Ask HN: Resources to prepare to a none-technical interview?
I've a "soft-skills" interview very soon with one of the most important companies in my country, what are some resources for a good interview preparation that I can use that focuses in soft skills questions, like situations, introduce yourself, etc..
Thanks in advance!
* Be yourself, and do so bravely. Don’t bullshit the interviewer, though politeness and mild flattery are beneficial. Dishonesty is most frequently expressed non-deliberately, and any half competent interviewer will see it. That also means being comfortable with who you are including all your shortcomings and opportunities for improvement.
* Know what you know. Be bold about what you do know as proven from prior experience and be quick with what you have not attempted. Don’t attempt to fill in the gaps. Experts are people with tremendous enough experience that they have learned to stop failing through trial and effort, and often forgotten things they find no longer necessary or in bad practice.
* Listen to them. An interviewer will attempt to control the interview, and that’s ok. Look for bias, intent, selection criteria, and more. Ask questions to qualify/disqualify the signals they resonate. This gets easier with practice.
* If you do not have prior leadership experience, actually leading people, you are not a leader, at least not yet. Be cognitively aware of that. If you want to be a leader then accept leadership where it’s available (initiative), and people will notice. I was promoted twice last week (each by different employers). I have been in leadership in my unrelated part time job for so long I didn’t even realize I practicing leadership at the primary job. I was actually just trying to do less work, but they saw something I didn’t.