Demonstrate Your Employer Branding And Company Culture
Conducting an interview gives you a great chance to demonstrate your employer branding and company culture. This means that apart from focusing on the candidate, you should also spend time on figuring out how you want to present your company. After all, since the majority of developers are passive candidates, many of them are inundated with recruiter mail. This means they can be very selective when it comes to choosing who theyd like to be interviewed by.
Thats where recruitment marketing comes in. In the last years, the role of the recruiter has changed significantly and the interview room is now a place where you get to form some sort of an opinion on the candidate, but also where they get to form an opinion of the organization.
According to SmashFly Recruitment Marketing Report Card for the 2016 Fortune 500, Tech comes fifth on the list of most recruitment marketing-savvy industries, which means theres still a lot of work to be done.
Source: SmashFly
Before conducting an interview, gather and memorize the information you need to present your organizations strategy and structure. Heres a helpful cheat sheet by Workable which can help you get ready:
Source: Workable
Develop Questions To Ask About Technical Job Responsibilities During The Interview
Come up with questions to ask your interviewer regarding specific technical responsibilities for the job. Asking technical questions demonstrates your interest in the position and shows the interviewer that you thoroughly reviewed the job description.
Related:How To Prepare for a Technical Interview
Memorize A Story That Illustrates Your Skill
At some point during your technical interview, you may be asked about your prior experience. Having a story readily available will help illustrate your familiarity with the knowledge and skills required for the position.
Use the notes you took while completing a project to create an outline and commit it to memory. Then, test it out on people. Share the story with your friends until you’re able to tell it without any stammering or pauses. This will help you sound confident during your technical interview, and being able to succinctly describe the problems you encountered and your solutions will demonstrate your expertise.
Recommended Reading: Questions To Ask A Cfo During An Interview
How To Answer Questions During An It Interview
The hiring manager will want to know, in detail, how equipped you are to handle the position. Prepare for the interview by considering the job qualificationswhat skills, knowledge, and experiences you’ll need in order to be successful in the job.
Take the job requirements that are included in the posting and make a list of the top qualifications the employer is looking for. Then match your credentials to the list. Be ready to discuss why you have each attribute the company wants. Here’s how to match your qualifications to the position’s requirements.
Also, review this list of common IT interview questions and take the time to prepare responses based on your qualifications for the job.
When responding, give specific examples, whenever possible, of how you have handled a project or situation.
Use the STAR interview response technique to generate examples to share during the interview.
Providing details will show the interviewer how and why you are qualified for the job. Do keep in mind that the questions you’ll be asked will be specific to the job you’re interviewing for, so they’ll vary.
How To Conduct A Technical Interview: Successful Tips For 2022
How to conduct a technical interview in a remote setting? When it comes to remote interviews, there is a lot to discuss. After two years of the pandemic, we all know that cameras are necessary for remote interviews. But how to make the right questions to identify the perfect candidate? Whether onsite or remote, this is still a hard question to answer.
During our 10 years of experience, we have learned how to evaluate skills like communication abilities, autonomy, time management, among others. And we know how to structure interview questions to evaluate both technical and soft skills. In this article youll find our main tips to help you conduct a technical interview succesfully!
Don’t Miss: Women’s Outfit For Job Interview
How To Prepare For A Technical Interview
Some elements of coding interview preparation should ideally start well before you even land the interview. Other job interview preparation steps can be accomplished closer to the day itself.
So, here are some of the most important coding interview preparation tips to master in the days, weeks, or months leading up to your job applications and interviews:
1. Prepare a 30-second to 1-minute elevator pitch for the tell me about yourself question
Its important that you go prepared to talk about non-coding topics like your employment history, career goals, past projects, etc. The technical interview could just be one part of many if youre at a company with a long interview process, and youll probably have to answer some version of this question when you meet new interviewers. Its a great time to demonstrate soft skills and passion.
2. Before you go, study up on the most important CS fundamentals
Dont stress yourself out like youre cramming for an exam and trying to learn everythingbut do dedicate extra preparation time to key technical interview skills.
Parker advises narrowing your focus to two main areas: Fill the gaps in your knowledge of data structures and algorithms. Run a lot of practice problems.
Start with these must-study topics:
3. Pick one programming language and know it really well
Check out these LTCWM resources for places to go to brush up on your coding skills:
The Best Questions To Ask
Valani said she likes to ask candidates to talk about a challenging project theyve previously worked on, as well as what actions they took, what results they saw and what other solutions they could have implemented. She said candidates answers offer insight into what they have actually accomplished, and spotlights the roles theyve held at other companies. Talking about past experiences also helps candidates feel comfortable, she said, because, in contrast to brain teaser type questions, theyre discussing an experience they actually lived through.
What role did they play in that? How did they work with other people? What did they learn out of it?
It gives you a way to understand, what role did they play in that? How did they work with other people? What did they learn out of it? Valani said.
When Geisendorfer was interviewing for his job at Apex Learning, he remembers being asked to write a program in a fictional coding language that would make two trains running on an infinite track collide. Albeit vague, Geisendorfer said he liked the prompt because he had never been asked it before, and there was still an element of it that related to his work experience.
It was fun because Id never been asked that question before, and the interviewer and I were working through it together, Geisendorfer said. It was a hybrid of a kind of coding problem and then that abstract type.
Thats about as hypothetical as the questions at Apex get.
You May Like: Best System Design Interview Prep
Technical Interview Preparation Tips And Advice
A programming interview is a daunting task. Theres a lot that you will need to prepare for. Whether it be working on a whiteboard or answering the types of questions that will come up in the interview. Preparation will help you succeed in the interview and will, in turn, increase the chances that you get the job.
Lets explore a few ways that you can prepare for your tech interview to set yourself up for success:
Tips For Conducting An Effective Technical Interview
Conducting a technical interview can be tricky, especially when tech recruiters dont have the expertise or skills that theyre trying to assess for the position.
Random coding or esoteric behavioral questions arent enough anymore. In fact, they can actually make interviewers and candidates more anxious and performative. Instead, your recruiters should focus on facilitating comfortable, honest conversations about experience and work habits.
Every company conducts tech interviews differently, but some best practices have emerged. At Educative, weve seen the good, the bad, and the ugly of technical interviews. Weve created a guideline for conducting a technical interview effectively.
Today we will discuss:
Recommended Reading: Mailscoop Io
Tell A Compelling Story
Whether you choose to discuss a completed project or a highly technical topic, traditional storytelling methods are some of the most effective ways to structure a presentation. A classic formula can engage your audience and make your message memorable. Follow these steps to tell a compelling story:
-
Present a problem.
-
Explain why the problem matters.
-
Discuss the trials you encountered as you searched for an answer.
-
End with a strong resolution and impact.
Interviewing Is A Skill
In the end, interviewing is a skill. It takes some studying and a lot of practice to master.
So don’t beat yourself up if you don’t perform how you would have hoped. Keep learning, and keep practicingyou’ll get there!
If you have any questions or comments, feel free to reach out to , and if you want more information on how to prepare for a development career, I write stuff like this on my blog.
Thanks for reading!
Don’t Miss: How To Prepare System Design Interview
Tip #: Ask Clarifying Questions
In the doubly-linked list challenge I was given a blank Ruby file , and a blank test suite. Something like this:
class DoublyLinkedListend
So, a doubly linked list eh? Maybe you know what that is, or maybe you don’t. If you don’t: ask questions. This is the first pitfall to avoid. If you don’t understand the problem or what they are asking for, keep asking questions until you do.
I’ve seen interviewees go down the wrong rabbit trail and the interviewer just let themall the while silently going to fail them. While I don’t agree with this practice, make sure you’re working the right problem.
I do come from a computer science background, so I knew a doubly-linked list means a list that has a pointer to a head and a tail nodewhere each node also points to its next and previous node.
Now even though I knew that, what did I do? I said that out loud and asked if that was correct. Even though I thought I knew what to do, I made absolute sure I did.
Once you think you understand the problem, restate your understanding the interviewer so they can correct or guide you.
The next thing I did was ask another question: “Can I use an array for the nodes?” And I typed out something like this:
But, the interviewer told me, no, I couldn’t do thatwhich makes sense. If I had used an array it would have defeated the whole purpose of the exercise which is building out the fake “pointers” between the nodes.
So no arraywell what do I do now? Here’s tip #2:
Trick #: Watch For Visual Cues
This is probably my favorite tip/trick. It’s not the most useful, but it is kind of fun. One of my interviews I did remotely, and we were using a screen-sharing program and I could see the interviewer’s face in the top-right of my screen.
I noticed out of the corner of my eye as I was coding that the interviewer was nodding their head. Ah ha! A little visual cue to know that I was on the right track.
Again it’s not much, but it could be useful. 🙂
Recommended Reading: What To Wear For An Interview Women
What Kind Of Tech Projects Do You Work On In Your Spare Time
If you havent already picked up on it, passion goes a long way in tech almost everyone I spoke to for this article mentioned it at some point.
Kevin Hayen, CTO of Lets Be Chefs, considers self-directed creative work a critical piece of assessing entry-level applicants and veteran candidates alike. The way an interviewee answers these types of questions shows Hayen what in tech they are really passionate about or if they even are passionate about tech in the first place.
It doesnt matter what your hobby is: Talk it up with all the genuine enthusiasm you have. Like many of these questions, its not the actual answer that interests Kevin he says he doesnt care if the answer is open source, DIY, or even just playing around.
Hayen says that this question also helps him figure out how the candidate might fit into a particular team and what bonus skills they might bring to the company things you didnt even think to add to your resume but will make you a more well-rounded applicant.
What Type Of Work Do You Want To Be Doing Five Years From Now
This question can tell you what direction the candidate wants his or her career to move in, Hammond said. The interviewer can probe their answer to understand their motivation: For example, if their goal is to become a software architect, is it because they want to make more money, or because they want to manage others?
Recommended Reading: Cfo Interview
Keep Your Solutions Clear
In addition to speaking clearly, you should also keep your solutions to whiteboard questions clear and simple. You dont get bonus points for writing a lot of code. On the contrary, the more efficient you can make a program, the more likely you are to advance to the next stage of the hiring process.
When you are designing your solutions, you should also make sure your variable names are clear. Dont use names only you understandmake them clear and state their purpose in the variable name.
The more confused an interviewer is when they are reviewing your code, the less likely they are to reach out to advance the hiring process. Feel free to add comments if they will help you think through a problem or provide clarity for the interviewer.
Interview Questions About Your Education
What They Want to Know: Although many tech professionals are self-trained, some have completed at least some secondary education at technical colleges or universities. Be sure to mention all technical certifications you have earned.
How to Respond: Emphasize your academic achievements as you describe the relevant coursework you completed during your training. Did you earn scholarships? Conduct a well-received capstone project? Perform an internship with a tech company? Describe key projects in detail, including mention of the technologies you mastered in order to complete them.
1. What are your technical certifications?
2. How did your education prepare you for this job?
3. What do you do to maintain your technical certifications?
4. How would you rate your key competencies for this job?
5. What are your IT strengths and weaknesses?
Also Check: Top 10 Behavioral Questions
Dont Be Afraid To Share Your Opinions When Applicable
Sometimes, as you work through problems, you will make decisions that are entirely based on your own taste and opinion. And thats OKemployers are interested in your opinion! The way you think and react to situations makes a big difference to the culture of a company. Having an opinion is also a sign of leadership and technical maturity as a developer. To have a discussion about your opinions requires that youve evaluated other positions on a given subject.
Remember, however, that opinions can be held very closely. If you disagree with your interviewer on a given subject, tread lightly when sharing that information. While its good to have a point of view, its also important to note that sharing it is not always necessary and know how to choose your battles. A good rule of thumb: Dont share your opinion unless you are asked.
How Do You Find The Largest And Smallest Number In An Unsorted Integer Array
From Faceprep:
Method 1: Traverse the array iteratively and keep track of the smallest and largest element until the end of the array.Method 2: Traverse the array recursively and keep track of the smallest and largest element until the end of the array. Method 3: Sort the array using STL and return the first element as the smallest element and the last element as the largest element.
For example, consider the array.arr = Smallest element : 1
From Eric Elliot at JavaScript Scene:
A closure is the combination of a function bundled together with references to its surrounding state . In other words, a closure gives you access to an outer functions scope from an inner function. In JavaScript, closures are created every time a function is created, at function creation time.
To use a closure, define a function inside another function and expose it. To expose a function, return it or pass it to another function.
The inner function will have access to the variables in the outer function scope, even after the outer function has returned.
Recommended Reading: Interview Questions For A Cfo
Meaningful Questions To Ask The Interviewer
Interviews are a two-way street. You should be learning about them just as much as theyre learning about you!
Asking thoughtful questions is also a good way to stand out in the interview. The age-old adage people dont remember what you say, but they remember how you made them feel is so true when it comes to interviews, says Refael . When a candidate keeps the flow going in a friendly conversation, instead of making me feel like I am conducting an interrogation, I will remember our brief time together fondly.
Of course, you should tailor your questions to the specific situation, but here are a few meaningful questions you can ask:
- What do you like most about working here?
- What frameworks, tools, tech stack, etc. does your company use?
- Can you describe the development process here?
- How do you test your code?
- Does the company offer opportunities for professional development, training for engineers, etc.?
- Whats the most challenging project youve worked on here?
The other upside: while youre listening to their answer, you get a little break from talking!
