This is an adaptation of an internal doc I wrote for Wave.

I used to think that behavioral interviews were basically useless, because it was too easy for candidates to bullshit them and too hard for me to tell what was a good answer. I’d end up grading every candidate as a “weak yes” or “weak no” because I was never sure what bar I should hold them to.

I still think most behavioral interviews are like that, but after doing way too many behavioral interviews, I now think it's possible to escape that trap. Here are my tips and tricks for doing so!

Confidence level: doing this stuff worked better than not doing it, but I still feel like I could be a lot better at behavioral interviews, so please suggest improvements and/or do your own thing :)

Before the interview

Budget 2+ [...]

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Outline:

(00:47) Before the interview

(00:51) Budget 2+ hours to build

(01:24) Think ahead about follow-ups and rubric

(02:07) Focus on a small number of skills

(02:47) During the interview

(02:50) Kicking off

(03:28) Dig into details

(05:02) Evaluating candidates

(05:05) Make yourself a rubric

(05:48) General things to watch out for

(07:46) Appendix: example rubric and follow-ups

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First published:

Source:

Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.