How to prepare for a job interview in 7 days
A day-by-day plan to prepare for a job interview: research the company, build your answers, rehearse out loud and walk in with questions of your own.
- 5 min read
- 9 sections
On this page
- 01 Day 1 — Take the job description apart
- 02 Day 2 — Research the company, not just its website
- 03 Day 3 — Write five stories
- 04 Day 4 — Prepare the questions that always come
- 05 Day 5 — Rehearse out loud
- 06 Day 6 — Prepare the end of the interview
- 07 Day 7 — Logistics, then rest
- 08 On the day
- 09 Practise the whole interview before it counts
In short
Preparing for a job interview takes about a week of short sessions. Study the job description and the company, write five stories from your experience that prove the skills the job asks for, prepare your introduction and your salary range, then rehearse out loud — ideally in a simulated interview — and finish with the practical details and two questions of your own for the recruiter.
Most candidates prepare for an interview by reading a list of questions the night before. Then the first real question arrives, and the answer that sounded fine in their head comes out twice as long and half as clear.
Preparation is not reading. It is deciding in advance what you will say, and then saying it out loud enough times that it survives the stress of the room. A week of short sessions does that better than one long evening.
Day 1 — Take the job description apart
Print the offer and underline every skill, tool and behaviour it names. Then sort them:
Must-haves — the things repeated, or listed first. These are what the interview will test.
Nice-to-haves — the things the recruiter will be glad to hear but will not reject you for missing.
Hidden expectations — read between the lines. "Fast-paced environment" means they will ask how you handle pressure. "Cross-functional" means they will ask about a disagreement with another team.
By the end of the day you should have a list of six to eight things the recruiter needs to believe about you.
Day 2 — Research the company, not just its website
Read the "about" page, but do not stop there. Look at recent news, the company's LinkedIn posts, and the profiles of people in the team you would join. You are looking for three things:
- what the company sells, and to whom, in one sentence;
- what has changed recently — a new product, a new market, a hiring wave;
- why this role exists now.
That last one is the question behind half the interview. If you can guess it, you can answer as the solution to their problem rather than as one more applicant.
Day 3 — Write five stories
Recruiters do not believe adjectives. "I am rigorous" proves nothing; the story of the bug you found before a release does.
Take your list from Day 1 and find, for each important skill, a real situation from your studies, your internship or your job that proves it. Five strong stories usually cover a whole interview, because one good story can answer several questions.
Write each one with the STAR method: the situation, the task, what you did, and the result — with a number if you have one. Keep each to about a minute when spoken.
Day 4 — Prepare the questions that always come
Some questions appear in almost every interview, so there is no excuse to meet them unprepared:
- Tell me about yourself — ninety seconds, present to past to future, ending on why this job.
- Why do you want to work here? — use what you found on Day 2.
- What are your strengths and weaknesses? — a real weakness, with what you are doing about it.
- Where do you see yourself in five years?
- What are your salary expectations? — a researched range, not "whatever you offer".
The full list, with what each question is really testing, is in the most common interview questions.
Day 5 — Rehearse out loud
This is the day most candidates skip, and the one that makes the difference. An answer you have only thought about is a draft. An answer you have said out loud five times is ready.
Three ways to rehearse, from weakest to strongest:
Alone, recording yourself. Better than nothing. Listen back for length, filler words ("um", "you know") and the moment you lose the thread.
With a friend. Useful for nerves, but a friend rarely asks the awkward follow-up, and rarely tells you the honest truth.
In a simulated interview. An interview simulator asks questions built from your CV and the role, follows up when an answer is vague, and gives you a score and written feedback afterwards. It is the closest thing to the real room you can repeat as often as you need.
Day 6 — Prepare the end of the interview
"Do you have any questions for us?" is not a formality. It is the last thing the recruiter remembers. Prepare two or three questions to ask at the end — about the team, the first months in the job, how success is measured.
Then decide your closing sentence: one line on why you want the job and what you would bring.
Day 7 — Logistics, then rest
- Confirm the time, the address or the video link, and the name of the person you will meet.
- For a video interview, test the camera, the microphone and the connection from the exact place you will sit.
- Prepare your clothes, a printed CV and something to write on.
- Re-read your five stories once. Then stop.
A tired candidate who over-prepared the night before performs worse than a rested one who prepared during the week.
On the day
Arrive ten minutes early, or join the call five minutes early. Listen to the whole question before you answer. If you do not know something, say so and say how you would find out — recruiters remember an honest "I don't know" far better than a confident invention.
Practise the whole interview before it counts
The hardest part to arrange on your own is Day 5: someone who asks the questions of your target job, in the language of the interview, and tells you honestly what did not work. Talk2Hire is built for exactly that — an AI interviewer that runs a full HR or technical interview from your CV, then a scored report, and live sessions with real recruiters when you want the final rehearsal.
Read next: the most common interview questions and the recruitment process, step by step.
Reading about it is not practising it.
Take a real interview — an AI interviewer that asks follow-up questions, or a live session with a working recruiter. Every session ends with a recording and a scored report.