(Transcript)

tl;dr

Dealbreakers are worse than red flags. Red flags add up overtime into a rejection. Dealbreakers can be an instant rejection. The most nonobvious dealbreaker is showcasing negativity, and it usually happens in motivation questions and when talking through past projects.

Note: negativity is not as simple as “blaming other people.” That’s a common way it’s expressed, in that case it’d be negative teamwork. But negativity can also be applied to your thought process and even your ability to be decisive.

“Given the chance, what would you do differently?”

It might be intuitive for you to say “I can’t think of anything I would change.” Because you probably worked hard on that project. You may truly be satisfied. But saying you wouldn’t change anything is signaling negativity in your thinking: negation of ways to improve. A less charitable description might call it intellectually laziness.

Whatever you want to call it, interviewers across big tech companies cite not having an answer for this question as one of the most common red flags or deal breakers.

If you can’t think of an answer, expand the scope of possibilities

If you really can’t think of anything, imagine that you were given more time and resources. With unlimited time and resources there’s nothing you could think to optimize? You could get the latency down a little bit, or have it be so the long-term maintainability was a little bit easier.

Companies will ask this question often–it’s one of the most common follow-ups across all types of behavioral questions. Dig for ways to improve, even if you need to imagine a scenario where you had twice as long of time to complete the project and twice as many resources.

“Tell me about this work gap.”

If you have a work gap, or were recently laid off, chances are your first few times discussing that fact in an interview will be suboptimal. The intuition is to overexplain, to show them that it wasn’t your fault. Those stories get overly-long and “me thinks the candidate doth protest too much” very fast. Once that happens, you seem like a whiner, which is obviously a trait of negative employees. Don’t do it.

Do this instead. “The company [org or group] ran out of funding and laid off 3 entire teams including mine.” That one line does the job. You can include 1-2 additional lines, with quips such as “It wasn’t performance-based.” But almost 100% of the time, the most simple 1 sentence response is the most effective. It just may take you a few rounds of practice to see it for yourself.

“What are you looking for in your next opportunity?”

“I’m looking for a product which makes me want to get out of bed in the morning.”

“A lot of the teammates who I worked well with have left.”

What do these have in common? The candidate seems to have no ownership over their own life. It’s like everyone else is deciding things for them. That is a microsignal that they will be just as rudderless at this new company. Negativity in this case is a lack of motivation: the candidate doesn’t have a positive score in the category of motivation, they have a negative score.

The safest, most boring answer here will work

Avoid all the dealbreakers and red flags. Opt instead for banal simplicity that is still true. “I’ve learned a lot here, and now I’m ready for a new challenge. Specifically, I’m looking for challenges like [Name something simple you can find at this company.] For example, if they’re a startup, mention “getting a product from 0-1.” And if they’re an established company, say “helping a high-scale company penetrate new markets or deepen their success in current markets.”

Nontraditional approaches can also work

I talked to a really smart senior engineer before with a cool background: FAANG and startups. And he was saying “I want to work in a new problem space. I’ve done social media. I’ve done construction tech. I want to work in a new space.” As long as that company was not in those two spaces, this is a fine answer. Simple yet effective!

When talking about your past projects

Do not blame anybody, any process, any leadership team, any team mate, or any past company. Do not do it subtly or directly.

If you have stressful past experiences when it comes to conflict, if you don’t practice calmly and productively articulating the important part of that (the conflict resolution) you can easily (and falsely) focus on the conflict. That teammate you had that disagreement with might have really been a terrible person. And without prepping thoroughly, your true (and negative feelings) will leak out.

Measured disclosure

If you don’t prep for behavioral, and take interviews cold, you’re riffing your answers. When you’re riffing you're usually operating on “what do I say next”; it’s a game of free-association. In that game, the time is ripe to be “too-honest” about past colleagues or companies. Instead, if you prep ahead of time, you can use measured disclosure, which is about knowing what you’re not going to say.

For example, you can tell yourself, “When I talk about that interpersonal conflict at IBM, I’m not going to mention the bullying I felt, the brashness of that engineer, or the past incidents they had with other engineers.” Because mentioning those things would only apply if the goal was to prove to the interviewer that you were right. That’s not the game you’re in. And in this game mentioning them would make you seem like you blame others. So, use measured disclosure, and decide what you’re not going to say before you speak on a topic that you’re uneasy talking about (for any reason).

Key takeaways

Negativity can leak out in nonobvious ways. When in doubt, keep it simple. Shorter responses are probably better, especially if it’s a topic you’re shaky on.