I’m not in the tech sector but this is absolute gold, with plenty of transferable tips to other sectors. Thank you for such a thorough, practical post.
Completely agree Nazish, there is a lot of content in this post that applies to every sector. Telling your career story transcends all industries and geos, and what I teach in this post will work anywhere.
Behavioral interviews are *the standard* interview format in most industries, and anyone on a job search will benefit from learning how to answer these questions robustly.
Appreciate it Tom! Every time Lenny would review a new draft from me, he would ask for more examples, more content. We went wayyyyy over the email read limit for this post to give perhaps the most free content ever in a single Lenny's post.
Lenny helped a ton with organizing since there's a large surface area to cover and many rabbit holes that are best suited to 1:1 coaching or group coaching / interview circles.
I'm so glad to hear that the content is resonating and that the structure made it easy to digest. Thanks again for the feedback Tom.
This was absolute gold dust and one of the best articles I’ve read for interview advice. Thank you for sharing such great feedback and helping to create access to information.
When I got the "Your Weekly Stack" email my finger hovered over the "delete" button, as I wanted to spend time preparing for a first round interview. I decided to give it a quick glance before deleting it, and boy, am I glad I did.
I read this article at 9 am, spent the rest of the morning going over the suggested exercises, wrote down 4 more or less recent experiences in detail, and in the afternoon did what I think was my best interview so far. Whether I get hired or not, this increased my chances by a lot. I was able to recollect situations on the spot and give good examples for "tell me about a time when..." questions. Before this these questions were always a challenge, as my memory is terrible and I used to bring up nearly irrelevant examples when put on the spot.
Thank you so much for writing this article, and for being incredibly timely! :)
Such a comprehensive end-to-end actionable plan! Love this 💛
Went and read a few more of your articles, the same thoughtfulness across is so impressive. I couldn't leave comments on your Substack posts, so drooping some love here.
I'll add here that if you're interviewing at Amazon, your recruiter will likely provide you with a spreadsheet with all the leadership principles and the STAR method so you can draft out the beats of an answer from your experiences.
I just subscribed to her substack; good info. I just wished it was better organized (structured, headlines, searchable, keywords etc)
Also, I could not find a way to post comment on her content in her substack to which I have subscribed. Maybe I couldn't locate it? Not the greatest of experience.
Hi Fahad, I haven't added keywords to my posts yet, great suggestion! I also recently started allowing comments on new posts, and I'll be opening them for old posts as well. When I first got started, I wasn't sure how much people would want to converse about the content in the comments. Sounds like I have at least one taker!
May I ask you to share more about your feedback (not sure how I would make my posts more structured or searchable, but if you know how, I'm all ears -- shoot me a note at hello@coacherika.co)
I’m not in the tech sector but this is absolute gold, with plenty of transferable tips to other sectors. Thank you for such a thorough, practical post.
Completely agree Nazish, there is a lot of content in this post that applies to every sector. Telling your career story transcends all industries and geos, and what I teach in this post will work anywhere.
Behavioral interviews are *the standard* interview format in most industries, and anyone on a job search will benefit from learning how to answer these questions robustly.
I appreciate the comment!
Great advice, with some ++. Thanks!
Hello nice post
Thank you Sarah 🙏
I love that extra ++ how-to with examples, and we definitely stuffed a lot into this post! Thanks for noticing and for the comment.
Outstanding article Erika! The content was great and I really loved the structure too.
Appreciate it Tom! Every time Lenny would review a new draft from me, he would ask for more examples, more content. We went wayyyyy over the email read limit for this post to give perhaps the most free content ever in a single Lenny's post.
Lenny helped a ton with organizing since there's a large surface area to cover and many rabbit holes that are best suited to 1:1 coaching or group coaching / interview circles.
I'm so glad to hear that the content is resonating and that the structure made it easy to digest. Thanks again for the feedback Tom.
This was absolute gold dust and one of the best articles I’ve read for interview advice. Thank you for sharing such great feedback and helping to create access to information.
Thanks for the reply. And your effort was definitely noticed!
When I got the "Your Weekly Stack" email my finger hovered over the "delete" button, as I wanted to spend time preparing for a first round interview. I decided to give it a quick glance before deleting it, and boy, am I glad I did.
I read this article at 9 am, spent the rest of the morning going over the suggested exercises, wrote down 4 more or less recent experiences in detail, and in the afternoon did what I think was my best interview so far. Whether I get hired or not, this increased my chances by a lot. I was able to recollect situations on the spot and give good examples for "tell me about a time when..." questions. Before this these questions were always a challenge, as my memory is terrible and I used to bring up nearly irrelevant examples when put on the spot.
Thank you so much for writing this article, and for being incredibly timely! :)
🥹🥂💛
Great post
Such a comprehensive end-to-end actionable plan! Love this 💛
Went and read a few more of your articles, the same thoughtfulness across is so impressive. I couldn't leave comments on your Substack posts, so drooping some love here.
Appreciate you taking a look at The Career Whispers and taking the time to share your feedback here @chhavi!
@Erica, such a great content and practical tips.
I am a tech PM and am looking for job search coaching. Is it possible to chat with you before committing to buying one of the packages?
Hi Mike, I don't do free consultations, but there are a many ways to get a sense of my style and approach as a coach:
(1) you can watch some of my YouTube videos to get a sense of how I communicate and structure my coaching.
(2) you can find lots of testimonials and reviews on my website (coacherika.co).
(3) I also offer affordable 20-minute intro sessions via Pocket Board (pocketboard.co/mentor/erikag).
Interesting breakdown. Thanks Erika.
Very good tips on getting over the first interview hurdle ... congrats on the article.
Thanks for the insightful post!
The Amazon leadership principles could also be a solid reference to practice behavioral questions: https://www.amazon.jobs/content/en/our-workplace/leadership-principles
Prepare a STAR method based story for each Amazon leadership principle and reuse the stories to answer most of the typical behavioral questions.
I'll add here that if you're interviewing at Amazon, your recruiter will likely provide you with a spreadsheet with all the leadership principles and the STAR method so you can draft out the beats of an answer from your experiences.
If they don't give it to you, ask for it!
I just subscribed to her substack; good info. I just wished it was better organized (structured, headlines, searchable, keywords etc)
Also, I could not find a way to post comment on her content in her substack to which I have subscribed. Maybe I couldn't locate it? Not the greatest of experience.
Hi Fahad, I haven't added keywords to my posts yet, great suggestion! I also recently started allowing comments on new posts, and I'll be opening them for old posts as well. When I first got started, I wasn't sure how much people would want to converse about the content in the comments. Sounds like I have at least one taker!
May I ask you to share more about your feedback (not sure how I would make my posts more structured or searchable, but if you know how, I'm all ears -- shoot me a note at hello@coacherika.co)
Update: all posts now have tags and allow for comments, and you can see all the posts in each series here: https://thecareerwhispers.substack.com/p/posts-organized-by-topic