A postdoc asks—

I'm trying to prepare for a few upcoming interviews, so I've been looking up common interview questions online. They are pretty easy to find, but there's like hundreds or thousands of questions to prepare for. What do I do if they ask me a question I didn't have time to practice yet?

Interview preparation can be tricky and daunting, especially if you are someone who feels most prepared when you’ve practiced answering the question before. Unfortunately, it is probably impossible to practice every possible question you might be asked. There are even some hiring managers who pride themselves on asking intentionally unusual questions to see how candidates react (this is a terrible approach to hiring, by the way, but it is nevertheless somewhat common). So, instead of trying to prepare and practice each question individually, I recommend preparing by coming up with a handful of stories:

• 2-3 stories about impressive professional accomplishments. You’ll want more than one so that you don’t end up giving the impression that you only have a single success and it is all you can talk about. You can draw from these stories to answer questions that get at your experience with particular job requirements and qualifications.
• 1-2 stories about a time you did something wrong or took a less-than-ideal approach to a situation, including what you’ve learned and would do differently now. You can draw from these stories to answer questions about weaknesses, areas of growth, or your approach to learning.
• 1 fairly short and easy to understand story that answers, "tell me about yourself." You’ll likely be asked to introduce yourself at any interview, sometimes more than once.
• 1 fairly short and easy to understand story about why you want to work for the specific organization that is interviewing you. Ideally, this also covers what you hope to accomplish working for them.
• 1-2 stories about how you best work with others. You can draw from these stories to answer questions about how you handle conflict, how you communicate on a team or across different teams, and questions about leadership and followership style.
• 1-2 stories about your preferences in how you structure your work, ready to provide a lot of detail. You can draw from these to answer questions about how you stay organized, how you prioritize, how you ensure attention to detail, and so on.

If you are prepared to share all of these stories, you can do a great job answering any realistic questions they might have.

-David Blancha, Assistant Director, Career Development Team for Researchers