First, I sent in a resume from an open job posting that was pointed out to me by an alumni acquaintance.Within about a week, I received an email message from an HR representative to schedule a phone interview. Because of the 4th of July, we had to put off the phone interview until the next week, the day after the holiday. At a pre-arranged day and time, the HR rep called me and we spoke for about a half hour. There was a 3-hour time difference between us since I was on the West Coast and she was on the East Coast. This was a screening interview which, later on, proved to be a courtesy interview. Maybe to fulfill a statistic that the company follows up on most/all applicants? Not sure, but I found out at the end of the interview that the company had already found a candidate and was in the final round of interviewing that person, so this interview seemed to fulfill a requirement.