5 Pre-Interview

Tips, tricks, and hacks §

This section borrows and provides some tips, tricks, and life hacks borrowing from some excellent books.

Harvard Consulting Book Yes it’s consulting, but they’re great at breaking down the general steps of how to get into places. ![[71O1VM65eML.AC_UF1000,1000_QL80.jpg | 150]]![[61YGoUsyVWL.AC_UF894,1000_QL80.jpg | 150]]![[81vvgZqCskL.AC_UF894,1000_QL80.jpg|150]]

1. Don’t be scared! You’re much smarter than you think you are, and this stuff is a lot easier than you think it is. Top 3 regrets are always: I wish I wasn’t as scared, I wish I just a) started learning this thing sooner, didn’t realise it’d be so easy/fun. b) wish I just applied, I actually had a chance + woul dhave been good practice anyways.
2. The best way to practice answering questions aloud is to practice answering questions aloud. Give it a go right now, imagine I just asked you “what is a probability distributions.” The mic is yours.
   1. I’m a big fan of recording, so it helps to make a interview-prep folder in your voice recording app of choice, and go crazy. No you will never listen to them, but it enhances the illusion that you’re ‘talking to’ someone. And gives you a nice repository to look back on.
   2. Use it for those less-calculationaly but more explanatory questions.

---

Addressing Luck §

☞ Yes, there is tons of luck involved.

☞ You might be just as deserving of the role as the next candidate, if not more.

☞ But from the point of view of the company, they do not care.

☞ No matter who they pick, they are receiving a 9/10 candidate

☞ Yes, there is tons of luck involved. Your success depends on the sum of many random variables:

• Depends on how well you sleep the night before
  • Whether they ask you that one topic you spent ages on
    • Whether you get paired up with an interview who likes you
      • Etc…

☞ You cannot control the outcome of these random variables on the day. Such is the nature of randomness - as a data scientist/mathematician/quant, you must come to terms with this.

☞ You can’t control your observations. What you can control is your distributions.

Clearly, is it possible for candidate A to outperform candidate B on the day. But who would you bet on?

Don’t stress about the outcomes you can’t control; focus on changing your distribution.

---

So practice, practice, practice. Practice leetcodes. practice books.

1 hour 10 hours 100 hours 10_000 hours

Rules §

Rule 1: $\stackrel{Expectation}{\mathbb{E}(X)}=0$

have no expectations. just practice.

Rule 2:

class Interview: 
	def interview(self):
		if you_know_ur_stuff:
			interview()
			be.yourself()
			speak(confidently) && speak(clearly) 
			# Remember: confidence comes from preparation
		else:
			continue reading
	def preparation(self):
		while True: 
			Read()
			Understand() # everything in Data Science is about intuitive explanations
			Memorise()   #
			Practice() 

Rule 3: Success is one-to-one with effort, with the exception of a little bit of error

$\mathbb{S}=f(\text{E})+ϵ,ϵ\sim N(0,\sigma )$

---