followed by a lunch meeting, followed by a day of interviews. 1. Phone interview: A standard discussion about portfolio of work, interests, experience and design processes. With a few questions specifically about the area/project I was applying for. The main purpose seemed to be to gauge my design competency. 2. Lunch Meeting: Met hiring manager and team director for lunch on-campus. We talked very casually, again about my work, the project I was applying to work on, and more about design systems and projects management. The main purpose seemed to be to gauge my personality and compatibility with Google culture. 3. Day of interviews: Presented a homework assignment and portfolio presentation to a group of designers, project managers, researchers and engineers, none of whom where on the team I was applying to join (this is a strategic thing). About 8 people in total. Then, had individual 1 hour interviews with a few of them, each focussing on different areas of connection they would have with a designer like me. In other words, the researcher asked me about design testing, the engineer asked about optimization of assets and flow, the project manager asked about how to deal with conflicting opinions and settle on a good decision, and the designers set me a mini design challenge. There were no trick questions or brain teasers.

The interview process started with an initial conversation with a Google recruiter, and then an interview with a Creative Director based in the US. My first impression of the recruiter was very positive. She was very professional, responsive, and seemed genuinely engaged in the process. Communication was very clear. However, the role was advertised as a visual designer position, during the interviews, both the recruiter and the Creative Director emphasised that this was a junior position. During the interviews it felt like the expectations were closer to a mid-senior level designer. The scope of the work, the depth of experience discussed, and the portfolio expectations all suggested they were looking for someone more experienced than a typical junior candidate. This mismatch between the level of responsibility and the compensation range was a bit surprising. It felt like the company was hoping to find mid-level or senior capability while offering a salary aligned with a junior position???? Overall, the people I interacted with were professional and the process was structured, but there seemed to be some inconsistency between the job title, expectations, and compensation level.