BlackRock Aladdin Client Services Summer Analyst

Some background: I am an accounting major from a non-target who applied with a 3.66 at that time. I had substantial Leadership positions in various ECs that weren't traditionally business oriented and my professional experience only ranged from Staples to Chipotle.

I applied around the end of July in 2018 for their Aladdin Client Service Summer Analyst position. From there, I got an automated invitation to do a HireVue cover letter that gave me about 5 minutes to prepare for a 1-2 minute answer. Before I did the HireVue, I wrote the answer down and memorized it, which I still use for my interviews. I didn't hear back about anything until around November when I got an email for a digital interview with an actual analyst at BlackRock. They were pretty challenging questions. Some questions I got were:

1. Explain a difficult concept to me in simple terms
2. What's the difference between Financial Risk and Risk Management
3. Explain Aladdin to me
4. Why ACS?
5. When was a time you received great customer service?

I prepared really really in-depth questions about their 10-K and their blog posts about their economic outlook. A week later I got an offer to their superday. The superday was honestly nerve-wracking because I am from a non-target, so everyone in the office was from a top-30 school. Of the 8 interviewees, I was the only state school kid. Everyone else went to a big name school, so it was already very intimidating just walking in, but I maintained my cool. They then split us to two groups of four. We did a group interview where we analyzed a problem a client was facing for 10 minutes, discussed for 20 minutes how to present to them, and then did a 10 minute presentation. After that, we did 3 rounds of 30 minute interviews. Questions were:

1. What's a financial derivative
2. What's a question a client could ask us (This question REALLY trumped me)
3. What's a bond?
4. Explain 3 ways to improve a website you frequently use.
5. Why ACS
6. A case question about how to deal with 3 conflicting managers (kinda a brain teaser)
7. Talk about some great customer service you provided
8. What's a product you're interested in Aladdin (This will be better provided in the case interview, so you BETTER PAY ATTENTION TO IT!!)

Questions I prepared were about their 10-K (again) and their news. Asked for emails and left.