interview-prep

name: interview-prep description: Structured interview preparation framework — research, behavioral prep, technical review, and follow-up

Interview Preparation

Systematic framework for preparing for technical and behavioral interviews, with a security/engineering angle.

Phase 1: Company Research

Before any interview, gather intel on these dimensions:

Technical Profile

• Tech stack — Check job posting, StackShare, GitHub repos, engineering blog
• Infrastructure — Cloud provider (AWS/GCP/Azure), container orchestration, CI/CD
• Scale — User count, request volume, team size (LinkedIn headcount)
• Open source — Do they contribute? What projects?

Business Profile

• Product — What do they sell? Who are the customers?
• Revenue model — SaaS, enterprise, freemium, marketplace?
• Funding/stage — Crunchbase for startups; annual reports for public companies
• Recent news — Last 6 months of press releases, blog posts, acquisitions
• Competitors — Who else plays in this space?

Culture Profile

• Glassdoor/Blind — Team reviews, interview process reports
• Engineering blog — Writing quality signals culture quality
• Leadership — CTO/VP Eng background, public talks
• Remote/hybrid policy — Check careers page and recent postings

Research Template

Company: [Name]
Role: [Title]
Interview Date: [Date]

Tech Stack: 
Cloud/Infra: 
Team Size: 
Product: 
Revenue Model: 
Recent News (3 items):
  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
Why This Company: 
Questions to Ask (3+):
  1. 
  2. 
  3. 

Phase 2: Behavioral Prep (STAR Method)

Structure every behavioral answer as Situation → Task → Action → Result.

Core Stories to Prepare (8-10)

Have polished stories for each theme:

1. Leadership / Influence — Led a project or convinced stakeholders
2. Conflict Resolution — Disagreed with a teammate, resolved it
3. Failure / Learning — Something went wrong, what you learned
4. Technical Challenge — Hard engineering problem you solved
5. Security Incident — Responded to or prevented a security issue
6. Under Pressure — Tight deadline, production outage, crisis
7. Cross-team Collaboration — Worked across org boundaries
8. Mentorship — Helped someone grow
9. Process Improvement — Made something more efficient
10. Customer Impact — Directly improved user experience

STAR Template

Story Name: [Short label]
Theme: [Which theme(s) it covers]

Situation: [2-3 sentences — context, when, where]
Task: [What was your specific responsibility?]
Action: [What did YOU do? Be specific. Use "I" not "we"]
Result: [Quantifiable outcome. Metrics if possible]
Security Angle: [How does this relate to security/engineering excellence?]

Security/Engineering Angles

• Emphasize threat modeling in design discussions
• Mention shift-left security practices
• Reference incident response experience
• Highlight automation of security controls
• Discuss compliance awareness (SOC2, HIPAA, PCI)

Phase 3: Technical Prep

System Design Checklist

• Requirements gathering (functional + non-functional)
• API design (REST/gRPC endpoints)
• Data model (schema, relationships)
• High-level architecture (services, data flow)
• Storage (SQL vs NoSQL, caching layer)
• Scaling strategy (horizontal, sharding, CDN)
• Security considerations (auth, encryption, rate limiting)
• Monitoring and observability
• Trade-offs discussion

Coding Interview Checklist

• Clarify inputs/outputs and edge cases before coding
• State brute-force approach first, then optimize
• Think aloud — explain your reasoning
• Test with examples before declaring done
• Discuss time/space complexity

Security-Specific Topics

• OWASP Top 10 — can explain and mitigate each
• Authentication patterns (OAuth2, OIDC, JWT pitfalls)
• Network security (TLS, mTLS, zero trust)
• Container security (image scanning, runtime policies)
• Cloud security (IAM, VPC, secrets management)
• Supply chain security (SBOMs, dependency scanning)

Phase 4: Day-Of

Pre-Interview Checklist

• Review company research notes
• Review your STAR stories
• Test audio/video setup (15 min before)
• Have water, notepad, pen ready
• Close distracting apps and notifications
• Pull up the job description for reference

Questions to Ask Them

• "What does the first 90 days look like?"
• "What's the biggest technical challenge the team faces right now?"
• "How does the team handle on-call and incident response?"
• "What does the security review process look like for new features?"
• "How are technical decisions made? (RFC, ADR, design docs?)"

Phase 5: Follow-Up

Thank You Email (Send within 24 hours)

Subject: Thank you — [Role] Interview

Hi [Name],

Thank you for taking the time to speak with me about the [Role] position. I enjoyed learning about [specific topic discussed].

Our conversation about [specific technical/team topic] reinforced my excitement about the opportunity. I'm particularly drawn to [something specific about the team/mission].

[Optional: brief follow-up on something discussed — a resource, clarification, or additional thought]

Looking forward to the next steps.

Best,
[Your Name]

Decision Framework

When evaluating an offer, score 1-5:

• Compensation (base, equity, benefits)
• Technical growth opportunity
• Team quality and culture
• Work-life balance
• Mission alignment
• Career trajectory (title, scope, visibility)

Notes

• Preparation compounds — invest 4-6 hours minimum per company
• Record yourself answering behavioral questions; review for clarity
• Research your interviewers on LinkedIn before the call