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This isn't helpful to you but I don't get why they ask such technical questions. Like are we doing strategy consulting or are we scientists in the lab. People with a technical background can pick up most of these mechanisms from a brief reading. It's not like you need to know it off the top of your head for the job
In my ClearView interview the technical questions didn't really require deep understanding - they were framed as 'hypothesize how this drug is silencing protein expression' for example. Pretty sure I answered wrong too and was beating myself up about it after the interview. But I still landed the offer so it goes to show its how you theorize and present your logic rather than getting the science correct. Also, ClearView consultants are very scientific and these questions are designed to screen for candidates who could be thought partners with R+D Directors during client meetings. As mentioned here the Yale LS 2014 casebook is very helpful so DM me if you would like more info + I am happy to share
What do you mean by "technical science questions?" Our interviews in general should not pre-suppose specific knowledge of the disease or drug discussed
ZS1 - that's what it should be. The only time I can imagine a more intense science question is if someone published a paper in a specific area, then they should understand the science there.
There's a Yale 2014 life science casebook that is fairly good to practice with. CV cases are just stripped versions of their actual projects so I didn't feel like anything was unreasonable to ask, some basic biology and regulatory (how do drugs get approved) plus asking them for specifics of the drug when I didn't understand. Got an offer but didn't join
If you have a copy, can I get it?
Mentor
I would say from when I was on recruiting, the goal was to test someone’s ability to understand and draw implications from some of the science. We do a good number of projects (often triages) that involve getting down to the molecular underpinnings of the disease (like could this disease be addressed by CRISPR) as well as commercial and clinical factors.
I think the way CV2 put it is a good way to think about it. It’s less about knowledge and more about the thought process. Are you comfortable making some assumptions/hypotheses and then driving to the implications of those? The knowledge you can get, but drawing out the implications is much harder to teach.
ClearView does screen for a particular type of candidate (hard science background + looking for exposure to clients) given the project work we do. However, in the recent past we have seen how this may work against ClearView. IMO some of the people we hire are too smart or too good to work at this firm -- or in consulting in general (at least at the level of satisfaction/WLB today), and get disillusioned very quickly. Oftentimes the best candidates we hire leave the fastest because they have more exit opportunities available to them. Moral of the story: don’t take it personally if you’re not considered “good enough” by ClearView, ClearView itself isn’t good enough for many candidates/hires.
Yep. I find it ridiculous, especially when people don’t know something in ppt, excel, sql they usually google and learn…
I was turned down for the exact same reason lol