Caliva Interview Questions
& Process

This was the second phone interview. I was a bit hesitant about this position because the salary was at the very bottom of what's typical. While looking into the company, I found an article by the hiring manager where she mentioned her employees work 6-7 days a week, 12 hours a day. So I brought that up. The question seemed to catch her off guard, but she eventually said she has more work than she can handle in a day. It seems the expectation is for employees to work 80+ hours a week for a low salary. I didn't get to ask why someone would do that because as soon as I mentioned the low pay and long hours, the interview ended.

So I had this interview that was supposed to be 15 minutes but it was only 5. They started with some questions about my background, my experience working with teams, and if I've managed people. Honestly, I'd probably tell people not to apply here. The whole process felt like a joke, and I suspect they just reject most applicants anyway. What's the point? Is it because they pay so little? I think I'd rather just get a regular retail job that pays more.

The process started with an HR screen, followed by a homework assignment that was way too hard. They should have provided a sample, anonymized CSV dataset instead of using BigQuery’s public stack overflow dataset which was irrelevant to the business. The office was crappy and looked really old. The commute was long because it's far from Caltrain. They didn't reimburse me for interview travel expenses, which was disappointing. A data scientist asked me a really easy SQL question, which felt like a waste of time for both of us. He seemed nervous and wasn't a great interviewer. The data pipeline seemed immature and complex. I got the impression the job would be stressful with little reward. There's a lot of government paperwork due to marijuana regulation, more than a standard background check. This regulation seems more important to the company than creativity in products, acquisition, or retention. The recruiter left vague voicemails asking me to call back about travel and the rejection, instead of sending an email or leaving a more detailed message. Communicating bad news verbally just makes it worse. The company culture seems like former hippies. Are you into Burning Man or have a nose piercing? Then you might fit in.

Got the interview request two days after applying. Had two phone screenings with two different recruiters. They mentioned they'd follow up in 2-3 days. Both recruiters were nice and asked similar questions about my experience.