High Yield Interview Tips + Resources From a Successful Applicant Last Cycle! (Part 1)

Hey everyone :)

Hope you all had a great holiday break! As interviews have started to roll out, I wanted to give some personal tips that helped me greatly for the 2021-2022 interview cycle. I remember feeling pretty lost on how to approach preparing for interviews. Going through the process, I learned a lot and hope that my advice can act as a guide for those who were as lost as I was at the beginning of the process.

Just as a disclaimer, I’m by no means a total expert on the interview process - what I share here are just my personal opinions and strategies that helped me succeed. I personally approached these interviews with the intention of giving it my all and not letting up anything to chance so I practiced a ton. For context, I applied and interviewed at 4 schools (UofT, Queen’s, Ottawa, Mac) and was ultimately accepted to 3 schools, and WL’d at the other. By practicing the tips I’m about to outline, I improved my skills a lot and felt pretty confident by the time my first interview came up.

Also, if anybody wants some extra advice/resources or wants help with prep, feel free to PM me! I know how hard this process can be and I’m here to help.

IMO, these are the top 6 most important tips (Part 1 will have tips 1/2, part 2 will have tips 3/4, part 3 will have tips 5/6) :

1. Understand the interview format. Follow it to a tee when practicing.

Make sure you know how the interview will be run (e.g. panel vs MMI), synchronous or asynchronous, the number of stations, how long you’ll get for prep and speaking, and lastly whether or not there will be follow-ups. This information will typically be provided in the interview invite. Knowing this information is essential in structuring your practice - always practice as if it was the real interview! Follow the exact interview format for the school you’re preparing for to mitigate room for error come interview day.

2. Know the question types. Create a structure for each one.

There are 3 basic categories of questions that you’ll come across:

  1. Situational: (E.g. You are an ice cream shop manager and it is the middle of the hot season. The store is packed 24/7 and you need all the help you can get. One of your scoopers, Mandy, has been repeatedly late to their shift. She profusely apologies every time and gives you the explanation that she has to rush over from her second job she works in order to make ends meet. What would you do in this situation?)
  2. Opinion: (E.g. Multiple research studies have demonstrated that female physicians continue to get paid less than their male counterparts across all medical specialties. What do you think are the reasons behind this wage gap? Is this an issue that should be resolved, and if so, how so?)
  3. Personal: (E.g. Tell me about a time when the ends justified the means.)

Some of the question types will be mixed together and sometimes there will be questions that don’t follow any of the three categories. However, more often than not, the questions you’ll see will be one of the three types.

Create a structure for each question type so that no matter the situation, opinion, or personal input that the question asks for, you can apply a framework that will guide your answer and flow in a logical manner that is easy to understand for the interviewer.

Here is my structure for situational questions. I’ll use the the ice cream shop question above as an example:

A. Introduce yourself and your answer. Start by summarizing the situation, acknowledging its complexity, and roadmap the points that you will be discussing.

  • “Hi there, it's a pleasure to meet you. My name is John. I’ll be answering what I would do in this difficult situation in which I’m the manager of an ice cream shop and one of my coworkers is repeatedly late due to another job she is working to make ends meet. I’ll start by discussing the perspectives of the people involved in this situation and how I would effectively deal with this conflict.”

B. Discuss the perspectives of the stakeholders involved. For this point I would take on the perspective of myself, the person in conflict, and a more macro-level perspective. This section is a great place to shine in your critical thinking and you can also include personal experiences briefly.

  • “First I want to take on the perspectives of myself as the store manager, the business, and Mandy. From my own perspective, I am primarily concerned about the wellbeing of my coworker Mandy and I recognize that as the manager, I may hold certain privileges at the establishment, such as work hour scheduling, that could help her in this situation. I want to do whatever that is in my power to best help her. However, another perspective to keep in mind is of the ice cream shop as a business. If we are unable to meet customer expectations of a timely service, this may lead to customer dissatisfaction, a decreased brand reputation, and consequently a decrease in business. Lastly, taking on the perspective of Mandy, I can really empathize with her in this situation. Growing up in a single-mother household, my mom was working two full time jobs to make ends meet. In this scenario, there are many unknowns, such as why Mandy is in such a tough financial situation. Perhaps she too has children to take care of. Perhaps she has a family member that is sick. Perhaps she has debt in the form of student loans. As there are many unknowns about her personal situation, with her consent, I would want to have an open conversation with her."

C. Discuss how you would tackle the situation. I like to think of this section as two subsections. The first subsection is the manner in which I would have the conversation (e.g. be empathetic, be an active listener). The second subsection is what I would actually say and do. In this section, I ‘escalate’ in which I would provide if/then statements starting from the best case scenario and ending with the worst case scenario. I would always end my answer with a ‘bottom line’ in which I draw an ultimatum and a rationale for the ultimatum.

  1. SUBSECTION 1: “In this conversation with Mandy I would want to make sure that I am able to talk to her in a manner that is empathetic and comfortable for her. I’ve found in my past volunteer experience as a Crisis Support Worker that the best way to do so is to demonstrate active-listening by having open body language, using empathetic and validating statements, and having the conversation in a setting away from others out of respect for their privacy.”
  2. SUBSECTION 2: “Based on the conversation with Mandy, I would try to better understand her circumstances to best help her personal and financial situation. For example, if it's the case that her financial situation is due to having children, I would try referring her to charitable organizations such as the Salivation Army that would be able to provide funds for expenditures like groceries or provide free daycare service. Hopefully this will free up time in her schedule to reduce the burden on her shoulders and allow for her to come to work on time. If she continues to come late to her shifts after providing her with external support, I could try to discuss with her a shift swap that may work better with her personal life. If even after these shift swaps she continues to come late, I will have to discuss with her the possibility of decreasing her hours at the store. Although decreasing her hours would affect her financial situation, as the store manager I ultimately have to consider the impact this is having on customer service and the overall business. Even after reducing her hours I will continually try to support Mandy as much as possible.”

Throughout my answer I try to interweave small sections about my personal experiences that make me unique. I found this to be the best way to answer situational questions as it gives the interviewer an idea of who you are and your qualifications, while still answering the question.

Extra section: Additional resources

That’s it for part 1 of my interview tips! I split it into 3 parts because I didn’t want it to get too long for a reddit post. I hope you found it helpful. If anybody wants some extra advice/resources that didn’t make it to the brain dump, have questions about the tips, or want help with prep, feel free to PM me! Best of luck to everyone :)