A one-page interview prep sheet
Copy a short worksheet for one interview. Keep the role, your best example, the call details and your questions together.
Ghosted editorialPublished 12 min read
On this page
- Five lines for the interview in front of you
- Why one page beats a folder of notes
- What goes on each line
- Find the problem the job exists to solve
- One story, in three short parts
- Ask something only this job can answer
- Use it during the call
- Four things to settle before the call
- When a prep sheet stops helping
- A checklist for the hour before
- Fill in the last line before anything else
- Questions people ask about interview prep
The sheet
Five lines for the interview in front of you
That’s the whole sheet. Fill in the first four lines the day before, keep it beside you on the call, and fill in the last one before you hang up.
Start here
Why one page beats a folder of notes
Most interview prep produces too much paper: pages on the company, twenty likely questions, three drafts of “tell me about yourself”. Then the call starts, Jo asks something, and you can’t find anything in it.
A prep sheet is for the call itself, not the night before. During an interview you don’t read, you glance, and a glance has room for a line. So the sheet keeps only what you need under pressure: who you’re talking to, what they need, the story you’ll tell, the question you’ll ask, and what happens next.
A folder of notes
- Good for learning about the company the week before
- Too long to search while someone is talking
- Tends to turn into a script you read aloud
One page
- Made for a glance during the call
- One example ready, chosen for this job
- Ends with the next step, written down
Nothing written down
- Fine for a kind of conversation you’ve had many times
- Easy to blank on names, times and your best example
- Nothing to check when the follow-up is due
Line by line
What goes on each line
Each line answers a question you’ll need answered mid-call. The examples come from Alex’s sheet for a Support Engineer interview with Jo.
Meeting
Who, their role, the time in their time zone, and where the link is: “Jo, support lead, 14:00 London time, calendar invite”. Their role tells you what they’ll listen for. A recruiter checks fit, pay and dates; the person you’d work for checks the work.
What they need
One problem the job exists to solve, in the posting’s words where you can. Not the list of requirements: the reason someone approved the hire. “Customers lose time repeating the same troubleshooting steps.”
My example
A time you dealt with that problem, or one like it, in three short parts: what happened, what you did, what changed. “I wrote a handoff note so the next agent could pick up the case.”
What I want to ask
One question about the actual work, ideally one your example leads into. “What makes a handoff useful to your engineering team?” shows you’ve pictured the job, and the answer tells you something you need.
After the call
Left empty until the end. Who does what next, and by when: “Jo will email the exercise on Thursday.” It’s the line people skip, and the one that tells you when to follow up.
Do the reading
Find the problem the job exists to solve
A job gets posted because something isn’t getting done. The requirements list says who they hope to hire; a sentence or two elsewhere says why. That sentence goes on your second line, and the rest of the interview should answer it.
Where to look. The first paragraph, which often says what changed. Lines that start “You’ll own…” or “You’ll help us…”. Words that come up more than once. And the product itself: if you can use it or read its help pages before the call, do.
| The posting says | What they need |
|---|---|
| “You’ll own escalations between support and engineering” | Cases get stuck between the two teams |
| “Help us grow our help centre” | Customers lose time repeating the same troubleshooting steps |
| “Our customer base is growing fast” | The queue is growing faster than the team |
| “Write clear, reproducible bug reports” | Developers can’t act on what customers report |
Pick one. If two look equally important, pick the one your best example answers. You can mention the other if it comes up. Trying to prepare for everything is how a sheet turns back into a folder.
33%
Not researching the company or industry before the interview topped the list of the most damaging mistakes an applicant can make, cited by 33% of the 300 hiring managers in Robert Half’s Australian survey.
Source: Robert Half, survey of 300 Australian hiring managers, 2022
Your example
One story, in three short parts
Interviewers ask about what you’ve done because it’s better evidence than what you say you’d do. “Tell me about a time…” is the usual form, and one well-chosen story answers most versions of it. Choose it for this job’s problem, not because it’s your proudest moment. Here’s Alex’s, in full:
- What happened Cases bounced between agents, and customers had to explain their problem again each time.
- What I did I wrote a handoff note for each case: what the customer had tried, what we’d ruled out, and what to try next.
- What changed The next agent could pick up a case without asking the customer to start over, and the note became a team habit.
On the sheet, that whole story is one line: “I wrote a handoff note so the next agent could pick up the case.” The rest is in your head. The line is there to start you off, not to be read out.
Say what you did
“I”, not “we”, for your part. The team’s result is the setting; your part is the answer.
Pick a recent one
A story from this year or last is easier to tell in detail, and the details are what make it believable.
Keep a spare
A second story in your head, not on the sheet, for a question the first one doesn’t fit.
r = .42
How closely structured interviews predicted job performance in Sackett and colleagues’ 2022 re-analysis, where 1 would be a perfect match. No other hiring method they compared scored higher. These interviews work best when they’re built from a close study of the job.
Source: SIOP’s TIP, on Sackett, Zhang, Berry and Lievens (2022)
Your question
Ask something only this job can answer
Near the end, you’ll be asked if you have any questions. “No, I think you’ve covered everything” ends the call on nothing. One real question about the work shows you’ve pictured doing the job, gets you something you need to decide, and gives the conversation a last useful turn.
| Instead of | Ask |
|---|---|
| What’s the culture like? | How does support hand a case to engineering? |
| What does a typical day look like? | What did the last person in this role spend most of their week on? |
| Is there room to grow? | What would you want this person doing that nobody has time for now? |
Questions about pay, holidays and start dates are fair. They’re usually best put to the recruiter, who can answer them, unless the interviewer brings them up first.
Write it down anyway
The question you thought of in the shower tends to vanish the moment they say “Any questions for us?” One written line is enough to bring it back.
On the day
Use it during the call
Keep the CV you sent nearby. If the same example comes up twice, it’s fine to pause and choose another. Before you leave, ask what happens next. Write down the answer while it’s fresh. “Jo will email Thursday” is easier to act on than “good interview.”
Not sure which version of your CV they have? Here’s how to find the one you sent.
On a video call
- Put the sheet just below the camera, so a glance looks like attention
- Paper beats a second window you might share by mistake
- Open the link the day before, not at 13:58
On the phone
- Spread the sheet and your CV out in front of you
- Pick somewhere quiet, with signal for the whole call
- Write the next step while you’re still on the line
In person
- A printed sheet in a folder is normal; nobody minds
- Glance at it while they talk, not while you answer
- Read your question from the page if you need to
Notes in an interview are normal. If it feels awkward, say so once: “I’ve jotted a few things down so I don’t forget to ask.” Then use them.
The day before
Four things to settle before the call
The time, in both time zones
Write theirs on the sheet and check yours in your calendar. If the email and the invite disagree, ask now, not five minutes before. If the time no longer works, reschedule it as soon as you know.
Where you’ll be
A quiet room with a charger and a signal. Or, for an interview in person, the address, the route and how long it really takes.
Which CV they’re reading
Open the exact file you sent. Their questions come from it, and the version you’ve edited since may say something different.
What you’ll say about pay and dates
If they ask your salary expectations or your notice period, you want an answer you chose calmly, not one you make up mid-sentence.
What goes wrong
When a prep sheet stops helping
It turns into a script
Full sentences on the page get read aloud, and it shows. Keep to a few words per line: enough to remind you, too few to read.
One sheet for the whole company
The recruiter’s screening call and the team round want different things. A new sheet for each meeting takes minutes, and it makes you think about who’s on the other side.
Five stories, none ready
A list of stories you could tell isn’t the same as one you’ve told out loud. Say your example once before the call, to a friend or to the wall.
Notes on a shared screen
If they ask you to share your screen for an exercise, close your notes first, or keep them on paper.
An empty last line
If you didn’t get a date, that’s worth knowing too. Write “no date given”, and decide when you’ll ask.
Last look
A checklist for the hour before
After the call
Fill in the last line before anything else
Before you close the tab or leave the building, write the next step: who does what, and by when. Then put that date in your calendar. If Jo said Thursday, Friday is when you check, and when you send a short note if nothing has come.
A thank-you the same day is optional and rarely wasted. Our follow-up email after an interview has one you can copy, and a check-in for when their date passes. If the silence goes on, here’s what to do when there’s no response after an interview.
Keep the sheet. If there’s a second round, start the new one from it. The next interviewer may ask about the story you told Jo, and you’ll want to tell it the same way. If they ask for references next, ask the people you have in mind before you send their names.
Questions
Questions people ask about interview prep
Is it OK to have notes in a job interview?
Yes. A page of notes is normal in person and invisible on a call. Glance at it while they talk and look up when you answer. Reading a script aloud is what to avoid, not having notes.
How long should I spend preparing?
Long enough to read the posting twice and choose your example with care. Filling in the sheet takes minutes; picking the problem and the story is the real work. If you have time left, spend it saying your example out loud.
Do I need a new sheet for each round?
Yes. Each meeting has a different person with a different question in mind. Start from the last sheet, change the first line, and check your example still fits.
What if they ask something my sheet doesn’t cover?
That will happen. The sheet makes sure what you can prepare is ready; it isn’t meant to cover everything. Take a moment, say “Let me think about that”, and answer from what you know.
Should I print it or keep it on screen?
Print it for an interview in person, and think about it for a video call too: paper can’t end up on a screen you share. Print gives the blank sheet with room to write; Copy gives the same lines as text.
What if the posting is too vague to find one problem?
Look at what the company sells and who uses it, and ask yourself what this role would fix. If you still can’t tell, make it your question: “What would you most like this person to fix first?”
Keep your prep with the interview.
Keep each interview, its link and your prep notes with the job you applied for.