2 Common Questions to Know for Behavioral Interviews

And how to answer them

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Background: While going through recruitment seasons for two years, I have been in a number of behavioral interviews for software engineering internships. During the process, I learned that there are two common behavioral interview questions that will likely be asked for any job across the industries. Therefore, this piece might help anyone expecting such an interview and hasn’t had much experience with behavioral interviews.

Problem: I found behavioral interviews to be unpredictable as opposed to technical ones. I did not know how to prepare for them and what questions to prepare for out of hundreds of possible questions available on the web.

My solution: I found out that almost all behavioral interviews contain one or both of the following prompts: Tell me about yourself and why do you want to work here? I recommend you prepare for both of these before all your interviews. Now, how to prepare?

1. Tell me about yourself (aka elevator pitch):

Depending on how long the interview is, the pitch shouldn’t take longer than 60–120 seconds.

Part 1: Briefly introduce who you are, where you study (or studied), and major in 1–2 sentences.

Part 2: Talk about why you are passionate about this type of job/industry (technology, finance, etc.). One option is to share what past or present experiences made you so passionate. It is crucial that you say something specific and give an example.

Part 3: Finish your pitch by saying what you are looking for in your next job/internship or what you are planning to do in the job. Make sure to show your interest in the company by linking your passion from part 2 to something that you care about at the company. For that, look into the values/mission section of the company website and see if you resonate with anything. This part should be brief (1–3 sentences).

2. Why do you want to work here?:

Some people think that this question is about the company. However, this question is more about the candidate.

I suggest starting thinking about this question while researching the company website for question #1. Once you find a mission or value that you resonate with, begin forming your answer.

Part 1: State the value/mission.

Part 2: Write about why you resonate with that specific value/mission by giving a specific example or telling a short story. Again, you can accomplish this by linking that value to your past or present experience.

Part 3: Say what you will bring to your job and what you would like to achieve at a higher level. Make sure that this whole response focuses on you and not as much on the company.

Please feel free to leave your feedback or suggest any improvements in the comments.