HACKER Q&A
📣 clu

How to stand out in an Assessment Center?


Hi Hackernews,

I'm currently applying for software engineering roles in several companies. I seem to do well on the CV screening part of the interview process, but have a very hard time when being interviewed "in person" (currently mostly over video anyways).

Could you share some tips, tricks or anecdotes on how to:

1) Be less nervous while being interviewed

2) Make a bigger impression on an interviewer

  👤 Skaven Accepted Answer ✓
The hardest thing I think is to be just human. If you can casually ask the interviewer how he is been, make some small talk about some random stuff and get them to talk about something else, you are on the road to success. The more they talk about something unrelated the better.

I once got a job from an interview, that completely derailed. We had rescheduled a few times, cause somebody messed it up. It all worked out after I had a call with the secretary of the big chief.

20 minutes in, I wasn't asked a single serious question but listen to them talk about scheduling how busy everyone was. Then the big chief had to leave and was again very apologetic about it.

I worked there for 6 month before going back to university and finishing my master. Was really nice, never saw anyone from the interview again, though. Got introduced to the team as a friend of the big chief and everyone was very nice to me.

Always be nice to the secretary.