how to ace an interview - solo show

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How to ace an interview now. I said how to ace an interview at the end of the day. I don't think you can ever ace an interview because as an interview is very subjective and you're not gonna, I'm never gonna be able to do it 100% well. However, I wanna give you some tips and tricks on how to do better for your next interview. First off, here are some basic things. You're probably like, yeah, Taylor, no kidding, no kidding. But a lot of you all miss out. First off, research the company, right? Research the company. No, what the company does, right? It's pretty simple. No, what the company does, please.

Like if I ask you, what if you're interviewing for gun IO and you're asking, and I'm asking, hey, what is gun IO do? And you're like, I don't really know. I'm like, well, do I wanna help you interview it, right? So again, make sure that is, make sure you do that. Also, nothing too. I say this all the time. Please make sure you have your resume printed out a pen and paper, right? Now you're probably like, Taylor, you're talking about some old school stuff right now, right? Like I don't use pen and paper. I don't, I just use Apple Notes or Google Notes, whatever, listen, listen to me.

I've talked to so many higher managers about this. If you are on a Zoom call and you are typing and you're like this, typing while someone's talking to you, it's incredibly distracting. And I've asked this to a bunch of engineering managers and they've all agreed with me. But, I've tried to find my notebook, I've tried to find my notebook, but here's one notebook, not my notebook, but let's say I'm like, I have my notebook out and I'm writing something down here, that's less distracting, right? That's less distracting. So basically all that, all that being said, like have something in front of you because it's gonna be less distracting for the higher manager if you're not typing off screen.

Another thing that I would do as well that a lot of people don't talk about is, you can type this up, you can write this out. But for me, I think have some clear defined pointers that you really wanna get across for the interview as it relates to the role, right? So for me, when I was interviewing at Gun I-O, when I was interviewing at Gun I-O, I basically was like, all right, what does Gun I-O need, right? So the first interview I had, I was like, well, what's y'all's problems? Like, where are y'all lacking in the business, right? So they said, well, we were lacking, we don't have any content, we don't really have any social, we don't have a social media arm, we've never done community, we've never done conferences and we're also looking to hire a salesperson.

I said, okay, great. So then what did I do, is in the next interview, I basically wrote down very specific things that I wanted to highlight about my background, right? So for me, social media, I garden are probably two to three million impressions. A month across all platforms, I have a close to 1,000 person email newsletter, I have a Discord, Yada Yada, I've driven $2 million in sales at my last company and I go to conferences, I'm a speaker, I'm a key noter and I have a Discord community over like 700 people. So for me, like that right there, I was prepared to go into the interview because I knew their problems, right?

No accompanies problems and why they're hiring this person. And I think that's a great conversation on the first interview, but like, hey, Mr. Miss's manager, like, like what, like what's else, why y'all hiring this? Right, why I hired this person, did somebody like, not have the skills and they got fired? Do you have you never had this person like what, like figure out the problem on the first round, but also too, you can still have notes as it relates to the job description, right? You can still have notes, the main things that you have done as it relates to the job description. I wanna get wanna break for a few questions here.

I wanna do thoughts on bringing donuts to an in-person interview. So I'm a fan of maybe bringing something to the in-person interview, maybe not donuts, right? So like if you interview with me, Emmet, and let's say you're interviewing at GOM and we're gonna do an in-person interview and you got, and we talked about some passion stuff. And everybody knows I'm a freak for good coffee, good coffee, not Starbucks, not Duncan, good local small batch coffee. Emmet, if you texted me your email me before the interview, you're like, hey, tell me I'm stopping to get coffee, do you want anything? And you happen to pick out my favorite place, that is going to go a long way, right?

I'm not saying you should like, I'm not saying you should like bring donuts to every interview just to bring donuts. I don't know if that's gonna move the needle. What moves the needle is figuring out what a person likes and then bringing that to the interview, if that makes sense. So hopefully answers your question. What else here, Chris, it's good to see you. I'm here for donuts, aren't we all? Also, by the way, side note, cake donuts are better than the yeast donuts. I'm gonna hot take here, hot take. I think like traditional, I don't think crispy cream traditional donuts are hot trash. I just think cake donuts are elite.

There's no question there. Let's see here, Thomas goes, I think something you and I talked about the other day, like Dev's just naturally don't know how to quantify. Yeah, so Thomas, Thomas and I hung out at a little coffee meet up. We had about four people, three people there, three plus me. And we were just talking about just catching up. And Thomas really brought up a great, he said he got this from my previous content, but really quantifying what you've done. Now, Thomas said like Thomas, Chris me from wrong, but like Thomas had to reach out to marketing. Like Thomas was like, hey listen, how many users are we supporting with this, what I'm writing, or like what's our visibility?

Like Thomas had to do some research, but he said that really helped him land another interview because his resume was very quantifiable. So again, this is again going into an interview. And listen, we have dealt with one client recently last two months. We're finally just now getting offers with client. This is called one client. But it's been two months of like really working with them to like figure out interview processes and fine tuning, fine tuning. But one of the most consistent themes I'm seeing is that even senior principal engineers cannot talk in detail about what they have done, not only quantify it. But if you have like CICD on your resume and I tell you what have you done within the CICD space, most people can't answer things like that.

So my advice to you all is coming into an interview, know what you're about to get into, know the type of role you're interviewing for, prep yourself with a few pointers that you want to bring into the interview. But then also really know your background and be able to speak to it. Whether it's, hey, I've said this feature I wrote supports over a million users or I've this environment, this platform I helped develop has, you know, a million transactions, a minute, something like that, like quantifiable. And if you have to go out and listen, you're almost gonna fact check you. And I'm not talking about lying on your resume, by any means.

But like if you give like a ballpark answer, let's say like it's like, let's say you said it's a million transactions, but it's really like 700,000 transactions, right? Like that's not enough to like get you fired or lie on your resume. That's just like what you know. And then in hindsight, it was a little less, right? It's not a big deal, but be quantifiable, please. If Valerie thoughts on having links and projects pulled up already sent over. So it depends where you're at in the interview. I would have that ready, first sure, absolutely. Please make sure you have projects ready to go. But also try to have projects that are applicable to what you're interviewing for, right?

If you're interviewing for a front and angular role and then you're like, well, I got this Python project I'm working on. It's like, it doesn't quite line up, right? Let's see here. Also, yeah, Anton, I also asked them. Yeah, I think that's great. Hey, I would tell the hiring manager, Mr. Mr. Manager, I have a pen and paper right here. Can we, can we, can I just, I'm gonna write some notes down if that's okay. 10 out of 10 hiring managers, you can be like, yeah, that's fine. Forgive me, it heads up. Let's see here. A lot easier to cook with the recipe than put it together.

Yeah, 100% love that. Let's see here. What else we got here? Kate, donuts truly superior, absolutely. That's correct. Reaching out to different stakeholders, right? So Thomas again, props to you for that. And what do you have done as an individual? Yeah, yeah. So this is big. So this goes to again, being very explicit on what you specifically done. A lot of people put their accomplishments on their resume. That was done by a group, not with them, right? Listen, I know hiring managers that will pick out a random term on your resume and ask you what you've done just to see if you're lying. Or not even lying, just putting fluff on your resume.

So again, when it comes, this is resume writing, we'll do another live next week, maybe about resume writing specifically. This is why you do not put fluff on your resume. Put the things that you have done, but expound on the things you have done as well. Listening to leadership calls helps with that too. Yeah, the Ryan's probably referring to learning the impact of the type of app slash platform you're writing, which is 100%. The all interview, AKA conversation between two liars, Jamie, that is really funny. And then donuts, I'd hire them promote you. There you go. All right, so we got the, all right, so to recap what we've done so far, we've pen and paper and printed out resume in front of you.

We have written down and or typed your sizzle, which is basically three to four bullet points of key things that you want to get across as it relates to the interview that you're about to go into. You have researched the people you are interviewing and also the company. Now researching the people, not a lot of people do this. And I don't know why. You can get a lot of really good information out of someone's LinkedIn potentially and use it to turn the interview into a conversation. Right, the whole point, the whole focus for you should be taking an interview and making a conversation. And the way you do that is to find similarities between two people, you and the other person or a group of people, right?

I'll never forget. Back when I was at my last company, my very first hire of the new division that I started. This individual, he went through my LinkedIn, I was like, hey, I saw you went to South Carolina. I went to UGA, ha, ha, ha, ha, SEC, we beat you. And like, immediately I was like, you know what? Like that's great. Let's really talk about SEC football. So we got, so we started talking about SEC football. And then the entire tone of the conversation changed and then I hired him, right? I mean, I didn't hire him because of that. But again, right? I got the tone change.

It was very conversational. It was great. So definitely do that. Let's see here. When it comes to, so we got that, also another thing too. When it comes to when you're in the interview, again, I'm gonna say this. When it comes to the interview, sorry, I'm collecting my thoughts here. When it comes to the interview, you need to be able to, I've completely lost my train of thought, y'all. This has never happened for me before. Too much going on around me. Say, I don't know, there we go. I don't know. I don't know. Say, I don't know. I don't know. It's not hard. It's not just say, I don't know.

Also, too, there's nothing wrong with saying it. I don't know. Right? So many people just try to push their, listen, listen. I've interviewed hundreds. It's not thousands of people at this point in my career. I can tell you, I know when you're trying to lie to me or just push through a question. So can the other person. So let's just not even try. Just be like, hey, Mr. Mrs. Manager, listen, I'm not quite following. I don't know. Can you like rephrase it? Here's the deal. Keep the conversation going. So many of us get in the interview. You're like, I don't know. I don't know. And then you just don't keep the conversation going.

Keep the conversation going. Say, hey, I don't know. But here this sounds like something I've done. Let me explain this. If the interviewer goes, no, that's not really right. But like, okay, well, then I haven't done it. But I just wanted to kind of guide you down to path. Because here's the deal. Hire managers want to know. One, you can tell them that they don't know. Right? And then also that you can push back. Right? Like I've had multiple people in interviews have pushed back nicely. And I've actually gotten to the next round because that's what the company wanted. Companies want individuals who can speak up and be confident in their answers and be kind in their answers, but then also say, I don't know.

Right? Like that's the key right there, folks. Keep the conversations going. Yeah, just, yeah, don't say no. Jason comes in here. If you can't answer something, don't make crap up. Just say you don't know. Yeah, absolutely. And just say how you figure it out. Because if you don't know the type of technology or something they say, be like, hey, listen, I'm not quite following. Can you expound on this a little bit more? Like all this stuff. Like expound on it. Can you use it? How they use the spell and make you use it in the sentence? Right? Get them to expound. Keep talking. Keep talking.

Yeah, no one word answers, please. No one word answers, please. For me, like it's not yes, no. Maybe, you know, it's so awkward, right? Just say, hey, you know, no, I have not used this. But I know what you're talking about. I've researched it. Like again, keep the conversation going. Let's see here. And again, if you haven't done it, what do you know about it or express willingness to learn? Yeah. Yeah, again, companies want people who are bought and dialed in like that, that just, I think the art of conversation is lost. I just really do believe in and the interviewer and the interviewer, like for me, like wants conversation, right?

People want to work with other people that can converse, right? You're not going to go on a date with a person who can't talk, right? Now, you may be married right now and looking at your significant other next to you right now, watching this live. And be like, well, that's you. That's another problem, right? But for the most part, people want to work with people who are fun, who are nice, can converse, who can, you know, a little banter, yada, yada, yada, yada. So all, all that being said, like those, those are kind of my big tips for interviewing. What, what else is there? Um, I would send a thank you, uh, LinkedIn notes, right?

After the interview, right? So, so let's let's let you interview with me. We, we had a great conversation. Connected to me on LinkedIn afterwards, send me a note in the connection. Remember send a note in the connection. Say, hey, Taylor's great chatting with you. I loved our conversation, especially around X, always mentioned something, always mentioned something in the interview that really resonated with you. That means I know you're paying attention and like you're engaged. And then that's it. I think that's a great tactic as well. Um, when it also comes to interviewing like, plus some it's nerve wracking, right? And, and, and I can say that confidently because I went through interviews last July when I left the company, the one company I was at for my entire career for 12 years, right?

And so for me, I know it's nerve wracking. I will tell you this. Try to get outside if it's sunny or the weather's nice right before the interview. Like 30 minutes before the interview. Cause like, even, even talking, even talking about it right now. Like I can get, I can feel my nerves a little bit like even putting myself back in the interview seat. I think one thing I would do more now, if, if I were to interview again is take more time before the interview to get outside and walk and clear my mind. Because what happens is I feel like our nerves take over.

We black out. Is anybody else black out? I black out sometimes. Right? I've actually, I'm actually counseling for trying to not black out, especially during stressful situations, right? And so for me, I don't know about you, but blacking out is something I've dealt with. AKA you don't know what you say. You kind of go through it. And you're like, you're done. You're like, holy cow, what happens? And so one of the things is grounding yourself outside. This is a little health and fit and see. I understand it. But like go outside, especially if you're in warmer climate, like like bare feet on the ground, it'll make you feel better.

And it will calm your mind. Because what happens is I feel like we like, like we get in the interview, we sit in front of our computer and like we're sitting in front of our computer for like 30 minutes, maybe an hour beforehand prepping. And then like all your tension and all of the anxiety kind of comes up. And like then then you go into the interview. I feel like it just all like spews out. Right. It's like, wow, right. And then it's and then you're a mess and you get nervous. And it's just all over the place. So my advice to you get outside, take some deep breaths and try get away from your computer before the interview.

What else? Some other interview tips as well. Let's see here. What's the other one? Somebody else is tuned in here. Yeah. Another one. And if you haven't done it about it, well, let's learn. I don't know how to do it, but I can research it 100%. And Tom comes in. I've asked is similar to insert thing in this other technology because I've done that for yeah, again, right. Yeah. I love that. So Anton, he's asked, is this similar to this and another technology because I've done that before? I love that. Right. Hey, I haven't done angular, but I have done, or I don't know, I don't know enough about those.

So I'm not even going to try to make that up. But yeah, you get what I'm saying, right? Like I haven't used this, but I've used this instead. Let me explain a little bit more. Right. Let's see here. Cool. All right. What else? I had another thought or two about the interview on how to ace your first interview. Is anybody else have any tips or tricks? Please fill them up. I want to share them with everybody. I think that's it. I really think that's it. Right. And here's the deal. Oh, also, a few more things. One, create a Google Doc, create a Google Doc. That's a journal.

So after every single interview you have, you write down what you like, what went well, what didn't go well. Basically you journal, right? I'm big on journaling now. Journaling is something I took on at the end of the year. It helped me a ton. But create a study guide. Right. So if you have the interview, here's the things that went well. I was very calm. I went outside. I asked good questions. Like folks are the positives. Right. So it looks a lot of times in interviews. We got interviews. Like I sucked. Right. And it really wasn't that bad. So positive, like write things down that you did really well.

Then say things to improve on. Right. And then bullet point it out. Right. I could have improved on, you know, I messed up on the question around Kafka or I messed up on the question around data structures or variables or I don't know again. I'm just making stuff up at this point. But that so what you've done well, what you didn't do well. And then what happens is that what the, what you didn't do well starts to become a study guide. So the next interview you go into, you can say, OK, all right. I need to probably research on these things here, here are some tips.

And then you continually interview and then you continue to have this ongoing study guide and brain dump of a document that's going to allow you to process things and move to the interview better. Um, I really love that tip. I think everybody should do that. Um, what else? Interview and interview and interviewing trying to think here. Uh, set up Google alerts. I love that. Love this idea Ryan. Set up Google alerts to get recent news about the company. Love that. So like, if so, like, if, if you are interviewing and this company just had a huge series B, like you can be able to like, hey, guys, congrats.

I saw on New York Times that you guys had a series B. That's fantastic. Right. I love that Ryan again. Like, focus, focus on making it a conversation as much as humanly possible. Um, I also want to give you confidence here too for a second. Listen, if somebody asked to interview you in this climate, it means you are good. Now, does it mean you're going to get the job? No. But it means you're good. Right. Have the confidence that you should be there. Right. Like, like, even the first round, if they chose you, they like you. Right. You got to remember something here. Companies hate interviewing as much as you hate interviewing.

Now, I know it doesn't seem that way all the time, but companies hate the interview process. Right. This one company I'm working with that's hiring 15 dot net rolls right now. They're underwater. They want to get people hired. Right. And so they don't want somebody to, to like, they want people to be comfortable because they want to hire you. Right. So again, it's a mindset shift. Right. If you are interviewing somebody, you really need to be like, all right. Here's the deal. They want me. They obviously have confidence in me. I need to relax because if they're talking to me, that means I have a chance.

Right. Now again, you may not get the job and it happens. Right. But again, have the confidence they are talking to you. They are interested in you. They want you. Relax a little bit. Also, nothing to companies are looking for reasons to reject people right now. I don't like it. I don't like I get it. But like if you misspell somebody's name, or if you, you know, I don't know, have a bunch of, you know, misspellings and your emails or, you know, your, your presentation doesn't look good. You know, in terms of Zoom, like everything docks you. Right. So again, be prepared. Have a good background.

Also, too, listen, I'm going to say this as well. I'm going to say this as well. Be aware of what is on your computer when you screen share. Let me say that again. When you screen share for a coding or design interview, and you have to screen share your computer, make sure there is nothing on your desktop. That is awkward for an interviewer on the other side. So I'm just going to leave it there. Just be aware. All right. Just be aware, folks. Let's see here. Jesse comes in. What's up? My guys scary one to ask, but always a good ask if they were any concerns.

Yeah. I love that. You know, Jesse, I think I'm going to push, but I love suggesting I work together. It's on a gun. Jesse, I like this. I think this also could make some people weirded out, you know, maybe, maybe, but definitely the recruiter. Definitely the recruiter. If you're working with a middleman or middlewoman, like an internal recruiter or an agency recruiter, basically just say, hey, because I would say, Jesse, I wouldn't ask this on the interview because people aren't going to tell you. There's not like, if you interview with me and you bomb with interview with me, you're like, was I okay? I'm going to be like, yeah, I mean, I'm not going to tell you on the call that you suck.

Right. Now, what I would do though is I would ask the recruiter to go get information for you, right? Because hiring manager is going to be a little bit more comfortable giving feedback to a third party like the recruiter to share with you. Yes, no professional stuff. Right. That's right, Jesse. Show enthusiasm. Another big thing. Be excited. He companies want people to work for them. They're excited about the company. If you are interviewing for a finance company, you're not really excited about finance. Like there are maybe probably other people who like got their financial degree and like wants to work for a fintech company. So I think showing excitement, like I talked to Dominic about this.

He was on the chat like interviewing. He loves being outside and the environment and all that stuff. I was like, we'll go research bunch of environmental focus companies and startups and just interview with them because you're passionate about it and you hike and you're outside all time. They're they're going to want to hire you because they want people who are passionate about their business, right? So again, show enthusiasm. Oh, good one. I closed windows before I shared with you earlier. It wasn't even bad. Just good practice. Yeah, Jason, I had a call earlier. Yeah, just when you're if there is any chance a screen share could happen and you don't even could have anything bad, you don't want to like be like Christmas shopping and like have to share your screen and it would be like, you know, it's just weird.

So just make sure you close all of your tabs. All right, Richie, what's up, buddy? Cool. Richie, I'm wrapping up here. Do you got any interview tips, big dog, Richie, you got anything? Any interview tips? As I'm wrapping up, Richie, give me your best interview tip. Cool. All right. Y'all, well, that's it for today. I appreciate it. That is it. Um, I want to give you a shout out. I want to give you an announcement. Gun IO. We opened up our platform. If you are developer, even if you're not looking for a job, I would just go sign up on our platform because we do a lot of part time.

We do a lot of freelance and we obviously do full time work too. If you are fit for something, we'll reach out to you. So literally, if you're a developer over five years of experience or so, I would just go and just submit your information. Just sign up, just get in our system. All that stuff. Yes. Yeah. Keep your kids out of the room and pets. I know I think I posted a gift or a meme about that last week. Have a quiet space. Y'all have a quiet space because even during this live, I got distracted. And I lost my train of thought because I had text and slacks coming in.

And I got distracted. I lost my train of thought. Right. And I do this for a living. So I can like, I can kind of like, you know, get back on it. A lot of y'all can't. Right. So make sure all of your notifications are quiet. All that stuff. Eric, absolutely cool. All right. Y'all, that's it for today. Hope y'all have a great rest of your Friday. If you need anything, holler, go sign up at Gun I O. Go check out render. It's going to be a blast. Share this if this resonated with you and let other people see it. Otherwise, I appreciate you. We'll see you all next week.

Got a hell of a week coming up a guest. Becca. Becca off of open sauce. She's coming on the show Monday. We have Dan Mall, render, ETL speaker coming on Tuesday. And then my guy, Joe Pervek coming back on the show, talking about his latest job search. Very excited about that. So again, oh, yes, another goal. One Anton Chek, your camera and your mic. Make sure it's working. It's clear. Yada, yada, yada, yada. So y'all have a good one. I appreciate y'all. The 2.0ers, 2.0ers, not 2.0ers, 2.0ers or 2.0ers. I think 2.0ers makes more sense. 2.0ers. Y'all have a great Friday. We'll see you. Peace.

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