1. Behavioral Interviewing
A behavioral answer is always the best interview answer
Randy Guthrie, PhD Microsoft Research

2. Interview Preparation
“Me in 30 Seconds Statement”
Answers the question: “Tell me about yourself”
Demonstrates most critical behaviors or experience
Uses a work-related experience to demonstrate behavior
Does not mention interests, experiences or behaviors not related to job
Do not mention family, hobbies, personal situations
Prepare 2 or 3 of these
Practice saying them to friends & family
DO NOT EXCEED 30 SECONDS!

3. Sample “Me in 30 Seconds” Behavior: passion for technology
I’ve always loved computers. I built my first from-scratch computer in 9th grade , and I starting writing C programs using MatLab to help with my math homework when I was in 10th grade. I earned some of the money for college by creating web sites for local businesses. I believe that information technology can change the world, and I want to be the person at the cutting edge doing it

4. Behavioral Interviews
Used by many large companies
Used by almost all consulting firms
Assumes your past behaviors predict your future behaviors
Consist of questions about past challenging situations you have faced
“I’ve never faced that” is a wrong answer
Do an Internet search on “Behavioral Interview” for detailed (essential!) information

5. Sample Behavioral Questions
Tell me about a time when you had to deal with an angry customer
Tell me about a time when you had to tell your manager she was wrong
Tell me about a time when you had to make a sacrifice to make a commitment
Tell me about a time when you had to deal with personality conflicts on a team
Tell me about a difficult decision you had to make this past year

6. The SAR or STAR Approach
Situation/Task: describe situation or assignment
Must be a specific (real) event, not hypothetical
Give just enough detail so the interviewer understands the situation
15-20 seconds in length
Action: describe the action YOU took personally (don’t say what the team did)
Results: describe the positive outcomes (including lessons-learned) from your actions

7. Situation: I was asked to join a team that that had been trying to build a software system for two years with little success
Action: I discovered that they did not have a specification or plan. I wrote a draft specification and insisted that we ratify or modify it and agree to it.
Result: We finished the system within 90 days of my joining the team. I was asked to be the project manager for the next version

8. Preparation
Think of 20 or 30 plausible / likely behavioral interview questions you might be asked
Think of jobs, internship, club service
Try to avoid family & spiritual service examples
often do not generalize to work situations
Write out a SAR answer for each question
Practice giving the answers to family / friends
Note: you can often use the same situation for different questions depending on how you spin it; ie: teams problems can be spun as a sacrifice to reach goals

9. Behavioral Answers are Best
When asked a non-behavioral question, answer with behavioral answer
Example:
Q: What would you do if…..
A: I had a situation like that. Here is what happened…

10. Resume as Interview Agenda
Resume focused on accomplishments will likely drive interviewer to ask questions that you have prepared answers for

11. Conclusion
Interview is focused conversation that YOU the interviewee have a great deal of control over what is asked and how it goes
If your resume is written to focus on accomplishments
You are well prepared
Think “rehearsal”