Why a One Month Interview Period Prompted
This Young AI Engineer to Choose Neural Group
Engineer, Research
and Development Department
Jinit Bhatt
Sasaki：What made you think about changing jobs to join Neural Group?
Jinit：I wanted to become involved in the entire business process, carrying projects through from the start to the very end. At my previous job I was primarily focused on research, and it was difficult to pick up on sales and marketing trends. Additionally, I wanted to acquire a broad range of new skills through trial and error. Because of this, a smaller sized company where one is required to wear many hats represented the ideal working environment. For this reason, I had my job search agent focus on introducing newly formed companies with 50 employees or less.
Sasaki：What made you chose Neural Group over other companies in the field?
Jinit：This was because I felt I could engage in a two-way dialog with yourself and other members on the team. I came to this realization thanks largely to the thorough screening period set in place. During the screening phase I was given assignments to tackle, and stopped by the office for about two hours once every week for a month. I was given tasks on machine learning and deep learning to complete. These exchanges gave a better insight into who I would be working with, and provided me with feedback on how I was doing. This careful screening process helped me realize how much I fit in with the company’s culture and gave me a greater understanding of the technology in use, prompting me to join Neural Group.
Sasaki：As you say, Neural Group does take its time with the screening process.
We give our candidates tasks to complete and allow at least one month to size each other up.
Changing jobs is always a major decision, so we want there to be as few mismatches as possible. When taking this into consideration, I feel that a period of at least one month is needed. By the way, what was your impression of the company after joining?
Jinit：I was greatly satisfied by the ability to take part all aspects of the business, from brainstorming ideas, to development and product sales. The biggest difference with my previous workplace is the sense of speed at which things get done, with projects going from the concept phase to commercialization in an incredibly short period of time. The longest project I have been involved in still only had a two month development period.
Neural Group is a place that offers new challenges to take on week in, week out. I have been working on an AI drive recorder since joining the company, which also let me try my hand at app development. This product uses machine learning to learn the movements of moving cars. The app sends an alert when the gap between cars suddenly closes. The opportunity to take on new challenges through the engineering pipeline in this way keeps me constantly engaged. This is a highly active workplace environment with many projects on the go, which may take some getting used to. Once acclimatized to our way of doing things however, I feel that Neural Group offers a highly stimulating workplace environment.
Sasaki：This sense of speed could only be achieved with the efforts of outstanding engineers such as yourself. We had you working on the two-month project you mentioned earlier, and two other projects at the same time.
I see the reason as to why we are able to increase the variety of projects we take on is because the differences in the backgrounds of our team members allows us to learn from one another. You are an expert in deep learning, while others specialize in front-end operations, while others are well versed in app development. While carrying out product development in-house naturally leads to a broader range of challenges we must come up against, we have the team members on hand to handle this.
Sasaki：Lastly, could you tell us what kind of advantages Neural Group offers to someone looking to change jobs?
Jinit：The biggest advantage is the ability to become involved in development projects that are promoted with specific business applications in mind. Deep learning engineers tend to focus their efforts on basic research, and can end up distancing themselves from efforts to incorporate this research into new products. At Neural Group, engineers not only involve themselves in proof of concept testing, but also subsequent product development efforts with a specific business application in mind. At my previous job I did not have the opportunity to experience the joy and astonishment of seeing my development efforts being used in such a short period of time.
