The document provides guidance for preparing for and succeeding in a technical interview for a business analyst role. It discusses understanding the interview context in advance, preparing by brushing up on relevant skills and thinking through sample scenarios and questions, and tips for impressing during the actual interview. The document includes worksheets, sample questions, lists of common skills and topics assessed, and recommendations for structuring responses and having fun while displaying confidence, enthusiasm and ability to explain one's experience.

1. The Technical Interview
Author: Neka Allen
BUSINESS
ANALYST
INTERVIEW

2. CONTENTS
Know what to expect
during the interview
03.
Interview!
01.
UnderstandContext
You’ve done all the work,
now go impress them!
02.
PrepARE
Brush up on skills and
think through scenarios

3. 01.
Understand
Context
Know what to expect during
the interview

4. Knowing what to expect during your interview will help you:
+
Use the worksheet on the next page to get all the basics covered
Focusyourpreparationefforts
There’s a lot of info out there! Spend time on this things they’re most likely to ask about.
Avoidsurprisesoninterviewday
There’s a lot going through your mind already! No need to get tripped up by logistical surprises.

5. TimING
● How many technical portions will there be?
● How much time will the technical interview(s) be?
Topics
● What software or topic areas will be covered?
(Tableau, Excel, SQL, Python, Statistics, etc.)
Format
● What type of interview will it be? (see next page)
● What technology will you be using? (verbal,
whiteboard, pen & paper, on computer)
DePTH
● What level of questions will they ask? (e.g.,
Basic/Intermediate/Advanced SQL functions)
Interviewer(s)
● Who is your interviewer(s)?
● What department do they work in?
● Who do they report to?
● From linkedIn, what does their level of experience
seem to be?
InterviewInfoWorksheet

6. Scenario QUESTION EXERCISE
The interviewer is
looking to assess how
you would approach a
problem, connecting
analytical skills with
business context.
Sample questions:
● How would you go about
determining what kind
of promotion we should
run next month?
● How would you
determine which
customers have high
future potential, even if
today they haven’t yet
spent a lot?
These questions assess
your technical
knowledge, without
actual demonstration of
the skills. (explantation
rather than code)
Sample questions:
● What are the different
types of joins in SQL and
what is the difference
between them?
● What are the different
parts of a SQL
statement?
● In Tableau, when would
you need to use a Level
of Detail calculation?
Work through a series of
questions or a single
case. You will solve it in
conversation on a
whiteboard (or virtually
on a shared document).
Sample questions:
Individual questions
● Join tables A+B, return the
5 records with highest
sales
Long-form
● Given this set of tables,
determine if we should
launch this feature. Ask
for any additional
information you think you
would need.
Commoninterviewformats
Pre-SCREEN
At-home exercise to
demonstrate analytical
and presentation skills.
Typically between first
phone screen and
business interviews.
Sample question:
● Given this data set, how
what changes to
inventory allocation
would you recommend
we make? Put together 5
slides and include your
Excel workbook.

7. 02.
PREPARE
Brush up on skills and think
through scenarios

8. Technical Interviews assess both Soft and Hard Skills
SKILLS ASSESSED
● Communication
● Culture fit
● Ability and interest in learning
● Critical thinking
● Technical skills
● Problem-solving
● Adaptability
● Interpretation of charts
Collaboration

9. Ensure you understand the question being asked
and the objective. Don’t feel rushed into giving
your response right away; ask clarifying
questions. (Even if you think you don’t have
any!..then confirm verbally what you’ve heard)
Take some time to think through your approach.
State assumptions you’re making; ask if they
agree those are reasonable. By talking through the
structure first, the interviewer may clue you in to
some information not initially revealed.
Work through your analysis/solution. In an
exercise it’s working through the
SQL/Tableau/Excel. In a scenario, it’s talking more
generally, but remember to mention specific
analytical techniques as well. Connect back to the
steps of your approach. Involve your interviewer in
the process. Ask additional clarifying questions
along the way. If you get stuck on a specific
function, say or comment out what you would do.
STEP01:OBJECTIVE STEP02: APPROACH
STEP03:SOLUTION
In your conclusion, include a restatement of the
question+objective, a summary of your approach
+solution, and how it solves the problem.
Connecting back to Step 01, ask your interviewer
if you’ve answered their question, or if there’s
anything additional they would like for you to
examine. Even if you’ve run out of time, leave a
few minutes to wrap up & mention what your
next-steps would be.
STEP04:CONCLUSION
StructuringYourResponse
Structuring your response applies more to Scenario and Long-form Exercise formats.
The Question and Individual Exercise formats tend to be more straight-forward, with a simple response.

10. SQL
● Parts of a SQL query (SELECT, FROM, WHERE, GROUP
BY, ORDER BY, HAVING)
● Join types (Left, Right, Inner, Outer)
● Primary & Foreign keys
● UNION vs UNION ALL
● row_number() & other window functions
● Subqueries & CTEs
● Limit number rows returned (e.g., top 10)
● NULL values
● Data integrity, checking for duplicates, dropped
records, etc.
EXCEL
● IF, SUMIF
● VLOOKUP, HLOOKUP
● Pivot tables
Tableau
● Difference between measures &
dimensions
● Level of detail calculation
● Chart types & their use cases
● Data source formatting & considerations
Statistics
● Type I and Type II errors
● Precision and Recall
● False Positive and True Negative Rates
● Business metrics vs Statistical metric
● Determining sample size
● Statistical significance
Sampletopicstoreview

11. GENERAL
● glassdoor.com: Sometimes you’re able to find
questions for the specific company. If not,
search for related companies or roles
● indeed.com
● quanthub.com
● Burtchworks.com Guide to Data Science &
Analytics Job Searches: This one’s more a
general guide, not technical interview focused
● 365 Data Science: Data Analyst Interview
Questions
QUESTION
● SQL
● Excel
Exercise
● Individual Question
○ SQL
PRACTICEQUESTIONRESOURCES

12. ● Visualization
○ Tableau (owned by Salesforce)
○ Looker (owned by Google)
○ Power BI (Microsoft product)
○ Google Data Studio
● Analysis & Data Science
○ Alteryx
● Product Analysis
○ Amplitude
○ Google Analytics
○ Heap
● Event Tagging
○ Segment
○ Google Tag Manager
● Surveys
○ Google Surveys
○ Survey Monkey
Common Analysttools
● Databases
○ Redshift
○ Snowflake
○ Databricks
● Languages
○ SQL
○ Python
● Project Management
○ JIRA
● Data Monitoring
○ Data Dog

13. 03.
INTERVIEW!
You’ve done all the work,
now go impress them!

14. Havefun
👍 Your interviewer is you potential future
coworker; they’re looking for someone who’s both
knowledgeable and enjoyable to work with
BeCONFIDENTINYOURself&YouRSKILLS
👍 You’ve worked hard to get here! It’s impossible
to know everything (..that’s what they made Google
for 😊)
If you get tripped up - ask them a clarifying
question! Maybe they’ll give you a hint, a new piece
of information, or it’ll give you a few moments to
pause and think.
If they ask a question you don’t have experience
with, that’s okay! Offer something related from your
experience or where you would like to apply it in
the future; it keeps the conversation moving +
shows your ability to make connections between
concepts. For example: “In my past roles I haven’t
worked with that exact scenario, but where I could
see that being useful is…”
ASKQUESTIONS
👍 Coming prepared with a list questions (even
some more generic ones for backup in case)
demonstrates your interest in the company and role
👎 Most interviewers leave time at the end for
questions; if you’ve got none it’s just...awkward
Display EnthusiasmFor Analytics
👍 Mention something you’ve done to further your
analytics knowledge on your own time - like
Tableau conference videos, looking at Makeover
Monday submissions, enroll in a Coursera course
Be AbletoExplainYourResume
👍 If you’ve used specific analytical terms, be
able to explain them
👎 One person I interviewed had CHAID analysis on
their resume, but could neither explain what it
stood for (okay..) or what it did in general (not
okay..)
TipsforInterviewDaY