How to prepare for interviews when you are experienced?

Question

This question might sound weird but when you are a fresher, not a lot is expected out of you beyond the basics. Things change when you get a bit of experience, considering you have exp of around 3-5 yrs and you are going to be interviewed for Mid-Senior .net dev position where would you start? Should I start from basics like data structures and algorithms or higher level stuff like design patterns, MVC, .net platform specific ? Any tips ??

EDIT: Any different approach if its a contract job you are interviewing for??

Answer 1

Speaking for myself, I've never "prepared" for an interview, beyond making myself look presentable. I generally feel confident talking about algorithms, design patterns, platform details etc. at any time. These are all things I've dealt with day in and out in my career, and I would expect a similar situation for other experienced engineers.

Then again, I'm no expert at doing interviews - I've only done a few, and have never been turned down a job. (Probably a sign I've not been aiming high enough...)

Answer 2

Well, your knowledge should already be prepared. You can refresh some areas that you haven't recently worked with, but they should rather look for a solid understanding of the concepts rather than remembering the details of the day-to day work anyway.

What you can do to prepare for a specific interview is to read up on what the company is doing and what tools and techniques they are using. That should help you to better understand what they mean by the questions that they ask and why they are asking them.

Answer 3

Honestly, your technical knowledge doesn't necessarily matter that much in interviews. The best way to get better at interviewing is to interview a lot. The most important skill for interviews is usually the ability to tell a compelling story. If someone asks you how you have solved problem X before, how well can you tell an interesting and insightful story to answer that question?

It's amazingly rare to get asked hard technical questions or be required to write code during an interview.

The more you interview, the more you become aware of what your weak points are. After the interviews, immediately dig in and learn more about the questions that stumped you. Over time, you'll have good answers prepared for the common questions you are being asked. Don't sweat the questions that don't come up often, your competition isn't likely to know the answers to those questions either.

Don't underestimate the need to be able to talk comfortably and knowledgeably about software development processes like agile development, continuous integration, etc.

Answer 4

In my experience you can prepare yourself by familiarizing yourself with the technical aspects of position you're applying for. Try to identify parts of the job description you can relate to and tie these with your previous experience. Actual experience is generally more valuable than just being able to list all the current buzzwords.

Nobody is going to be an expert in each and every field, so the interviewer should be looking for experience that is relevant to the job in question. If you can identify these areas prior to the interview, you can highlight your experience in these areas.

Answer 5

You will never be prepared for the incompetent people that will 'interview' you. A big problem with some IT people doing the interviewing is that they want to show how much they know and how little you know.

Another big problem is the HR person asking questions to justify their existence.

Put the two together and just how do you prepare? One wrong word to them and your stuffed.

Answer 6

You could update yourself on the latest technologies in your field.

Answer 7

There are a few different parts for how I prepare for an interview:

• Research the company - What do they do, how well do they do, what are some facts and figures that may be useful to point out if you get asked a, "What do you about our company?" question in the interview. This can include seeing how big are some departments, what kinds of work do they have, etc. Do I know where their offices are? How would I handle parking for the interview? Do I know the name and title of the person doing the interview?

• Prepare my questions for the interviewer - This may be somewhat standard things like work hours, dress code, work environment, or methodologies and technologies used.

• Know my story - If asked a, "Tell me about yourself," do you have a rehearsed answer. Do you know why you want this job? Why are you leaving your current position? What are key factors for you in a work place to be successful? What do you consider to be some of your big strengths? What are some of your weaknesses? Are you a leader or a follower? What was a project you worked on that experienced significant challenges? What has been the hardest thing you had to do at a workplace? Why do I think I'd be good at this job?

• Whiteboard preparation - I may get asked to go through writing up a pseudocode implementation of something like a priority queue, reversing a string, counting the 1 bits in a number, or a few other simple programs where the key is to show I cover the bases of stating the problem and getting enough clarification that I can have some idea of what to code and with what aim in terms of complexity, e.g. is there a requirement to minimize space used or time taken or something else, room to trace through examples to show it works, and there may be one or two other bits that I remember a book having ideas for what to show so that you aren't missing something major in trying to get it going and handle changing requirements which may happen in this test that usually is capped at about an hour but may be shorter where the key is to see how well one can get going on this kind of thing.

• Technical notes - Review some basic OO concepts like encapsulation, inheritance or polymorphism, design pattern examples, and be prepared for some odd technical quesitons that if you don't know the answer state that along with a, "If I had to know the answer, I'd use Google or dig up an old textbook of mine for the answer," note so that I am capable of getting the answer if that is needed.

While it may look like a lot of work, once I've done it a few times it does get to be pretty easy to get out this toolbox from time to time.

Answer 8

It never hurts to practice writing code with pen and paper, or a whiteboard because you never know if that situation is going to come up.

Answer 9

My option is always update your knowledge with latest technologies . mostly companies will ask you on the latest technologies like azure,silverlight etc

For interview preparation try these links

http://www.syncfusion.com/faq/aspnet/default.aspx

http://www.aspnetfaq.com/

http://blogs.crsw.com/mark/articles/254.aspx

http://www.techinterviews.com/basic-net-and-aspnet-interview-questions

http://www.dotnetuncle.com/