Advice Needed: Robotics Job Search, Interview Prep, and Next Steps

Hi everyone,
I’m Raghul, currently finishing my M.S. in Robotics & Controls at UC San Diego (Sept 2025). My background:

• Robotics Researcher – UCSD: Built a vision-based RL framework in MuJoCo for F1Tenth car navigation; deployed PyTorch models on Jetson TX2 using TensorRT with ROS2 integration.
• Autonomous Driving Intern – Siemens R&D: Simulated vehicle collisions in PyBullet; trained a deep neural network achieving 96% accuracy in crash severity prediction.
• Undergraduate Researcher – IIT Madras: Developed predictive maintenance models for air-brake systems using neural networks; improved fault detection accuracy.
• Sense-Plan-Act Robot (UCSD – Intro to Robotics)
• Motion Planning in 3D Environments (UCSD – Motion Planning)
• Visual-Inertial & LiDAR SLAM (UCSD – Sensing & Estimation)
• Autonomous Navigation with Obstacle Avoidance (UCSD – ML for Physical Apps)
• Mobile Manipulation (UCSD – Robotics)

Given this, I’d love advice on a few things:

1. With my experience, what type of positions should I focus on applying for (e.g., perception, motion planning, controls, ML in robotics)?
2. What should I focus on learning and practicing daily during my job search?
3. How deep should I go when preparing (e.g., strong focus on C++ fundamentals, LeetCode-style coding, or robotics-specific algorithms)?
4. What daily habits or study routines would best prepare me for technical interviews?
5. Do robotics companies follow a general interview pattern (coding → algorithms → robotics fundamentals → project deep-dive), or does it vary widely?

Any pointers or roadmaps would be hugely helpful. Thanks in advance!