Why Preparing for Behavioral Interviews Matters (Even If You're Not Job Hunting)

How Preparing for Behavioral Interviews Can Boost Your Career and Personal Growth Brief overview:

• The Unexpected Benefits of Behavioral Interview Preparation

• Understanding Behavioral Interviews

  • What is a Behavioral Interview?
  • Why Behavioral Questions Are Ubiquitous

• The Importance of Preparation

  • The Pitfalls of Spontaneity
  • Honest Self-Evaluation of Your Work

• How to Prepare for Behavioral Interviews

  • The STAR Method
  • Recognizing Signals and Red Flags
  • Analyzing Your Work Experiences
  • Seeking Feedback from Others
  • Reflecting on Lessons Learned
  • Exploring Behavioral Interview Questions

• Useful Resources

The Unexpected Benefits of Behavioral Interview Preparation

You might be wondering why you should bother reading this. After all, it seems to be just about prepping for big tech interviews. But, here’s the thing - this piece is actually helpful even if you’re not interested in joining a mega-corporation or any other company. This is not just about grinding through behavioral questions and memorizing the “right” answers. Instead, it’s about using this as an opportunity for self-reflection and personal growth. By examining your past experiences, you can learn what you did well and where you went wrong, which can be valuable insights for any future endeavors. 

I saw many people putting off self-reflection because it doesn’t seem important enough and they never seem to have enough time for it. But guess what? You can actually combine self-reflection and interview preparation! I’ve heard numerous anecdotes about people who did this and discovered a lot about themselves, with some even calling it a “shortcut for growing up.”

Understanding Behavioral Interviews

A behavioral interview is a type of interview where employers ask challenging questions, such as “Where do you see yourself in 5 years?”, “What’s your biggest weakness?” or “Describe a recent unpopular decision you made. How was it received? How did you handle it?“, “Tell me about a time when you had to work with a difficult team member. How did you handle the situation?”, and ““Share an instance where you had to deal with a challenging problem at work. What steps did you take to resolve the issue?“. These questions can look annoying because you may think you just need to answer what people want to hear, like “My biggest weakness is that I’m too invested and work too much” (if so watch this video). But even so, during the preparation stage, you have the chance to genuinely reflect on these questions and gain a deeper understanding of yourself. Embrace the uncertainty about where you’ll be in 5 years due to the ever-changing landscape and use it as an opportunity to explore your personal and professional growth.

Behavioral questions seem to be ubiquitous across the board - from small mom-and-pop shops to Silicon Valley startups and Fortune 500 corporations. It makes sense, as companies are keen to hire individuals who are clear about their goals, passionate about their work, and won’t cause any issues. By asking these types of questions, employers can gain valuable insights into how you have handled various challenges in the past and predict your future performance in similar situations. A classic example of behavioral questions comes from Big Tech companies, like Amazon, where they incorporate their leadership principles (such as customer obsession) into the interview process. Candidates are expected to relate their answers to these principles, demonstrating their alignment with the company’s values. 

Why prepare for it at all?

Why not just answer spontaneously based on your experiences? While it might seem like a reasonable approach, the truth is that unprepared responses can sometimes come across as unprofessional or even negative. Consider this example: “As a manager of 20 people, I still spend 90% of my time coding.” The interviewer could interpret it as an inability to delegate tasks or a lack of focus on managing your team. But you can analyze the situation and identify opportunities for growth: perhaps you can delegate more tasks to your team, focus on developing their skills, and invest more time in guiding and mentoring them, or even find out that you don’t want to be a manager at all!

This is also a chance to honestly evaluate your past work. Think about that project you poured your heart into, only to receive little recognition when it was completed. Why do you think that happened? What did you actually achieve, and what impact did it have on the key metrics that matter to your company? I recall a situation where a team spent months building an analytics platform, claiming it would improve decision-making for company management. However, no one bothered to verify what decisions were made or how they affected the business. What was the actual impact of their work? Considering the opportunity cost, what might have happened if that work was never done? 

When we come across various questions during our interview prep, it forces us to think about scenarios we might not have experienced yet, like dealing with an underperforming colleague or prioritizing projects. Even if we’ve learned a thing or two by observing others, actually pondering these situations in advance can help solidify our understanding. The process essentially equips us with a mental game plan on how to tackle such challenges when they inevitably arise in real life. It’s an excellent exercise in adaptability and problem-solving, which are essential skills in today’s fast-paced work environment. 

It will also give your resume a nice little boost. When you’re looking back at what you’ve done, you’ll start to see the difference between stuff you just worked on and the things you actually achieved. This helps make your resume way more convincing using the format “Accomplished [X] as measured by [Y], by doing [Z].” And if you ever had a project that didn’t really go anywhere, figuring out what went wrong means you can avoid making the same mistake next time.

How to prepare

A self-reflection journey might initially appear intimidating due to the number of tasks involved, but it’s essential to remember that it’s a valuable process for personal growth and self-awareness. Instead of viewing it as a daunting to-do list, think of it as a series of small, manageable steps toward self-improvement. By breaking down the process into bite-sized tasks, you can tackle one at a time, making the journey more enjoyable and less overwhelming. Let’s start (example1):

1. Get familiar with the STAR method: This method offers a structured way to answer behavioral interview questions using Situation, Task, Action, and Result as guiding points. It helps you effectively communicate your experiences by describing a specific context, your role, the actions you took, and the resulting outcome. You can learn more about the STAR here.
2. Learn about signals and red flags: positive signals like clear communication, adaptability, and problem-solving skills can demonstrate your potential, while red flags such as vague answers, negative attitude, and lack of self-awareness may indicate challenges. You need to learn it in advance so you can think about them during your next steps. Here is a great video to watch (or summary to read).

eamag’s SubstackSummary of Episode 07: Intro to Behavioural InterviewsRead morea year ago · eamag 3. Set aside dedicated time for self-reflection: Schedule a 30-minute session on your calendar to focus on analyzing your work experiences. By setting a specific time, you’re more likely to follow through instead of procrastinating. 4. Analyze your work experiences: 

1. Create a timeline: start by creating a timeline of your work history, listing all the projects and tasks you have been involved in, along with their respective timeframes. Start with the present and work your way back, week by week. This approach helps you recall experiences as you progress rather than just focusing on the parts you remember. Check your calendar events, emails, chat messages, and documents related to your work to jog your memory (but avoid getting overwhelmed). This will provide you with a clear overview of your work experiences and help you identify patterns or trends.
2. Consolidate your list of projects and tasks, identifying significant projects, minor tasks, and those that had little impact in the end. Consider whether you took on a leadership role, acted as a team player, or contributed individually.
3. Determine the quantifiable impact of each project, such as "Increased revenue by 10%," by examining data or consulting with colleagues. Dig deep to uncover these numbers by asking around or examining available data. If you can’t determine a quantifiable impact, it could be an indication that the project was less meaningful or falls into the realm of "bullshit jobs." This step is difficult but also the most important, you should be honest and factual.
4. Seek feedback from others: consult with colleagues, managers, or mentors who were involved in the same projects or tasks, and ask for their feedback on your performance. This will provide you with additional perspectives and insights into your strengths and weaknesses.
5. g. Reflect on lessons learned: for each project or task, consider the lessons you learned and how these experiences have shaped your professional growth. Think about how you can apply these lessons to future projects or tasks to achieve better results.

5. Explore a database of common behavioral interview questions. As you review these questions, identify those that relate to situations you have encountered in your past projects. Reflect on your actions in each scenario - what did you do correctly, and what could you have done differently? Analyze your decisions and consider how you might have improved the outcomes. For each question, also try to imagine how you would have handled a similar situation within the context of one of your past projects. Visualize the challenges you faced and the resources available to you at that time. Think about how you would have adapted your approach to better address the issue at hand. By comparing your real-life experiences with hypothetical situations, you’ll gain valuable insights into your decision-making process and identify areas where you can improve. You can even create a simple matrix: on one axis are each of your largest projects, on the other are common behavioral questions. 6. Practice. Practicing for behavioral interviews helps you become more self-aware, articulate your experiences effectively, and improve your overall performance. To assess if your approach is right or wrong, seek feedback from trusted peers or mentors, and reflect on the clarity, relevance, and impact of your responses to refine and enhance your interview skills.

So, go ahead and embrace this opportunity for introspection, regardless of whether you’re actively seeking a new job or not. The wisdom you gain from this exercise will serve you well in your professional and personal journey, helping you evolve into a more insightful and resilient individual. May your quest for self-discovery be as rewarding as it is enlightening!

Useful resources

• Amazing video about behavioral interview, discussing signals and red flags and why you shouldn’t bend yourself to pass

• Detailed interview guides

  • How to Succeed in A Behavioral Interview
  • Behavioral Interviews for Software Engineers
  • Helpful template

• Question banks

  • 75 behavioral interview questions
  • 25 behavioral interview questions from top tech companies

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1Example of a person doing a “How to Prepare” session:

Let’s consider Jane, a software developer who is preparing for an upcoming behavioral interview. To start her preparation, she sets aside a dedicated 30-minute session on her calendar for self-reflection and analysis of her work experiences.

Jane begins by familiarizing herself with the STAR method, watching videos and reading articles on the topic. She then learns about positive signals and red flags in behavioral interviews to understand what to look for in her self-reflection process.

To analyze her work experiences, Jane creates a timeline of her work history and lists all the projects she has been involved in. She checks her calendar events, emails, and other work-related documents to jog her memory and ensure she doesn’t miss any important details.

Jane then consolidates her list, identifying significant projects and their quantifiable impacts. She reaches out to her colleagues, managers, and mentors to gather feedback on her performance in these projects, which provides her with additional perspectives and insights into her strengths and weaknesses.

Reflecting on the lessons learned from her past experiences, Jane thinks about how she can apply these insights to future projects or tasks to achieve better results. She then explores a database of common behavioral interview questions and identifies those that relate to situations she has encountered in her past projects.

Jane creates a simple matrix with her largest projects on one axis and common behavioral questions on the other. She reflects on her actions in each scenario and visualizes how she would have handled similar situations within the context of her past projects. This exercise helps Jane gain valuable insights into her decision-making process and identify areas where she can improve.

Finally, Jane practices her interview skills by responding to behavioral questions using the STAR method. She seeks feedback from trusted peers and mentors and refines her responses based on their suggestions. Through this preparation process, Jane becomes more self-aware, articulates her experiences effectively, and ultimately improves her overall interview performance.