The hiring process in Rakuten is a little different from that in other US companies. At the very first step, they didn't require me to submit any resume, just some basic information about my address, my education, and social involvement. Then, I was required to take 2 tests: IQ and personality. I had a choice over the language of the test: Japanese or English. I chose English, since I didn't have any background on Japanese. The personality test was quite typical. The IQ test consisted of 3 parts: verbal (not really difficult), numerical (mainly check calculation speed and accuracy), and symbolic logic (this part is the most challenging. I guess most people would get stuck with this part, but after the test, I learned that there are several books that you can practice by yourself). 1 week later, I was invited to attend their Skype interview. Before the interview, I was asked to finished a CV as per their sample, which consisted of 3 essays (Why internet industry, why Rakuten, your experience with Rakuten services). Everything went well except the interview, since the interviewer didn't express any emotion on his face (no excitement, no smile or anything). That made me more nervous. The interview was not really challenging, since he asked me almost the questions from CV. However, their rejection was something expected due to my nervousness during the interview.
