The “STAR” Interview —Preparing for your upcoming interview

Being in the recruitment space for so long, one of the most common questions I’ve got from candidates is “Anything I’ll need to prepare for this interview?”.

Come on, seriously. My answer is always, “Of course!”. Who walks into an interview without any preparation? Any serious candidates that would invest time to meet or speak with the hiring team should at least do some homework beforehand. If not, I wouldn’t recommend even investing time to do the interview!

I believe that the real question is “How should I prepare for the interview?”.

While interviews come in different shapes and forms, and even if you’ve got a detailed brief on what the interview will cover, there is always an element of surprise come interview day. It doesn’t help when there are still a lot of interviewers believing that the best way to interview is to “free-style”.

One of the “safest” recommendations for my candidates, is to get familiar with the “STAR” interview technique and try to structure their answers to behavioral questions with it.

So, what is this “STAR” interview technique?

It’s been around for a while. The “STAR” stands for:

• Situation
• Tasks