I used to prepare for interviews by worrying about them. Hours of low-grade dread, no artifacts produced.
What replaced it is a checklist. Not because checklists are calming in themselves, but because most of what feels like nerves is really unfinished preparation — and finishing it removes the fuel.
Here is the full list, in the order I actually do it.
1. Reread the job description like it is an exam syllabus
Not skim. Read it with a highlighter.
Every requirement listed is a question someone intends to ask. Pull out the four or five that appear most emphatically and write one sentence of evidence next to each. If you cannot find evidence for one, that is not a reason to panic — it is a reason to prepare an honest answer about how you would close the gap.
2. Write down my three anchor stories
Not fifteen. Three.
Almost every behavioural question is a variation of a handful of themes: a hard problem, a conflict, a failure. Three well-chosen stories, each with real detail, can be angled to cover most of them. Fifteen half-remembered ones cover nothing.
I keep mine as bullet points, never as scripts. More on why in how I use the STAR method.
3. Research the company — narrowly
An hour, maximum, on the things that could actually come up: what they ship, who they compete with, what changed recently.
I have stopped memorising mission statements. Nobody has ever been impressed by having their About page read back to them. The full breakdown of what is worth reading is in how I research a company.
4. Look up who is interviewing me
If you get names, spend five minutes each on LinkedIn.
An engineer, a hiring manager, and a director are three different conversations. The engineer wants to know if you can do the work. The manager wants to know if you will be a problem. The director wants to know if you understand why the work matters.
Knowing which one is in front of you changes what you emphasise.
5. Prepare my "tell me about yourself" out loud
Out loud is the operative part. An answer that reads well silently often collapses when spoken — too long, wrong emphasis, no landing.
Ninety seconds. Timed. I build mine using the structure in this post.
6. Write five questions to ask them
Then throw two away, because they will be answered during the conversation.
Good questions are specific and slightly uncomfortable:
- What does the first ninety days look like for this role?
- What is the thing about this team you would change if you could?
- How does work get prioritised when two teams want the same thing? Weak questions are ones you could have answered with a search. Asking "what does your company do?" actively costs you.
7. Test the setup — even for in-person
For a video call: camera, mic, lighting, link, backup number. Do a real test call, not a mirror check. The details are in my virtual interview setup.
For in-person: route, travel time plus a buffer, building name, floor, and who to ask for at reception.
8. Print or open the essentials
- The job description
- My resume, in the version I actually submitted
- My three stories, as bullets
- My questions On a video call I keep these just under the camera, so glancing at them does not read as looking away. On paper, one page.
9. Eat something and stop preparing
The night before, I stop. No new material after that point.
Cramming a fourth story at 11pm does not add a story — it adds noise that crowds out the three I already know cold. Preparation has diminishing returns and sleep does not.
10. Arrive early and do nothing
Ten minutes early, in the parking lot or the waiting room or staring at a join button, doing nothing.
This sounds like filler. It is the item I would keep if I could keep only one. The gap between rushing in and settling in is visible in the first thirty seconds of how you speak — pace, breath, whether your first sentence comes out whole.
The short version
| When | Do |
|---|---|
| Few days before | Job description, three stories, company research, interviewer lookup |
| Day before | Rehearse intro out loud, write questions, test setup, then stop |
| Day of | Materials in reach, arrive early, sit still |
None of this makes you a better candidate than you are. What it does is remove every failure that has nothing to do with your ability — the broken mic, the story you half-remember, the answer that runs four minutes.
That leaves only the actual conversation. Which is a fair fight, and the part you can practise separately: how I stopped rambling.
And the checklist does not end when the call does — what I do afterwards matters more than most people treat it as.