I have performed a fair number of interviews for my current employer. I started 9 years ago doing phone screens when I was a Senior Software Engineer. If I was to throw the dart on the wall, I’d say that the tally of interviews I did (including phone screens), would be over a hundred. When I was promoted to an Engineering Manager, I performed what they call “Behavioral Interviews”. In short, behavioral interviews are aimed at having the candidate tell us about either a past scenario or what they would do in a hypothetical scenario in order for us to predict the future behavior and performance of this candidate. If your interviewer says,” Tell me about…” – this is a signal that a behavioral question may be coming. Behavorial questions are extremely important.
Another important type of question that follows the format,” Tell me about…” is the introduction, ” Tell me about yourself.” I found it interesting that despite the fact that everyone knows the importance of first impressions, the importance of the interview introduction is sometimes not mentioned in interview guides. In interviews, the introduction is not an invitation for an interviewee to tell the interviewer their life story, but really is a question that is more in line with, “Why should we consider hiring you?”
In an interview, anytime that you can be the one controlling what gets talked about during is a good thing. “Tell me about yourself.” is a question that gives the floor completely to the interviewee and allows them to highlight astonishing parts of their career which may not come up in the questions prepared by interviewers.
When I interview experienced Software Engineers, I pay special attention to the introduction. Specifically, does this person give me an introduction that either I can relate to as an Engineering Manager (scores empathy points), an introduction that really supports their interest in the job / position / company, or do I get the same generalized introduction that this person is giving to everyone they speak to?
I feel it’s a huge, missed opportunity not to customize your introduction to each interviewer to provide additional data points for them. If you know that you are speaking to a Product Manager, maybe speak about how you worked with a Product Manager to clarify requirements. If you are speaking with a Principal Software Engineer, maybe talk about some time you solved an interesting technical challenge. Talking about a failure and what you learned from it is also excellent.
My suggestion for job seekers is to take these introductions seriously – jot these introductions down and tell a different story to each interviewer — this gives the interviewer more positive data points in the actual assessment.
A typical Software Development interview goes through at least 6 rounds, this allows the interviewee to tell 6 distinct stories and further opens up the floor for them to go into details and further control the interview when the interviewer asks,” Tell me more.”
