Raymour & Flanigan is a family-owned company with over 70 years of history, making it the largest furniture retailer in the Northeast. With over 100 showrooms across seven states, it houses a talented team of IT professionals adept at leveraging organizational processes to address complex business needs.

The Data Engineer position, based in Syracuse, NY, focuses on developing and optimizing data pipeline architecture, enhancing data flow, and supporting various cross-functional teams. The ideal candidate will have extensive experience in data pipeline building and system optimization, geared towards supporting next-gen data initiatives. This role requires a proactive individual skilled in SQL, big data tools, cloud services, and programming languages.

This guide will help you navigate the interview process at Raymour & Flanigan, offering insights into the position and honing your preparation through Interview Query. Let's get you ready to join this leading company!

Submitting Your Application

The first step is to submit a compelling application that reflects your technical skills and interest in joining Raymour & Flanigan as a data engineer. Whether you were contacted by a Raymour & Flanigan recruiter or have taken the initiative yourself, carefully review the job description and tailor your CV according to the prerequisites.

Tailoring your CV may include identifying specific keywords that the hiring manager might use to filter resumes and crafting a targeted cover letter. Furthermore, don’t forget to highlight relevant skills and mention your work experiences.

Recruiter/Hiring Manager Call Screening

If your CV happens to be among the shortlisted few, a recruiter from the Raymour & Flanigan Talent Acquisition Team will make contact and verify key details like your experiences and skill level. Behavioral questions may also be a part of the screening process.

In some cases, the Raymour & Flanigan hiring manager stays present during the screening round to answer your queries about the role and the company itself. They may also indulge in surface-level technical and behavioral discussions.

The whole recruiter call should take about 30 minutes.

Technical Virtual Interview

Successfully navigating the recruiter round will present you with an invitation for the technical screening round. Technical screening for the data engineer role usually is conducted through virtual means, including video conference and screen sharing. Questions in this 1-hour long interview stage may revolve around Raymour & Flanigan’s data systems, ETL pipelines, and SQL queries.

In the case of a data engineer role, take-home assignments regarding data pipeline creation, optimization tasks, and data flow assessments may be incorporated. Apart from these, your proficiency in SQL queries, Hadoop, Spark, and AWS services may also be evaluated during the round.

Depending on the seniority of the position, case studies and similar real-scenario problems may also be assigned.

Onsite Interview Rounds

Followed by a second recruiter call outlining the next stage, you’ll be invited to attend the onsite interview loop. Multiple interview rounds, varying with the role, will be conducted during your day at Raymour & Flanigan's office. Your technical prowess, including programming and data modeling capabilities, will be evaluated against the finalized candidates throughout these interviews.

If you were assigned take-home exercises, a presentation round may also await you during the onsite interview for the data engineer role at Raymour & Flanigan.

Quick Tips For Raymour & Flanigan Data Engineer Interviews

• Brush Up on SQL and Big Data Tools: Raymour & Flanigan will likely test your proficiency in SQL and tools like Hadoop, Spark, and Kafka. Invest time in practicing these areas.
• Understand Data Pipeline Design: Be ready to discuss and demonstrate your experience designing robust data pipelines, including batch and stream processing, as well as optimization techniques.
• Know Your Cloud Services: Experience with AWS cloud services like EC2, EMR, RDS, and Redshift is crucial. Ensure you can speak to your hands-on experience with these services.

Typically, interviews at Raymour & Flanigan Furniture vary by role and team, but commonly Data Engineer interviews follow a fairly standardized process across these question topics.

• Create a function recurring_char to find the first recurring character in a string. Given a string, write a function recurring_char to find its first recurring character. Return None if there is no recurring character. Treat upper and lower case letters as distinct characters. Assume the input string includes no spaces.

• Write a query to get the average order value by gender. Given three tables representing customer transactions and customer attributes, write a query to get the average order value by gender. Round your answer to two decimal places. Only consider users that have ever placed an order.

• Identify first-time and repeat purchases by product category. Analyze a user's purchases to identify which purchases represent the first time the user has bought a product from its category and which represent repeat purchases. Output a table including every purchase with a boolean column indicating if the user has previously purchased from that category. Sort results by the time purchased in ascending order.

• Parse the most frequent words used in poems. Given a list of strings called sentences, return a dictionary of the frequency that words are used in the poem. Process all words as entirely lowercase and ignore punctuation marks. Keys should be the number of times the word is used, with values being lists of words with that frequency.

• Write a SQL query to select the 2nd highest salary in the engineering department. Write a SQL query to select the 2nd highest salary in the engineering department. If more than one person shares the highest salary, select the next highest salary.

• What would you do if friend requests are down 10% on Facebook? A product manager at Facebook informs you that friend requests have decreased by 10%. How would you approach diagnosing and addressing this issue?

• How would you set up an A/B test for changes in a sign-up funnel? A team wants to A/B test various changes in a sign-up funnel, such as changing a button from red to blue and/or moving it from the top to the bottom of the page. How would you design this test?

• What metrics would you use to determine the value of each marketing channel? Given all the different marketing channels and their respective marketing costs at a company called Mode, which sells B2B analytics dashboards, what metrics would you use to evaluate the value of each channel?

• How would you measure the success of a banner ad strategy for an online media company? An online media company wants to experiment with adding web banners into the middle of its reading content to monetize effectively. How would you measure the success of this banner ad strategy?

• How would you investigate a drop in Facebook posts per user? The posting tool on Facebook composer drops from 3% posts per user last month to 2.5% posts per user today. How would you investigate this decline? If the drop is specifically in photo posts, what additional steps would you take?

• How would you interpret coefficients of logistic regression for categorical and boolean variables? Explain how to interpret the coefficients of logistic regression when dealing with categorical and boolean variables.

• What is the difference between covariance and correlation? Provide an example. Describe the difference between covariance and correlation, and provide an example to illustrate the distinction.

• What are time series models? Why do we need them when we have less complicated regression models? Explain what time series models are and why they are necessary despite the availability of simpler regression models.

• How would you determine if the difference between this month and the previous month in a time series dataset is significant? Given a time series dataset grouped monthly for the past five years, describe how you would assess if the difference between this month and the previous month is significant.

• How would you address a manager's complaint about a packet filling machine not functioning correctly? A manager reports that a machine, which weighs and attempts to pack 25 packets into a box, is malfunctioning. Customers are complaining about incorrect packet counts. How would you investigate and resolve this issue?

• How does random forest generate the forest and why use it over logistic regression? Explain how random forest creates multiple decision trees and combines their results. Discuss the advantages of random forest, such as handling non-linear data and reducing overfitting, compared to logistic regression.

• How would you justify using a neural network model and explain its predictions to non-technical stakeholders? Describe the business problem and why a neural network is suitable. Explain the complexity and benefits of the model. Use simple analogies and visual aids to make the predictions understandable to non-technical stakeholders.

• How would you interpret coefficients of logistic regression for categorical and boolean variables? Explain how to interpret the coefficients of logistic regression, focusing on the impact of categorical and boolean variables on the odds of the outcome.

• Which model would perform better for predicting Airbnb booking prices: linear regression or random forest regression? Compare linear regression and random forest regression in terms of handling non-linear relationships, feature interactions, and overfitting. Discuss which model is likely to perform better for predicting booking prices on Airbnb.

• What are the assumptions of linear regression? List and explain the key assumptions of linear regression, including linearity, independence, homoscedasticity, normality, and no multicollinearity.

What is the average salary for a Data Engineer at Raymour & Flanigan Furniture?

Q: What does Raymour & Flanigan do?

Raymour & Flanigan is the largest furniture retailer in the Northeast, with more than 100 showrooms in seven states. Established over 70 years ago, the family-owned company focuses on maximizing organizational processes through experienced IT professionals to solve a variety of complex business needs.

Q: What does the Data Engineer position entail at Raymour & Flanigan?

The Data Engineer position involves expanding and optimizing data and data pipeline architecture, optimizing data flow and collection for cross-functional teams, and supporting software developers, database architects, data analysts, and data scientists. The role requires taking the lead on developing sustainable data-driven solutions, assembling large complex data sets, and enhancing internal processes for greater scalability.

Q: What skills and experiences are necessary for the Data Engineer role?

Candidates should have 5+ years of experience in a Data Engineer role, with a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Statistics, Informatics, Information Systems, or a related field. Essential skills include advanced SQL knowledge, experience with 'big data' tools like Hadoop, Spark, Kafka, experience with relational and NoSQL databases, cloud services (AWS), and programming languages like Python and C#. Familiarity with workflow management tools like SSIS and Airflow is also important.

Q: What benefits does Raymour & Flanigan offer?

Raymour & Flanigan offers competitive compensation and a comprehensive benefits package, including excellent health, dental, and vision coverage, 401(k) with company match, paid vacation and holidays, health savings account, flexible spending account, training and development opportunities, tuition reimbursement, a generous merchandise discount, short & long term disability, group life insurance, and specified disease insurance.

Q: How can I prepare for an interview for the Data Engineer position?

To prepare for the interview, research Raymour & Flanigan’s business and recent projects. Brush up on your technical skills and knowledge related to data engineering. Practice common interview questions on platforms like Interview Query to hone your problem-solving abilities and get ready to discuss your past experiences in data engineering.

If you're excited about the prospect of joining Raymour & Flanigan as a Data Engineer in Syracuse, NY, be sure to thoroughly prepare for your interview process. This position offers the chance to work on cutting-edge data architecture and support various cross-functional teams. For more insights about the company and a deep dive into potential interview questions, check out our main Raymour & Flanigan Interview Guide. At Interview Query, we provide comprehensive resources to help you excel, including guides for various roles. Explore all our company interview guides to boost your preparation. Good luck with your interview!