Recently I held a Wine and Interviews event at my house. I invited second year Interaction Design masters students over to talk about interviewing and share some wine. We each told stories about our interviewing experiences and learned quite a lot from each other. Following are some basic tips we talked about through our stories and experiences. These tips are not meant to be exhaustive, comprehensive, or applicable to every interview experience; rather they are meant to share the knowledge and experiences between fellow students. You likely already know many of these, but it’s good to be reminded and keep them in mind.
Spread the love, if you have tips to share leave them in the comments.
Projects, Stories, and Examples
Have a good story about failure.
Have a project to talk about in detail.
Prepare your capstone elevator pitch.
It’s ok to talk about the thermostat project.
Have an elevator pitch for your capstone.
Have an example of some design documentation.
You might be asked to show a task flow or wireframe flow, be prepared.
You might be asked to show some usability test results.
Know Yourself
Know your design philosophy.
- 7 themes of design
- user centered design
- how do your position yourself within the field?
- might be a good idea to weave project examples into your answers
Understand what you want from your future.
Before the Interview
Talk to Jeremy Podany!
- he can be a private outside party
- he can help you negotiate salaries and benefits
- he will help!
Understand that a UI Designer is not the same as a UX Designer.
It really helps to research your interviewer when possible.
It’s ok to ask about the dress code for your interview.
It can help to know some basic visual design principles.
Get your resume critiqued by many people.
During the Interview
Build rapport with your interviewer.
- change your perspective
- remember that you will be peers and colleagues
- try to find some common interests
- ask questions
- it’s ok to throw out some jokes
- try not to be nervous
- think of an interview more as a conversation
Take notes!
You will be exhausted.
It’s ok to ask for water during the interview.
Show that you are willing to learn.
Thanks for sharing the insights. Pictures and layout made this an easy read.
Love this authentic and straight-forward feedback about interviewing. You hit on a number of points that are rarely discussed with this much simplicity. I will add one seemingly unrelated thot–interviewing is more of a marathon than a sprint. Don’t underestimate the emotional energy – the ups and downs – it takes to go through the job search. Consider exercising regularly, sleeping well, eating healthier, and finding a good friend, colleague or career coach who can just listen to you about what you are going through. Just like the gathering that helped write this post. Wine helps too. CHEERS!