I got the opportunity to be a data expert and drive business impact, collaborate with the manufacturing and test engineering teams to provide key insights, and partner with the data teams to improve data quality. This exposure kindled my interest in leveling up and learning about the top problems being solved by top tech companies. I continued to hone in on my interest and ended up participating in a lot of Kaggle competitions and other hackathons in data science forums to maintain constant contact with current tech challenges. Looking back, that was critical in helping me retain a lot of information I had learned over the years and understand what was relevant in the industry.

Data Science is a vast field. So, for product sense interview questions, I chose to focus on everything that revolves around understanding the product:
- Viewing users’ needs and pain points from all angles
- Evaluating what data you need
- Formulating hypotheses
- Designing online experiments and tying the results to business questions.

I took all the products that I use online on a daily basis and listed down all the above and had a debate with my mentor. Trust me, leveling up is a process and not a single event. This will help in your interview and YOUR NEXT JOB.

To build my critical thinking, I solved real world problems with my mentors and I vividly remember my discussion with my mentor regarding the search effectiveness case study. These discussions provided me with a clear perspective of how Data Scientists drive key decisions in the tech industry.

Once I got what I needed from the mentorship, I continued my practice until I got my breakthrough in Adobe. I now work as a Data Scientist in product led growth, collaborate with PMs to design experiments that drive engagement, and activation. I get to work on problems that directly impact the users’ needs, and the business. They are larger in scale and are satisfying to my intellect. I can’t tell you how satisfied I felt the first time I ran a successful experiment, doing an analysis, proposing a product improvement, getting cross functional approval, releasing to all customers worldwide and then to see the users make use of the new feature in real time and drive better engagement. All of it within three months of joining the company. Remember I told you leveling up is a process and that it will help your next job? It did for me :)

1. Find a mentor who can help you identify and improve upon your weak areas.
Use your mentor to bounce concepts, case studies, papers etc. and listen to their feedback. It's ok that you don’t know. It's ok that you are still learning about what you want to do after five years in corporate America. Seek help from those who have done it.

2. Prepare a comprehensive plan to improve your interview coding skills.
You can be the best coder, but in an interview setting its different. Practice under a timer and do mock interviews. Mock interviews were super critical in my learning process. Its an iterative process, so do it until you feel like you have maxed out on learning.

3. Understanding how data is applied and used in the field of your liking.
Data science is a large term and everything in here is about understanding the product and thinking like an owner. Once you get through the basics, use the remaining time to dig deeper and become an expert on something. Learn algorithms and concepts that are most helpful for your field. Use that knowledge in turn for your interview. For example, I felt most passionate about solving problems related to things I use daily. You may have things that have happened to you or your family that can trigger your passion. Follow where you are heart is at and try to go deeper in that field. Come up with what you don’t like and what you would do for the same product. Trust me, all of this will help in your case study interview. If you are stuck, talk to your mentor in that field.

4. Reach out to your network for opportunities.
I have achieved more success with people who are actively posting on LinkedIn.In fact my current job at Adobe, even though I got a referral, I reached out to the hiring manager at LinkedIn and left a message stating why I love the product and why I feel passionate about solving their problem. That got me the interview and after that, its all preparation. Working with mentors at PrepVector, spending time understanding the product for your prospective employer and mock interviews were some of the things that helped me clear the line.

I hope this motivates you and guides you to the next step if you are keen to up level yourself. Especially, these are tough times for those on visas. Put your hard work to where it matters the most, If I can help you in anyway I can to reach there, always there to help.

PS: I wanna finish with this video from my superstar, MS Dhoni. Absolutely true.