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Getting hired at a top tech company like Galvanize is no easy feat. With its rigorous hiring process and emphasis on skills-based assessments, you need to come prepared to ace the interview. In this comprehensive guide, I’ll walk you through the most common Galvanize interview questions and provide tips to help you craft winning answers.
After extensively researching Galvanize’s interview process and speaking with countless candidates, I’ve compiled the top 20 questions that you’re highly likely to encounter. From technical coding challenges to behavioral questions about your communication style, this guide will help you navigate any question thrown your way.
Whether you’re interviewing for a software engineering or data science role, an instructor position or a general management function these questions touch on the must-have qualities that Galvanize looks for. I’ll provide sample responses to each question so you can see what high-scoring answers look like.
Let’s dive in and make sure you’re ready to bring your A-game to the interview!
Overview of the Galvanize Interview Process
It’s helpful to understand what the overall interview flow typically looks like at Galvanize Here’s a quick rundown
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Initial Phone Screen: Expect questions about your interest in the role along with high-level questions about your background and experience. This is a chance for the recruiter to determine basic fit.
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Technical Interview: You’ll be asked in-depth technical questions focused on algorithms, data structures, statistics, systems design, etc. Live coding exercises are also common here. Expect 3-5 rounds of these.
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Sample Lecture: For instructor roles, be prepared to deliver a short sample lecture as part of the process. This tests your ability to teach technical concepts.
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Roleplaying Scenarios: Galvanize may test your ability to handle student interactions with mock scenarios. This assesses your interpersonal skills.
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Behavioral Interviews: Several rounds of behavioral interviews focused on competencies like problem-solving, communication, teamwork, and leadership.
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Panel Interview: Interviewing with a panel of 3-5 people including the hiring manager, key stakeholders, and cross-functional teams.
As you can see, the process is quite extensive with up to 6 stages. Thorough preparation and practice are vital for successfully navigating each stage. Now let’s look at specific questions you’re likely to encounter.
1. Tell me about a project where you utilized both coding and teaching skills.
Galvanize places immense value on instructors who can not only code proficiently but also break down complex concepts into simple, engaging lessons. With this question, the interviewer wants to assess two aptitudes:
- Your ability to handle complex coding projects using best practices
- Your skills in identifying teachable moments and mentoring others
Sample Response:
In a recent project building a scalable web analytics pipeline, I was tasked with architecting a distributed system that could handle massive volumes of data. This required me to employ my strongest software engineering skills to ensure high performance, stability, and efficiency in the system.
Concurrently, I recognized the need to upskill the more junior engineers on these new technologies. I initiated weekly knowledge-sharing sessions where I guided them through the architecture using analogies, visuals, and interactive demos. We also did hands-on pair programming which allowed me to provide mentorship during implementation.
This not only enabled a smooth adoption of the new tech but also strengthened team-wide capabilities that enhanced productivity on subsequent projects. It underscored my passion for disseminating complex technical knowledge through patient teaching.
Key Takeaways:
- Demonstrate your mastery of coding best practices
- Emphasize your approach to teaching/mentoring others through the project
- Share the positive impacts of combining your technical and teaching skills
2. How would you debug intermittent software failures with unclear patterns?
Engineering roles at Galvanize require tenacity and creativity in tackling uncertain, complex technical problems. This question tests your systematic debugging skills when dealing with really tricky bugs.
Sample Response:
My first step would be ensuring the problem is well documented through logs, system snapshots, or tools like debuggers and APMs. I’d compile a dossier of when the failures occurred, under what conditions, and any discernible patterns.
I’d then review recent code changes and isolate components to run more focused diagnostic tests. Things like integration issues, race conditions, and edge cases only exhibited at scale would be high on my suspect list.
If the source remains unclear, I would engage others who have context on the system architecture and collaborate on hypotheses. Bouncing ideas off teammates is invaluable, as are fresh perspectives.
With intermittent issues, perseverance and a structured approach to eliminating variables and narrowing the search space is key. I’ve resolved several tricky bugs using techniques like flame graphs, profiling, and good old print line debugging.
Key Takeaways:
- Show step-by-step debugging practices and tools you’d leverage
- Highlight the importance of collaboration and different perspectives
- Demonstrate tenacity and creative problem-solving
3. Explain your process for preparing technical lessons for novice audiences.
Galvanize instructors need to intimately understand topics and break complex concepts down into digestible, engaging lessons. This question tests your ability to teach technical subject matter to non-technical people.
Sample Response:
My process always starts by understanding the audience’s baseline knowledge through pre-assessments and conversations. This allows me to gauge the appropriate depth and pace when designing the lesson.
Next, I simplify any advanced technical terminology using analogies and examples that relate the concepts to more familiar ideas. Things like metaphors, storytelling, and visual aids are invaluable translation tools here.
I also incorporate active learning techniques to apply the concepts and reinforce understanding. Simple hands-on activities, think-pair-share discussions, and collaborative problem-solving give learners opportunities to contextualize the information.
Getting feedback through quick checks for understanding or end-of-class surveys allows me to adapt my approach if needed. Making complex technical topics accessible is integral to my teaching philosophy.
Key Takeaways:
- Assess audience’s baseline knowledge to shape your approach
- Leverage analogies, visuals, examples, and active learning techniques
- Highlight your adaptability based on audience feedback
4. How have you balanced writing robust code with meeting deadlines?
Galvanize seeks engineers who can deliver clean, maintainable code while also being pragmatic enough to meet release cycles. This question tests that balance.
Sample Response:
With tight deadlines, I lean heavily on Agile methods to deliver robust code through iterative development. I break large deliverables into smaller stories that can be developed, tested, and integrated rapidly.
Prioritizing linting, testing, and modularity from the start ensures quality is baked in at each increment rather than addressed separately. Code reviews also help share best practices across the team.
If there are parts I need to optimize later, I’ll tag tech debt tickets to revisit post-launch. But I ensure the MVP meets all functional requirements for the release.
There have been cases where I felt quality being sacrificed and pushed back deadlines to address gaps. Finding this equilibrium is key to sustainable innovation.
Key Takeaways:
- Discuss specific strategies like Agile, linting, testing, modularity
- Share examples of balancing speed and quality successfully
- Show you understand when to push back to preserve integrity
5. Share a strategy you’ve used to engage an online or offline community.
Community building and engagement is central to Galvanize’s ethos. This question evaluates your ability to cultivate an active, inclusive environment.
Sample Response:
As an early member of Galvanize’s NYC alumni Slack group, I recognized an opportunity to strengthen networking and knowledge sharing in the community.
I devised a buddy system where members were matched based on common interests and encouraged to meet up monthly to collaborate on projects. We also organized monthly hackathons for friendly competition.
Additionally, I interviewed influential members for spotlights shared across social media, which amplified engagement. These inclusive initiatives quadrupled the group’s active users and fostered meaningful connections.
Maintaining this vibrancy required continuously evaluating participation metrics and gathering direct feedback to tailor new initiatives. By keeping the community front and center, I was able to boost engagement significantly.
Key Takeaways:
- Outline specific strategies and initiatives you’ve driven
- Include measurable results and data showing impact
- Emphasize adaptability based on community feedback
6. Tell me about a time you adapted your communication for different audiences.
Effectively tailoring communication across diverse audiences and personalities demonstrates keen emotional intelligence. Galvanize wants instructors who can connect with anyone.
Sample Response:
In my last role, our team included research scientists who appreciated meticulous details delivered through email and product managers who preferred high-level in-person conversations.
Recognizing these styles, I would send detailed memos to scientists before meetings so they coul
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Dilyana Timerkaeva wanted to move from academia to data science. She knew that to get the data scientist jobs she wanted, she would need a portfolio of real-world projects. In her research, Dilyara found that Galvanize’s Remote Data Science Immersive stood out. But first she had to get in! Take a look at Dilyara’s experience with the Galvanize application process, learn about the Galvanize Prep curriculum, and get insider tips from the Galvanize team on how to ace interviews and become the best candidate.
Dilyara, you already have advanced degrees in STEM fields. So why did you think you needed to apply to a data science bootcamp like Galvanize?
My background is in physics, and I’ve studied computational physics, computers, programming, and so on. Moving into data science made sense because it ties in with my mathematical, theoretical, and physical education background. I worked as an academic for years, but it’s hard to get a permanent job in academia, and most higher education jobs require you to move around. I started looking into industrial careers in my area. Especially with COVID-19, so many jobs now allow you to work from wherever you are.
I began teaching myself about data science, but I wanted practical experience and projects to work on. I thought that I needed real-world experience to show potential employers in order to make the switch to data science. I also wanted access to a career services team to help me find a job. For these reasons, I abandoned my self-teaching and signed up for a bootcamp.
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The Key Traits Galvanize Looks For in Applicants “There are a few commonalities that many of our grads share. First, successful grads are often those who enjoy the process of problem-solving; data scientists often have to focus on the technicalities of problem-solving and there often isn’t a “right answer,” so it’s important to have an open mind, ask questions, and enjoy the problem-solving process. Secondly, storytelling can be an important trait of a data scientist: a good data scientist should obviously have a good handle on manipulating and interpreting data, but a great data scientist should also be able to apply the findings in a way that provides meaningful insights, actionable directives, and in a way that makes sense to other stakeholders who may not be quite as data-savvy.” |
There are so many online data science bootcamps now! What stood out about Galvanize?
From my first interaction with Galvanize, I felt supported by them. The energy of the school and staff was so positive and encouraging, and this matched my own personality. I looked at the projects that Galvanize students had finished and talked to the admissions team. Out of all the online data science bootcamps I looked at, Galvanize really stood out.
How did you prepare for the Galvanize application? Did you complete Galvanize’s Data Science Prep Course?
The admissions rep asked me about my background, resume, and diplomas, and I signed up for the data science prep course. It’s online and self-paced. Since I didnt intensively focus on the prep course, it took me about 6 weeks to complete.
The course covered statistics, probability, and Python, and had us combining all of our skills to solve problems. There were also a few modules that focused on basic math for data science. I liked the overall consistency of the prep course. The lessons became gradually more complicated as I progressed. In the prep course, Galvanize made sure that the material was complete and in-depth, which gave me confidence in the material that would be for my coursework. It helped me master my programming skills.
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The Galvanize Admissions Process: What to Expect
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Was there a technical interview to get into Galvanize’s data science bootcamp?
After passing the prep course, there was a 45-minute technical interview. I found the math part of the technical interview easy, but it still took me a while and a lot of focus to solve. I also had to study for it. The prep course helped me remember the math I learned in school and got me ready for this technical interview.
Can you share some sample questions from the Galvanize interview?
There were several Python questions, statistical problems, and probability problems.
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Example Question from Galvanize’s Technical Assessment:
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Was the data science prep course worth it for you?
I could not have passed the exam without completing the prep course. By carefully going through the course, I tuned up my programming skills and prepared for the interview. For that reason, I did really well in the technical interview!.
I went through a prep course that helped me get ready for boot camp with the right mindset and skills to do well.
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Galvanize Prep Courses: Basic Prep vs Premium Prep Both of Galvanize’s prep courses are focused on preparing students for the Data Science Immersive admissions process. The main difference between Basic Prep and Premium Prep is the level of support students receive from Galvanize’s Prep Team.
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Project-based learning was a key reason why you enrolled at Galvanize. What kind of projects did you work on in the bootcamp?.
We completed three projects over the course of the bootcamp. We started with a data exploration project. I made sure I had some ideas early on in the program because I didn’t have much time to choose what to work on or find the data. For these projects:
- To sort yoga poses into groups, I used computer vision and transfer learning.
- I looked at information about education in France to find out if having more education or going to a top university increases or decreases a person’s job prospects.
For my final project, I built a popular science book recommender. You had two weeks to come up with an idea, find the data, make it work, and then show it off. The time pressure was challenging. I needed a dataset to work with, and while I had a lot of ideas about where to find it, most of them didn’t work! I tried over and over again until I finally asked Goodreads for data. When I had finished the project, it felt great. To start from zero and end with something you made is an incredible feeling.
How did you connect and collaborate with your cohort remotely?
We were communicating with each other the entire time at the bootcamp. We primarily connected through Slack and Zoom. We liked studying together on Zoom, and Slack was always open for other kinds of chats, like sending files, setting up sessions, and asking questions about programming.
At first, I wanted to go to Galvanize in person, but I loved not having to drive to a bootcamp campus every day. I was so involved in the remote bootcamp and talking to my classmates that I didn’t feel lonely.
How did the competitive application process impact your cohort at Galvanize? Did everyone have the same background/experience?
My cohort had students with many levels of experience. Galvanize is unique because the bootcamp is set up so that everyone, no matter how much experience they have, can learn something useful. With my STEM background, I could take a higher level of information and deeper understanding from the curriculum. I thought the bootcamp was very hard because I took the time to really think about the ideas and try to grasp them completely. I wanted to know the theories, not just the programming part. Galvanize taught in a way that prepared us to apply those concepts well.
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If you don’t get into Galvanize, can you re-apply? Absolutely! Any students who don’t successfully get into Galvanize their first time around should try brushing up on concepts by taking our prep courses, which cover the fundamentals of statistics, probability, and Python. Students may take the Technical Interview up to three times. After this interview, an Enrollment Advisor will relay next steps within two business days. |
Now that you’ve graduated, which data science roles do you feel qualified to apply for?
There are so many different opportunities in the data science field. My group of people all came to boot camp with different skills, such as a background in music, finance, dance, or computer science. We all put in for jobs as Data Scientists, Data Engineers, and Data Analysts, but in areas that fit our own backgrounds.
How has Galvanize’s career services prepared you for the job hunt both during the bootcamp and since graduating?
Galvanize’s career services do a great job of helping students deal with problems and rejections while also building their confidence and drive. During the bootcamp, the career services team gave lectures to help us prepare for the interviewing process. We also had meet-up sessions with recruiters where they answered our questions and gave us career tips. People who work in career services taught us how to network, prepare for interviews, build our portfolios, and stay focused during the job search. It was super effective training for me.
Since we graduated from the bootcamp, we meet with our career services specialist once a week to talk about our progress and strategy, set career goals, and get ready for upcoming interviews. Galvanize is always ready to answer my job search questions.
What has been your greatest challenge in this journey becoming a data scientist?
Everything has been hard! In bootcamp, there is a lot to learn in a short amount of time, from big ideas to the programming skills you need to figure something out. For the capstone, you had to come up with a great idea, find the data set, and then use what you had just learned about programming and the ideas you had come up with. At the same time, the bootcamp was fun, too. At Galvanize, I always felt supported and knew that I would receive help when I needed it.
Looking back on this career change, was Galvanize worth it for you?
Going through a bootcamp to switch from academia to data science has changed my life! By signing up at Galvanize, I became more qualified for the jobs I wanted to find. I have the tools I need to be seen as an authority in the field. Businesses that do research and development (R My skills in physics and data science make me a great fit for any R project. Plus, Im a more interesting and valuable candidate with a broad range of knowledge.
Galvanize did everything they said they would do for me, and it worked! I’ve felt so confident since I graduated, and I’m glad I have projects on GitHub. It was really important for me to have a portfolio to show potential employers. The projects I created in the bootcamp define my knowledge of techniques and my skill set. Recruiters are more interested in me now because of my projects.
What do you wish you knew before applying to Galvanize?
I am always asking questions. Im very comfortable with not knowing something and seeking the answer. I was never afraid to ask the team anything that crossed my mind. Still, I wish I had been braver, even though I spoke up a lot. If I could go back in time, I would tell myself to be sure of myself and trust that Galvanize would do everything they said they would do to help me succeed.
Find out more and read Galvanize reviews on Course Report. This article was produced by the Course Report team in partnership with Galvanize.
Jess Feldman is a skilled writer who works as the Content Manager at Course Report, the top website for people looking to change careers and find coding bootcamps. With a background in writing, teaching, and managing social media, Jess is a key part of helping Course Report readers make smart choices about their education. Please enable JavaScript to view the.
Galvanize DSI Technical Interview Coding Prep, Part 10: Analysis of the Poisson Distribution
What questions do you ask in a galvanize behavioral interview?
I interviewed at Galvanize Behavioral Interview mainly consisting of questions that would show if the candidate is passionate about web development and helping others learn the course content. The interviewer will ask a ‘describe your way of thinking’ question and the candidate would answer to see if they are a good fit for the team.
Are galvanize interview questions easy to answer?
Galvanize interview questions aren’t always easy to answer due to the bootcamp’s exclusivity. This guide can help you understand what to expect in the Galvanize interview and prepare for the interview process.
Who did you interview at Galvanize with?
I interviewed at Galvanize With staff, or technical mentor and current SEIR who asked with technical and behavioral questions. Also asked to role play scenarios. After answering question they would break down your responses.
How long did the galvanize behavioral interview take?
The process took 1 week. I interviewed at Galvanize Behavioral Interview mainly consisting of questions that would show if the candidate is passionate about web development and helping others learn the course content.
