Charles River Associates General Intern Interview Questions
& Process

It was a two-stage interview process. The first round involved an informational chat with two junior team members, an analyst and an associate. They were very approachable and asked typical interview questions, focusing on econometrics and data science expertise. The second round was quite lengthy, lasting almost four hours, and included a formal case interview along with two separate interviews with Principals.

The whole interview was in small groups. We took turns answering questions about when we showed certain skills. There was an individual market sizing question. Then we worked together on a group case. After that, there was an individual case and a presentation of the findings.

I applied for an internship and first took a math test in early November. Mid-January, I received another test, which was a report-writing one. After passing that, I had an online interview with two consultants. The interviewers seemed unfriendly and unenthusiastic. They had specific answers they wanted for the case study, making it more of a monologue than a discussion. I emailed two weeks later for an update but got no response. Following up with HR the next week, I was ghosted again. While I've interviewed with other consulting firms, this was a very poor experience. Before the interview, HR mentioned a case study would be sent beforehand for presentation, but this didn't happen. Instead, they presented two case studies on the spot. I had emailed HR a week prior to confirm the case study presentation details, but that email was also ignored.