National Instruments Applications Engineer interview questions

First, there was an interview on campus with a sales representative. Then, an all-day interview took place in Austin, TX at their headquarters, consisting of five 1:1 interviews and one 10-minute technical presentation. The presentation was given to 2-3 NI employees and 3-4 other competing candidates. The experience was enjoyable and the interviews were not stressful. They flew me out for the entire weekend, put me up in a really nice hotel for 3 nights, assigned to me a host who showed me around the whole weekend, took everyone to downtown Austin, went bar-hopping, and out to dinner.

I had never heard of NI before I attended a college career fair. They had a large booth of recruiters and multiple career path opportunities. I chose to pursue their Engineering Leadership Program because it seems to be a great fit for both my engineering and management aspirations. NI did a great job of selling their company at the career fair. I had a 1 on 1 interview at the career fair and was invited for a second interview and company visit about 2 weeks later. The invitation was for both my wife and I to come to Austin for further interviews and a better introduction to the company. I was able to choose between 7 different weeks to come. Because they required a 10 minute technical presentation I chose a date that allowed me a little time to prepare. We flew into Austin on a Thursday and had interviews all day Friday. I was more than impressed with the company. Everything they had said about their culture was true. Our candidate group for ELP was a little large but they said on average there are about 8 - 12 candidates per group. The ELP floor was a great atmosphere to be in. Very young and very hip. While I have never interviewed at Google I would have to guess that the work environment at NI is similar to the stories that I hear about Google. The day started by sitting with the Company CEO (Dr. T) and listening to him give a 45 minute presentation about the history of the company. The day consisted of 5 1:1 interviews and one 10 minute technical presentation. The presentations were given by groups of two candidates to about 5 other employees. I thought it was interesting that they had existing employees do all of the interviews. In general any employee that interviewed you did not interview any other candidates. I guess they all get together afterward and kind of have a draft pick. The technical interview was fairly easy. They try to give you a question that you cannot give a textbook answer to. One that you will have to work through so that they can watch your thought processes. The only trying interview was the behavioral one. They assigned me a host employee who walked me through the entire process. They took the entire group to dinner on Friday and Saturday night. We flew out Sunday morning. All in all it was a great interview. They put us in a wonderful hotel, gave us a rental car, great food, great introduction to many employees, great introduction to Austin, great introduction to other candidates, great service. They say they will get back to me in 2 - 4 weeks. I expect that they will give an offer.