Interview Cheatsheet

This is a straight-to-the-point distilled list of technical interview Do's and Don'ts. Some of these may apply to only phone screens on whiteboard interviews but most will apply to both. I revise this list before each of my interviews to remind myself of them and eventually internalized all of them to the point I do not have to rely on it anymore.

For a detailed walkthrough of interview preparation, refer to the "Preparing for a Coding Interview" section.

1. Before Interview

	Things
✅	Prepare pen, paper and earphones/headphones.
✅	Find a quiet environment with good Internet connection.
✅	Stay calm and composed.
✅	Familiarize yourself with the coding environment (CoderPad/CodePen). Set up the coding shortcuts, turn on autocompletion, tab spacing, etc.
✅	Dress comfortably. Usually you do not need to wear shirt and tie.

2. Introduction

	Things
✅	Introduce yourself in a few sentences under a minute or two.
✅	Mention interesting points that are relevant to the role you are applying for.
✅	Sound enthusiastic! Speak with a smile and you will naturally sound more engaging.
❌	Spend too long introducing yourself. The more time you spend talk the less time you have to code.

3. Upon Getting the Question

	Things
✅	Repeat the question back at the interviewer.
✅	Clarify input format and range.
✅	Work through a small example to ensure you understood the question.
✅	Explain a high level approach even if it is a brute force one.
✅	Improve upon the approach and optimize. Reduce duplicated work and cache repeated computations.
✅	Think carefully, then state and explain the time and space complexity of your approaches.
✅	If stuck, think about related problems you have seen before and how they were solved. Check out the tips in this section.
❌	Ignore information given to you. Every piece is important.
❌	Jump into coding straightaway.
❌	Start coding without interviewer's green light.
❌	Appear too unsure about your approach or analysis.

4. During Coding

	Things
✅	Practice good coding style. Clear variable names, consistent operator spacing, proper indentation, etc.
✅	Defensive coding. Check for nulls, empty collections, etc.
✅	Explain what you are coding/typing to the interviewer, what you are trying to achieve.
✅	Type/write at a reasonable speed.
✅	Write in a modular fashion. Extract out chunks of repeated code into functions.
✅	Use the hints given by the interviewer.
✅	Practice whiteboard space-management skills.
✅	Demonstrate mastery of your chosen programming language.
❌	Remain quiet the whole time.
❌	Spend too much time writing comments.
❌	Use extremely verbose variable names.
❌	Copy and paste code without checking.
❌	Interrupt your interviewer when they are talking. Usually if they speak, they are trying to give you hints or steer you in the right direction.
❌	Write too big (takes up too much space) or too small (illegible) if on a whiteboard.

5. After Coding

	Things
✅	Scan through your code for mistakes as if it was your first time seeing code written by someone else.
✅	Check for off-by-one errors.
✅	Come up with more test cases. Try extreme test cases.
✅	Step through your code with those test cases.
✅	Look out for places where you can refactor.
✅	Reiterate the time and space complexity of your code.
✅	Explain trade-offs and how the code/approach can be improved if given more time.
❌	Immediately announce that you are done coding.
❌	Argue with the interviewer.

6. Wrap Up

	Things
✅	Ask questions. More importantly, ask good and engaging questions that are tailored to the company! Pick some questions from this list.
✅	Thank the interviewer.
❌	End the interview without asking any questions.
❌	Ask about your interview performance. It can get awkward.

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