Accuracy is important to us at MarketAxess. Do you always double check or proofread your work?

"Spelling and grammatical errors are a pet peeve of mine. I will triple check my work if there is time! I feel that it is imperative to submit error-free work."

Double checking and proofreading are essential parts of a job well done. Assure the interviewer that you are diligent when it comes to submitting good, clean, work.

"I do my best to put great work out, at all times. I believe in double checking my work although I must admit that I have fallen victim to the odd mistake like the best of us!"

What programming languages would you consider yourself fluent in?

"From the start of college, where software engineering grew into a passion for me, I've become very fluent in Java, JavaScript and C++. My current role has me working primarily with C++, but I pride myself on my ability and passion to learn new programming languages and would be able to do so if hired for this role with MarketAxess."

While this question gives your interviewer insight into the diversity of your programming language experience, they most importantly want to know that you are adaptable and able to learn on the fly if needed. Talk about the different languages that you consider yourself fluent in and, if possible, do as much research into MarketAxess as you can prior to your interview and try to speak to the specific languages that they work with.

"During my training to be an engineer and then in my current role since graduating, a majority of my experience falls within Python. My current role delves deeply into artificial intelligence and Python is awesome with this advanced technology. As I understand it from talking to another engineer here at MarketAxess, a requirement would be for me to learn Scala. Though I haven't worked directly with Scala, I believe my experience and willingness to learn would have me up and running in no time if hired for this role."

What software programs do you use in your current work and how adaptable would you say that you are in learning and using new programs?

"In my current role, I currently use a program called Zendesk that is an interactive customer support tool. When we started to use this tool a little over a year ago, I was very quick to learn and utilize all of the great functions of the program and have since become a trainer for new staff that join our team. As well, I'm very fluent in the entire Microsoft suite of products and would consider myself an expert on the Outlook, Excel and Word programs."

Overall, your interviewer is simply looking to hear that you have a good grasp on programs to use to make you more efficient in your work and to do this, talk open and honestly about the programs that you currently use and talk about in what context that you use them. If at all possible with this role, try to research what additional programs you may have to learn if given this opportunity to join MarketAxess and reassure your interviewer that your computer skills are fluent enough to pickup quickly if needed.

"I consider myself very agile when it comes to using and appreciating the vast amount of software that is available to Financial Advisors today. In my current role, I solely use RightCapital as a financial advising tool with my clients. I really love its ability to help in the budgeting and comprehensive planning processes with my clients. I'm also very familiar with the MoneyGuidePro tool and have used it successfully in the past. If hired for this role, you can consider me an open book when it comes to learning and effectively utilizing any programs needed."

We pride ourselves on teamwork here at MarketAxess and this role in Client Services relies on teamwork. What are the top qualities you would bring to a team based atmosphere here?

"As with any team that I have worked on in the past, my priority is knowing that everyone has an important piece in the overall success of the team. In customer service, this is knowing who to contact with the right questions and who to guide customers to when needed. This ensures that our work is done efficiently on our end of things and that our customers are handled efficiently and effectively. If hired here at MarketAxess, my first goal would be to get to know everyone on the team that I would work with, what their roles are and how to best communicate with them."

At the heart of this question falls your interviewers need to determine how well you will work with others on the team at MarketAxess. You will be working with high level advisors and managers that are under a lot of pressure to perform in their jobs and your communications with them will either alleviate some of that stress or add to it. To ensure that your interviewer walks away from your conversation knowing that you are a team player that keeps the end goals of the company in mind, focus your answer on your effective communication skills, your knowledge of everyone's role on the team and your knowledge of what your role on the team will be.

"My top quality is my ability to communicate, both verbally and through writing. I have excellent interpersonal speaking and listening skills and my past colleagues have always appreciated this. Here at MarketAxess, your clients would appreciate this in my work as well. I am a very efficient and effective written communicator as well and this would be very beneficial at a company like MarketAxess, where your offices are spread throughout the country and I can imagine that email communication is vitally important."

List the top 3 skills that you have acquired in your last role.

"In the past few years I was able to upgrade my education while still working full time. The biggest skill that I gained was my ability to multi-task as I worked the dual role of employee and student. I also have strong skills in a variety of Microsoft programs such as PowerPoint and Excel."

You have likely gained many valuable skills in your career. Share with the interviewer which skills you value the most. Be sure to include skills that will potentially benefit this potential new employer.

"There are many skills I gained in my most recent position as I had a great training program and my boss was a strong mentor. If I had to choose three top skills I would say that the biggest ones were effective multitasking, solid closing skills, and cold calling abilities."

I'm giving you one minute to give me your best pitch on a stock that you would buy or sell right now. Go!

"Right now is the time to buying in big technology and there is no better buy than Alphabet. You are obviously familiar with Google and some of its subsidiary companies. What you may not be familiar with is that Alphabet is the conglomerate that came about as a part of Google's restructuring. With Google and other tech subsidiaries under Alphabet's umbrella growing rapidly, the purchase of Alphabet's stock is really a no-brainer right now."

As a Trader with MarketAxess, you will be expected to have a concise sales pitch that takes the important aspects of a complete stock story and summarizes it into a very convincing case for your clients. In essence, you are a salesperson and your answer should be as convincing as possible. Following your pitch to your interviewer, be prepared to answer quick witted follow up questions that they'll likely throw your way that will show your ability to think on your feet and further sell your case as you would likely have to for the clients at MarketAxess.

"Seeing that you are heavily invested in Netflix right now, and rightfully a great choice in recent years, my advice would be to get out while the stock is likely at its peak right now. As consumers continue to cut their cords from cable giants across the world, the streaming television service market is growing exponentially and the market will soon be flooded with more companies like Hulu. This will significantly cut into the profits of a giant like Netflix."

What SDLC models are you familiar in working with?

"During my training in software engineering and in my early career, the waterfall model was the standard. In this model, each phase of the development process happens in a set order and projects using this model are easily managed. But over time, as the development projects that I have led have become more complicated and intricate, I have implemented the spiral model. This model has allowed the ability of end users to give feedback early on and often during development and helps to build a more customized product to our customers."

As a software engineer, you are very familiar with the software development life cycle. For this question, your interviewer is looking to hear what models you have worked on in the past. While there isn't necessarily a right or wrong answer to this question, try to show your flexibility to working with different SDLC models by bringing up your past experiences. Then, show you have knowledge of different models like the waterfall model or agile model. It is also a good idea to use this question as an opportunity for you to learn more about MarketAxess by asking your interviewer which model they work off of.

"In my current position with XYZ Company, my department utilizes the agile model in development life cycle. Since our products are so tailored to the needs of our customers, we get a working product very early on in the process and then I work hand in hand with customers to fine tune the software moving forward. It is a very effective model that has built a great reputation for our software among customers. I also have familiarity working with the iterative model and it has similar advantages to the agile model. If I were hired here at MarketAxess, can you expand on what models you use here in your software development life cycle?"

At MarketAxess, we pride ourselves on providing the best overall customer experience. Talk about your customer service experience and explain why it will help our clients here.

"Over the past five years in my current role in customer service, my number one mantra has been to create the most personalized experience possibl for each person. I have done this by taking the time to get to know the customer, find out what their needs are and creating an experience unique to them. Where my time in automotive sales has really prepared for this role with MarketAxess is in this approach. If hired for this role, I know that I will be relied upon to use open and honest communication skills, time management skills and to take a empathetic and personalized approach with each client and I can definitely be relied upon to do that."

In the financial services industry, overall client experience is a major predictor of business growth and the team at MarketAxess takes the overall client experience seriously. For this question, your interviewer will be looking for you to expand upon your customer service experience past what they can see from your resume. To seal the deal for your interview, try to talk about times that you have went above and beyond the call of duty to provide the best service possible for a customer.

"In my years in a front facing customer service role, I've prided myself on being the face of the franchise. More often than not, my interactions with customers can be the difference between a repeat customer and a person who never comes back again. To ensure repeat customers, I make sure that I am knowledgeable about our products and services, I'm proactive with their needs and I'm always accountable for any mistakes that are made on my organization's side of things. If given the opportunity to join the team here at MarketAxess, I will work hard to be highly educated in your services and be proactive and accountable in every interaction that I have."

What do you feel are the primary features and benefits of the Java programming language?

"When I started working with Java three years ago, the first huge benefit was the fact that the Java syntax was based on C++. At that time, I had a great working knowledge of C++ and my transition to Java was absolutely seamless. The other amazing feature that I've come to appreciate with Java is how robust the memory management is in exception handling and automatic garbage collection."

As a company that utilizes Java, MarketAxess and your interviewer want to make sure that you have an understanding of the Java programming language and they do so by asking this question. Obviously a language packed with unique features, talk about the features that you can speak the most knowledgeably about and tie your direct experience to.

We pride ourselves on our interdepartmental teamwork here at MarketAxess. If hired for this role, what kind of team player could we expect you to be?

"My colleagues that I work closely with would tell you that I'm knowledgeable in my area of expertise to contribute to the much larger team and do so without hesitation. As well, I'm able to communicate effectively, take direction and run with when needed and always willing to help out other areas if I have free time. I understand that I would be working very closely with the Advising staff here at MarketAxess and know that they would have high expectations out of my work."

In the financial world, teamwork at an organization is the key to success and life at MarketAxess is no different. As you talk about your abilities and experiences in being a great team player, try to highlight certain themes like building trust, gaining respect and being a subject matter expert as part of a larger team. Don't hesitate to show flexibility in your ability to both lead others and be lead by others and use examples of times that you've done both. To seal your answer for this question, talk about your desire to work as part of a team and do your research on this position to find out what types of colleagues you will be working with.

"I prefer to work in an environment that promotes teamwork and collegiality. If I were fortunate enough to join the team here, I want you to know that I love being in a leadership type role on a team where I can delegate work and help train others to better the organization. As well, I also thrive in a role where I am the minion and taking direction from others. I'd say that my key skills in working as a team are my ability to friendly, honest and trustworthy with my team."

The software we develop here at MarketAxess requires you to have working knowledge of both privileges and roles within Oracle. Can you talk about your knowledge and experience of both within Oracle?

"In my current role, I have great working knowledge of both role and privilege within Oracle as I work with the system administrators of our end users very closely. I work with them on using the grant and revoke commands to define the roles or their users and grant permissions within their system. To do this, I have to gain strong knowledge on the different people that are allowed access to the system and what they will be doing with their access."

On the development end of software, your role at MarketAxess will require you to have knowledge of the differences between user privilege and role. Your role will put you working with end users on the two roles and explaining your knowledge of the two will be important to your interviewer. Give a basic understanding that privilege relates to the right to execute SQL statements and another user's objects as defined by Oracle. Then talk about roles being created by administrators to grant privileges to their users.

"As you can see from my resume, it has been a few years since I've worked directly with Oracle but I do have great working knowledge of the system. To best explain my knowledge, privileges control the ability to run SQL statements with the database and my role has been to outline those privileges for our end users. Then, roles group together different privileges for each end user. In my past work, I'm most familiar with creating the different roles within the system and then working with key decision makes with our end users to grant the privileges to the roles we defined."

Think back over your career up to today and tell me about the most difficult day on the job you encountered. What made the day difficult and how did you handle that situation?

"It's funny that you ask this question because I can honestly say that my worst day on the job happened just a few short weeks ago. Upon arriving to work in the morning, I quickly learned that our entire network was down and we wouldn't be able to work within our CRM or other programs that day. Many of my coworkers were visibly upset and questioning how we would be able to do our jobs that day. Rather than joining the crowd and freaking out about the situation, I huddled our group together to talk about solutions to the workday after we found out that the network likely wouldn't be fully up and running until late afternoon. While some colleagues carelessly went home for the day, I helped brainstorm how we could keep our phone lines open and my boss was very grateful for my efforts that day. Looking back, what made this the most difficult for me was seeing how others responded so negatively over an issue that we had no control over."

We've all had our share of difficult days on the job and how we handle those days in particular can really make or break where our careers go in that position or with that company. Think of a particular day ahead of your interview that really outlines your ability to handle adversity and proves that you were able to handle it with grace rather than turning your uniform in and heading home for the day. Another important piece of your answer should be discussing what lessons you learned from that particular day moving forward that you still carry with you to this day.

"Early in my career, I had a day where my entire office came down with the flu and I was left alone with the receptionist for the day. Being trained and working Financial Advisor, my colleagues also handled market analysis, retirement plans and insurance plans. At first, the receptionist and I went about our business. After being flooded with calls and in-person visits into our office, we connected again to talk about a plan moving forward. We discussed what types of calls she could handle and which ones I would handle and she triaged from there. I made contacted with my personal clients I had scheduled that day to reschedule and we worked well from there. If I couldn't answer a question for a client of one my colleagues, I ensured they knew that my colleague would follow up as soon as possible. Looking back, I learned that on days where you have to break routine like we did then that it was important to make a plan as early in the day as possible."

In Oracle, do you understand what a join is and what the various types of joins are?

"Having worked with Oracle for the past five years, I have a strong experience in using join to query data from multiple tables within the system. I have written queries utilizing left and right join, but the majority of my work in my current role utilizes inner join. This query looks to select data that is common in multiple tables and has been extremely useful in healthcare related software."

As a software developer that utilizes Oracle databases, your interview will expect that you have a strong working knowledge of concepts within oracle. One such concept is joins. Let your interviewer know that you understand that join is used to combine columns from multiple tables based on values within the columns to allow you to query data from those multiple tables. Then, explain what you know about left, right, inner, full outer and cross joins.

"I do fully understand the join process in Oracle and have experience working with all of the types of joins that are possible in querying in the system. I've recently become very familiar with the cartesian cross join that basically joins all rows from multiple tables. In recently helping develop a program for the auto sales industry, I created a grid in Oracle that populated all of the common specs of makes and models of vehicles and the cross join made this much easier."

In this role with MarketAxess, we will rely on your organized and methodical approach to provide financial analysis reporting. What does your current reporting process consist of?

"In my current role, I utilize the Tableau program to provide live, up to date information to my clients. After using a simply built Excel program for many years, Tableau provides beautiful and easy to understand reporting that my clients can take and run with to make important decision. The connections and automations within the program have save me time and effort, allowing me to take on a much more robust client base. If hired for this role here at MarketAxess, I also have familiarity with SAS and Spotfire and consider myself a very quick learner if I need to learn a new program."

Providing the clients of MarketAxess with detailed reports will be a key part of this position and your interviewer will be looking to gauge your ability to be organized and detailed while also utilizing your critical thinking skills to provide the best reports possible. In your answer, keep a focus on the techniques and tools that you use to do your job in ensuring that clients are receiving the most accurate and detailed reports possible. As well, let your interviewer know that you are willing to learn new ways and new technologies to help onboard yourself to their team quicker.

"When I need to provide reporting to clients or my firm, I ensure that the reporting includes all key risks and valuation. Today, we as Financial Analysts have so many great tools available to us and my current preference is a statistical program like Crystal Ball. When paired with the advance Excel sheets that I have created, and have been commended, my clients are always happy with the insight that I am able to provide."

Can you think of a situation where raising debt over equity would be beneficial?

"In the situations where I've advised an organization to increase debt, they've received a distinct advantage in a lower cost form of financing versus equity financing. In the end, this reduced the organization's WACC and came out to be a win for them."

Debt and equity have a very closely bonded relationship with each other in relation to a company's finances. In most situations, raising debt can create too high of an amount of pressure to meet payments versus raising equity. But, there are a few key situations where there is a distinct advantage in raising debt over equity and your interviewer will be looking to hear that you understand at least one of those advantages to be tax shielding, reducing cost of capital and not diluting the stake for investors.

"Last year, I advised a manufacturer to take the debt over equity route when adding a new line of products that was guaranteed to be very profitable. This fact allowed the company to simply and quickly repay the loan plus interest while being able to reap the rewards of the extra profits. In that same case using equity, final profit would've been less."

If you were having an interaction with a client here at MarketAxess and you weren't able to answer their question or solve their problem on your own, how would you handle that situation?

"In my current role in Customer Service with Metropolis' largest automotive dealership, I frequently get asked questions that our sales, finance and service staff have to give the final stamp of approval on in answering customers questions. In these situations, I have a great amount of knowledge where I can prepare the customer for speaking with the right person while also ensuring them that the sales, finance or service staff will provide the final answer. Then, I work quickly to get them to the right person."

As the forward facing client services representative with MarketAxess, you may be asked serious financial or market related questions that either don't know or aren't qualified to answer. In those situations, you will be expected to explain to the customer how that question will be answered and then deliver a timeline on when it can be answered. In the end, the customer wants to know the clear path to ease their mind and it will be your job to do just that.

"In a situation where I didn't know an answer, I would ensure the client that we have the right staff in place that would be able to help them quickly and efficiently. I would communicate to the customer what the next step would be and if that would be me putting them directly in contact with someone or me taking their contact information and having someone get back to them. In the end, setting the right course and timeline would be important for every customer when I faced this situation."

Our clients here at MarketAxess expect top-tier service and products and we will expect you to do just that in this role. Have you ever went the extra mile for a client when it wasn't expected? Why did you do so?

"A couple of years ago when I was working customer service in retail, a customer was looking for what happened to be a discontinued item of clothing for her sick mother. The easy route would have been to simply look it up, tell her it was discontinued and have her be on her way. What I did was take down the customers contact information and let her know that I could contact our person that handled archived products. If we could track it down, I would be in touch. With a simple phone call, my colleague was able to track the item down from the supplier and have it coordinated to ship directly. We put the customer in direct contact with the supplier and she was as happy as could be. Looking back on that situation, I felt that it was the right thing to do given the situation that the customer was in and knowing she was a loyal customer of ours."

MarketAxess looks to set themselves apart from their competition by delivering the best service possible in the industry. You, as a customer service professional, are likely used to doing this so in your example, be sure to think about a time where your going above and beyond the call of duty really impacted the overall customer experience. No matter what example you use, be sure to explain why you felt it was important to take that action and what outcomes you are aware that it produced.

"My current role in hospitality often has me working with very high profile customers that come to our hotel. Last year, a touring manager for a musician contacted me regarding and upcoming stay for the musician. I proactively asked for their dining and entertainment preferences and with that list, I was able to work with our catering staff to ensure we had preferred items on the menus for the nights that he stayed and that we had a customized video game package in the musician's room for the his extended stay. Prior to him leaving, his manager reached out to thank me for the great service!"

Here at MarketAxess, we are expecting someone with strong leadership skills to take this role. How would you describe your management style?

"My overall management style is the belief in building a positive team atmosphere. I'm a firm believer that each person and role brings a specific skill set to the ocverall goals and purpose of a team and I promote a team based atmosphere by larifying everyone's role on the team, keeping every person's objectives clear, rewarding great performers on the team and holding people accountable for their actions. If hired for this role at MarketAxess, you can be assured that my promotion of a team based atmosphere would help achieve even higher goals than you have set right now."

Prior to your interview, try to take a long, hard look inside your skills and styles as a leader of others and prepare to present the best management style possible to your interviewer that fits the role that you are interviewing for with MarketAxess. Your answer should also involve solid research into the culture of MarketAxess and the details of the role you are interviewing for. Some important things to touch on are your ability to promote a team atmosphere and your ability to delegate responsibilities when necessary.

"I think that it is crucial for a leader of others to be flexible in their style rather than relying on just one of the canned management styles. I'd like to highlight my abilities to lead as being a manager that works to grow and develop my staff to help them achieve their career goals and a leader who is able to provide direction and authority when the time for it arises. By knowing my team well and promoting our goals, I have the ability to assign work to the right people and follow through with my team on meeting all objective necessary."

What tools of the trade do you find most useful in your work as a Trader?

"I pride myself in saying that my career is my passion and this started at a young age back in a high school economics class. Since that year, I've subscribed to an read publications like the Wall Street Journal, Money Magazine and Barron's. All of these publications still help me to this day to stay on top of my game in the trading business. I also don't hesitate to utilize some of the more reputable online and software programs. Elite Trader and Daily Stocks are great sites that I check daily for new industry news. As well, I'm very proficient in my use of Matlab to analyze market data for use in buying and selling stocks."

As part of your interview for the Trader position with MarketAxess, your interviewer will be looking to get a sense that you are very resourceful in your approach to studying the market and other assets so their clients can benefit the most from your approach to trading. As you answer this question, try to be as diverse as possible as you talk about your approach to gaining insightful information that will best suit your clients. Make sure that your interviewer walks away knowing that you know and enjoy the Wall Street Journal just as much as you enjoy different websites and software available to you in your work.

If you joined the team here at MarketAxess, how would you build relationships with those that you would be working closely with?

"From my first day on the job, I would take the time to break the ice with my colleagues by introducing myself and setting up an individual meeting with each person. In the past, I've done these meetings over lunch or in an office where I've had questions prepared for me to get to know the person both personally and professionally. I want to ask my colleagues what they expect from me and what I can expect from them. I've found that these conversations really help to open up doors for working with each other moving forward."

For this question, your interviewer will be looking to get the sense that you would be proactive about getting to know your colleagues and fitting into the culture of the organization. Use a personal approach to talk about ways that you have done this in the past and how you would do it if hired for this position. Talk about the importance of relationship building in your line of work and how it helps the overall good of the organization if you take the initiative to do this.

"Being the new person on the job can be a very high anxiety time for some people, but I love the opportunity to break the ice with my coworkers by making that first contact. I think it's important to get to know each other on a personal level because we spend so much of our lives together in the workplace and I am a caring person that wants to know how last night's soccer game went for the kids. Beyond that first ice breaking conversation, my work relationships are then bonded through my work ethic and helping others on my team to show that I am a true team player."

At MarketAxess, our Financial Analysts have to often work under a tight deadline. Talk about a time you had to work under a tight deadline in the past. How did you handle that situation and what made it a success?

"In my current role, I'm tasked with preparing some reports for our leadership team's bi-weekly meeting. Upon first taking that responsibility, I made sure that I kept myself organized during each work day and saving and prepping relevant information needed for their report. A couple of months ago, I was informed first thing in the morning that the meeting was being moved a week up to later that day due to some conflicts and vacation time for some of the team. Right away, I moved some things on my calendar to make this a top priority. From there, my regular organization of the materials needed made it easy for me to complete my job."

The financial field can sometimes be chaotic and stressful for analysts working on high pressure deadlines and the work life at MarketAxess is no different. To test how you will perform in these situation if hired for this role, your interviewer will be looking to hear about a time where you did just that. No matter what the situation is that you discuss, be sure to show how you remained calm, focused and on-task to get the job done. Try and stress how you are resourceful and willing to utilize a team effort if necessary.

"During my last semester of my MBA program last spring, I was nearing completion of my capstone project. The project was a case study of mergers within the manufacturing industry and was a great overall project to learn from. During the semester, my full-time job I was working to put myself through school was becoming much more demanding and parts of my project got postponed to a point where I was fearing not being able to complete it to the best of my abilities with the final due date approaching. Right away, I rearranged my work schedule to work half time and began plugging away at the final pieces of the project. To complete it, I had to sacrifice some outside weekend events with friends. While sad to do that at first, I learned some great lessons on time management, project management and sacrifice."

If hired to this role here at MarketAxess, what do you see as one initial hurdle you will have to overcome in your first weeks on the job?

"Having put a lot of thought into this even before submitting my resume for this position, I realize that my greatest hurdle would be making the leap as an Auditor into the financial focused industry. My five years of experience out of college have been focused on management and technical consulting services, but I feel that I've built a very good knowledge base and experience for this role here at MarketAxess. If given the opportunity to join your team, my initial focus would be to get enthralled in auditing in the financial industry and I'd do this by being attached at the hip to my colleagues and taking the time to talk one on one with a lot of other staff to help better understand what they'll expect of me in this role."

At the heart of this question, your interviewer is asking you to take an honest look inside of yourself to discuss what you feel is the biggest learning curve you will have if offered this position. This will give your interviewer a sense of how to handle your onboarding process if hired for the position and give them a sense that you have the ability to see what your biggest need would be. Similar to the what is your greatest weakness question, the key to answering this question is humbly pointing out a flaw that you may see and making a plan for how you will overcome that flaw.

"Understanding that my role here at MarketAxess would have me working with the entire advisory staff, the first hurdle would be getting to know everyone on that team and showcasing the skills that I could bring to their work. If hired for the job, I would hope to be invited to team meetings where I could introduce myself and my role with the team and I'd invite an open conversation with the entire team."

If you were asked to review a colleague's code that they had written, what key things would you look for?

"As an experienced software engineer, I fully expect my colleagues to reach out to me for my insight and I never hesitate to provide open and honest feedback. When asked to do this, my main focus is ensuring that the code is readable and functional. If there are lines of code that need to be removed, I don't hesitate to let my colleague know that while also giving them feedback on why I feel it is unnecessary."

For this question, your interviewer will obviously be looking to hear that you have adequate knowledge when it comes to coding processes. But most importantly, your interviewer will be looking to gauge your ability to be a team player and focus on the bigger picture when working on a project. In your answer, focus on your attention to detail and your ability to help others when needed.

"When I'm asked to do this in my current position, my main focus is on regulatory requirements that were put in place for the project and security issues. I work with a team of great engineers that are very efficient coders and these two areas are most often overlooked."

As a Trader with MarketAxess, you will be trusted to take a very diverse approach with our clients. How would you explain the limitations of using solely a P/E Ratio approach to purchasing stock to a client?

"One aspect that I really love about working as a Trader is client interaction and using my knowledge and skills to help educate them in building towards a solid financial future. When I've had clients that tried to educated themselves that bring up P/E Ratios, I will commend that ratio for being an accurate predictor when used in the right context, but I'll also point out that the ratio is only effective when looking at companies within the same industry. That can be useful when I know that an upsurge in a sector like energy will occur, but its not useful when looking at companies within the market as a whole. This is my opportunity to bring new insight into the equation when helping clients."

Oftentimes, clients at MarketAxess will come to the table with the expectation that a single market metric will be the determining factor in their investment decisions. Your job as the Trader may be to educate them on the potential dangers of that approach and this question will be used to test your ability to do that. When answering and giving the specific limitation of the P/E Ratio approach, be sure to talk about the importance of weighing several factors in any investment decision.

"While the P/E ration of a company can be effective at times, I would explain to a client that the ratios use of hard data from the past is not always to most accurate predictor of where things will go in the future for them. As well, if the ratio is using projected earnings like in a forward P/E, there is not a guarantee that the estimates used will be accurate."

One huge philosophy that we believe in at MarketAxess is professional development. How have you worked to develop yourself professionally throughout your career?

"I am a firm believer in being a life long learner in my work as a Data Analyst. As technology and times have changed over the course of time, I see it as very important to be learning and changing along with the times. Just over the past two years, the Data Fest and Data Summit national conferences and participation in these events on a yearly basis is super important to me to help me grow and develop."

In an ever-changing field like financial services, MarketAxess knows that professional growth and development is vital to them staying at the forefront of their industry. For this question, your interviewer is looking to ensure that your values surrounding professional development match the values of the company. Use this question as an opportunity for you to highlight the many ways that you grow and develop yourself to be the best that you can be in your career. Highlight any continuing education you have completed, any societies or groups that you belong to and any publications that you read on a regular basis that will prove to your interviewer that you aren't comfortable being stagnant in your career.

"In the financial field, I have to stay at the top of my game to compete with other advisors and keep clients happy and flourishing. To do this, I subscribe to and read many of the great publications that are out there. Some of my favorites include the Wall Street Journal, Money magazine and Forbes. I also subscribe to many others. As well, I am a member of NAIFA and I have attended the organization's Congressional Conference on a few occasions."

The day-to-day life at MarketAxess can be hectic and stressful at times. If hired for this role, how would you keep yourself motivated when working with stressed colleagues and pushy clients?

"Being a person that thrives in a fast paced work environment, I have the ability to handle stressed colleagues with a grain of salt. As you can see from my resume, I've spent the last five years in the manufacturing industry where my department worked under tight deadlines all of the time. If I noticed that a colleague was under stress, I offered my help if I was able to and down the road that was usually reciprocated back to me. This unselfish attitude and realizing that someone else's stress wasn't directed at me was the key to maintaining personal health and balance on the job."

The daily life at MarketAxess is naturally very fast paced and because of that, both the colleagues and the clients that you may be working with have potential to be stressed, needy and downright mean at times. For this question, your interviewer is looking to get a sense that you would be able to work in this type of environment. In your answer, talk about the fact that you are cognizant of what this job entails as far as personal interactions go and talk about times where you have worked successfully through situations like this in the past. As well, don't hesitate to talk about your own personality traits that help you thrive in these types of situations.

"In my current role in client services with a large hospitality group, some days can go off the rails and it feels like I'm working with enraged customers all day long. I have the attitude that their anger isn't directed towards me, but I'm the face of the company that they are currently working with and I need to do my job in helping solve their issue. While I do have great resources at my hand to help solve customer issues, I think that taking the time to get to know all of our management team and how they solve problems is key as well so I know who to put customers in touch with if needed."

How would you define what working capital is for a company and what does its measurement mean?

"In my current role, we measure working capital to gauge the ability of a company to pay off its debts quickly. In working with many industries, from retails to the public sector, the determination of a company's ability to do so based on calculation can differ greatly from industry to industry. To calculate, a range of line items from the company are used to take their current assets minus their current liabilities. In the retail industry, seasonal spikes in business create the need for a much higher working capital and if hired for this role, I have a great understanding of each industries specific needs."

As a Financial Analyst with MarketAxess, you will be asked to help measure working capital of organizations. In your definition that you provide to your interviewer, ensure that you give them at least the basic definition of the calculation being current assets minus current liabilities. Then, talk about real situations that you've used the measurement to make critical decisions in the work that you've done in the past. This will confirm with your interviewer that you have the ability to use the measurement in this job.

"In a very broad sense, working capital is found by subtracting an organization's current liabilities from their current assets. In my current role, I utilize a more focused calculation of adding accounts receivable plus inventory and then subtracting accounts payable. The more focused calculation give a better idea of total working capital for organizations when trying to get a better overall picture of their health and efficiency when projecting out towards the future."

MarketAxess Interview Questions

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1. Accuracy is important to us at MarketAxess. Do you always double check or proofread your work?
2. What programming languages would you consider yourself fluent in?
3. What software programs do you use in your current work and how adaptable would you say that you are in learning and using new programs?
4. We pride ourselves on teamwork here at MarketAxess and this role in Client Services relies on teamwork. What are the top qualities you would bring to a team based atmosphere here?
5. List the top 3 skills that you have acquired in your last role.
6. I'm giving you one minute to give me your best pitch on a stock that you would buy or sell right now. Go!
7. What SDLC models are you familiar in working with?
8. At MarketAxess, we pride ourselves on providing the best overall customer experience. Talk about your customer service experience and explain why it will help our clients here.
9. What do you feel are the primary features and benefits of the Java programming language?
10. We pride ourselves on our interdepartmental teamwork here at MarketAxess. If hired for this role, what kind of team player could we expect you to be?
11. The software we develop here at MarketAxess requires you to have working knowledge of both privileges and roles within Oracle. Can you talk about your knowledge and experience of both within Oracle?
12. Think back over your career up to today and tell me about the most difficult day on the job you encountered. What made the day difficult and how did you handle that situation?
13. In Oracle, do you understand what a join is and what the various types of joins are?
14. In this role with MarketAxess, we will rely on your organized and methodical approach to provide financial analysis reporting. What does your current reporting process consist of?
15. Can you think of a situation where raising debt over equity would be beneficial?
16. If you were having an interaction with a client here at MarketAxess and you weren't able to answer their question or solve their problem on your own, how would you handle that situation?
17. Our clients here at MarketAxess expect top-tier service and products and we will expect you to do just that in this role. Have you ever went the extra mile for a client when it wasn't expected? Why did you do so?
18. Here at MarketAxess, we are expecting someone with strong leadership skills to take this role. How would you describe your management style?
19. What tools of the trade do you find most useful in your work as a Trader?
20. If you joined the team here at MarketAxess, how would you build relationships with those that you would be working closely with?
21. At MarketAxess, our Financial Analysts have to often work under a tight deadline. Talk about a time you had to work under a tight deadline in the past. How did you handle that situation and what made it a success?
22. If hired to this role here at MarketAxess, what do you see as one initial hurdle you will have to overcome in your first weeks on the job?
23. If you were asked to review a colleague's code that they had written, what key things would you look for?
24. As a Trader with MarketAxess, you will be trusted to take a very diverse approach with our clients. How would you explain the limitations of using solely a P/E Ratio approach to purchasing stock to a client?
25. One huge philosophy that we believe in at MarketAxess is professional development. How have you worked to develop yourself professionally throughout your career?
26. The day-to-day life at MarketAxess can be hectic and stressful at times. If hired for this role, how would you keep yourself motivated when working with stressed colleagues and pushy clients?
27. How would you define what working capital is for a company and what does its measurement mean?

MarketAxess Interview Questions

1. Accuracy is important to us at MarketAxess. Do you always double check or proofread your work?

2. What programming languages would you consider yourself fluent in?

3. What software programs do you use in your current work and how adaptable would you say that you are in learning and using new programs?

4. We pride ourselves on teamwork here at MarketAxess and this role in Client Services relies on teamwork. What are the top qualities you would bring to a team based atmosphere here?

5. List the top 3 skills that you have acquired in your last role.

6. I'm giving you one minute to give me your best pitch on a stock that you would buy or sell right now. Go!

7. What SDLC models are you familiar in working with?

8. At MarketAxess, we pride ourselves on providing the best overall customer experience. Talk about your customer service experience and explain why it will help our clients here.

9. What do you feel are the primary features and benefits of the Java programming language?

10. We pride ourselves on our interdepartmental teamwork here at MarketAxess. If hired for this role, what kind of team player could we expect you to be?

11. The software we develop here at MarketAxess requires you to have working knowledge of both privileges and roles within Oracle. Can you talk about your knowledge and experience of both within Oracle?

12. Think back over your career up to today and tell me about the most difficult day on the job you encountered. What made the day difficult and how did you handle that situation?

13. In Oracle, do you understand what a join is and what the various types of joins are?

14. In this role with MarketAxess, we will rely on your organized and methodical approach to provide financial analysis reporting. What does your current reporting process consist of?

15. Can you think of a situation where raising debt over equity would be beneficial?

16. If you were having an interaction with a client here at MarketAxess and you weren't able to answer their question or solve their problem on your own, how would you handle that situation?

17. Our clients here at MarketAxess expect top-tier service and products and we will expect you to do just that in this role. Have you ever went the extra mile for a client when it wasn't expected? Why did you do so?

18. Here at MarketAxess, we are expecting someone with strong leadership skills to take this role. How would you describe your management style?

19. What tools of the trade do you find most useful in your work as a Trader?

20. If you joined the team here at MarketAxess, how would you build relationships with those that you would be working closely with?

21. At MarketAxess, our Financial Analysts have to often work under a tight deadline. Talk about a time you had to work under a tight deadline in the past. How did you handle that situation and what made it a success?

22. If hired to this role here at MarketAxess, what do you see as one initial hurdle you will have to overcome in your first weeks on the job?

23. If you were asked to review a colleague's code that they had written, what key things would you look for?

24. As a Trader with MarketAxess, you will be trusted to take a very diverse approach with our clients. How would you explain the limitations of using solely a P/E Ratio approach to purchasing stock to a client?

25. One huge philosophy that we believe in at MarketAxess is professional development. How have you worked to develop yourself professionally throughout your career?

26. The day-to-day life at MarketAxess can be hectic and stressful at times. If hired for this role, how would you keep yourself motivated when working with stressed colleagues and pushy clients?

27. How would you define what working capital is for a company and what does its measurement mean?