Saturday, November 6, 2004
Interview #9: Teradyne
Took place Thursday, October 28. Teradyne makes testing equipment. Yeah, I haven't heard of them either.
In all the other interviews I've had so far, it was my job to try to impress the interviewer. In this interview, the interviewer tried to impress me.
Ted (the interviewer) spent the entire thirty minutes selling me the idea that Teradyne is the best place for an electrical engineer to work. No technical questions, no behavioral questions. He said that the reason why he was "wasting my time"—yes, he said those words—was because my resumé is very strong. I will likely receive multiple offers, so he wanted give me the company pitch now.
He said the work at Teradyne is much more challenging than work at any other company. The boards he works with have 20+ layers; (for comparison) the iMac G5's motherboard has six layers. He said Cisco and Sun do "Mickey Mouse" stuff. He said anyone can add a PCI bus—just follow the specs. When it comes to testing, there are no specs.
The whole interview, I didn't know what to say. It was weird. I felt like a first-round draft pick. Jay, my partner-in-crime when it comes to homework this semester (117 and 142), received the same treatment. Everyone else got the standard interview.
The interview has definitely piqued my interest. Teradyne wasn't even on the map before. Now, I think Teradyne sits at the top of my list of companies I'd like to visit. It might seem like I'm easily swayed—and well, I am—but companies should be rewarded for pursuing candidates in the fall instead of waiting until the spring, don't you think?
Some of the people at Teradyne are smart.
Don't you mean all the people at Teradyne are smart?
No, I don't know about those Stanford people... oops, did I just say that?