Interview prep Everything to prepare, in one place.
Pick the role to see what the job involves and what it pays, from official data. Then build your answers from your own experience: tell me about yourself, STAR stories, questions to ask and a thank-you note. No sign-up; nothing you type leaves your browser.
Prepare in this order: understand what the role involves, write a one-minute answer to “tell me about yourself”, prepare two or three true STAR stories, practise the general questions out loud, research pay before you're asked, pick three questions to ask, and send a thank-you note within a day.
Your interview
What the job involves
Data From O*NET, for the occupation in general.
Build a one-minute answer
Advice
Your facts · template wording · [placeholder to fill]. Nothing is invented; empty fields stay as placeholders.
Read it aloud and time it; aim for about a minute.Turn an experience into a story
Advice Situation, Task, Action, Result. Build two or three, each showing something different.
Your facts · template wording · [placeholder to fill]. Nothing is invented; empty fields stay as placeholders.
Know the market before you're asked
Advice How to answer. If you can, ask about the budget for the role first. If you give numbers, give a range you would genuinely accept, based on the job's level, your location and your experience. You can say you'd like to learn more about the role before naming a figure.
Follow up after the interview
Advice
Your facts · template wording · [placeholder to fill]. Nothing is invented; empty fields stay as placeholders.
Send it within a day of the interview.General interview questions
Advice Questions worth preparing for in most interviews, what a good answer shows, and how to prepare.
| Question | What a good answer shows | How to prepare |
|---|---|---|
| Tell me about yourself. | A short, relevant summary: where you are now, what you've done that fits this job, and why you want it. | Use the builder below; keep it to about a minute when spoken. |
| Why do you want this job? | That you understand the work and have a specific reason for wanting it. | Name one thing about the role and one about the employer, both true. |
| Why are you leaving your current job (or why did you leave your last one)? | That you're moving toward something, without criticising a past employer. | One honest sentence, then turn to what you want next. |
| What are your strengths? | Strengths that matter for this job, with proof. | Pick two that match the role and attach a short example to each. |
| What is a weakness you're working on? | Self-awareness and what you're doing about it. | A real, non-critical weakness plus the concrete step you're taking. |
| Tell me about a time you faced a challenge at work. | How you handle problems: what you did, not what the team did. | Prepare it as a STAR story. |
| Tell me about a mistake you made. | Ownership and learning. | A real mistake, what you did to fix it, and what you changed afterwards. |
| Describe a disagreement with a coworker. | How you work with people under pressure. | Focus on how you resolved it; keep the other person anonymous and fair. |
| Where do you see yourself in a few years? | Whether the job fits your direction. | Connect a realistic goal to this role. |
| What are your salary expectations? | Whether your range and theirs overlap. | See the salary section: research first, then give a range or ask about their budget. |
| Do you have any questions for us? | Interest and preparation. | Have three ready; see questions to ask. |
Role-specific practice questions, built from each occupation's O*NET profile, are on the role's interview page; pick a role above for the link.
Questions to ask the interviewer
Advice
- What does success look like in this role after the first three months?
- What are the biggest challenges for the person in this role right now?
- How is the team organised, and who would I work with most closely?
- How do you measure performance for this role?
- What does a typical week look like?
- What training or support is there for someone starting in this role?
- What are the next steps in the hiring process, and when should I expect to hear back?
Pick a role above for three questions tied to its main work activities.
Phone, video, in person or panel
Advice
Phone screen. Keep your resume and notes in front of you; stand or sit somewhere quiet; smile while you talk, it changes your tone.
Video interview. Test the link, camera and microphone beforehand; put the camera at eye level; close notifications.
In person. Plan the route and arrive a few minutes early; bring copies of your resume; ask beforehand who you'll meet.
Panel interview. Learn the panel's names and roles if you can; answer the person who asked, then include the others.
The night before
Advice
- Re-read the job posting and your resume.
- Practise your one-minute answer and two STAR stories out loud.
- Know the pay range you'd accept.
- Write down three questions to ask.
- Confirm the time, place or link, and who you'll meet.
Keep going
Applying elsewhere too? Build a cover letter from your own facts.
How this tool works
How this page is built
Role prep comes from O*NET 31.0 for the occupation: the three Core task statements with the highest importance rating, and the three highest-rated skills, knowledge areas and work activities (importance scale 1 to 5; estimates O*NET flags Recommend Suppress are excluded). Preparation prompts and role-specific questions are built mechanically from those lines; they describe the occupation, not any employer's interview.
Pay figures are BLS OEWS May 2025 national annual percentiles for the BLS occupation named beside them. Where TryHired's role is an O*NET specialty, BLS publishes pay only for the broader occupation, and the tool says so. The range check only compares numbers you type with those percentiles; it does not recommend a figure.
Roles listed: the 160 careers with a published TryHired career page and complete O*NET task, skill, knowledge and work-activity ratings. The builders assemble text in your browser from what you type and fixed template sentences; nothing is sent or stored.
- What a specific employer will ask: no public source records that, so the tool never claims it.
- What you will be offered: BLS percentiles describe what workers in an occupation earn, not offers.
- How likely any preparation is to get you hired: no reliable public data measures that.
- O*NET 31.0 Database, U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA), used under the CC BY 4.0 license. TryHired selected, ranked and combined the data; O*NET is not responsible for these pages.
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), May 2025 estimates. Public domain. bls.gov/oes
Disclosure. TryHired sells HIRED, a paid job-search program. This tool is free and doesn't require it.