Build 8 reusable STAR stories
8 stories cover ~80% of behavioral interview questions. Recombine on demand — never memorize answers.
- Led through ambiguity
- Disagreed with a senior stakeholder
- Missed a deadline
- Proudest delivered impact
- Failure you learned from
- Decision without data
- Mentored / developed someone
- Turned around a struggling project
Technical screen prep cadence
2–3 hours/day for 3 weeks beats 8 hours/day for 4 days. Focus on patterns, not problem count.
- Day 1–7: pattern library (sliding window, two pointers, DP, graph traversal)
- Day 8–14: timed problems on Easy/Medium
- Day 15–21: mock interviews with feedback
Negotiating the offer
Never accept the first offer. Always counter on base + sign-on + equity — three levers move ~20% on average.
- Anchor with market data, not feelings
- Counter once, decisively, with a number not a range
- Get every term in writing before signing