The best way to prepare yourself for the interview is to put yourself in your interviewers’ shoes, and ask yourself “what is the interviewer looking for?” Understand the reasoning behind the interviewers’ questions, give him the information he needs to make the right decision about you.

Show them that you’re more than a programmer.  When I interviewed candidates I wanted someone who had delivered projects, not just programmed a module inside a package. Someone who had worked through the design and deployment issues is much more valuable than some one who knows the alphabet soup of computer languages but has done the same thing over and over throughout his career.

You are not your resume; show me you’re a person.  Instead of going through a mental checklist, talk to me.  When I ask about your previous questions go beyond the question I’ve asked, explain the reasons behind the decisions you made, why did you choose REST over SOAP, what tools did you use? Tell me how you overcame problems and handled surprises, what parts of the project did you enjoy the most, what would you do differently now?

If you’ve done these things then the interviewer will have a good idea how you would handle a real project; if the salary negotiations go great, you’re hired!

Good luck with your next interview.

• Get the interview. Don’t forget the sole purpose a resume is to get the interview, a resume will not land the job for you. Do not try to get the job by overwhelming the reader with irrelevant information and boring details.
• Remember your audience; strive to write the resume from the viewpoint of the hiring manager. Do your best to provide him with the information he wants, then organize your resume by placing the most relevant information on top. Think, what would you look for if you were in his position. Does he really care that you enjoy sports? If you don’t know, ask a friend.
• Be specific not artificial. Try to avoid buzz words, they make you seem dishonest, instead be specific about your achievements, tell me why what you did was important and do it using active, not passive verbs. Also, please never mention the word synergy or “personal growth.”
• Write an objective. I consider objectives to be an important part of your resume, it help me understand the type of job you are looking for. I also like it when you’ve customized your objective for the specific job opening. Write the objective yourself, do not copy and paste from sites like monster.com. If your objective sounds anything like the following I will burn your resume: “To acquire a position that will allow me to utilize my education, creative skills and talents, while realizing my full potential on a professional level and maximizing my personal growth.“
• Make it pretty. Just because your resume was sent to me in an email, it doesn’t mean you can’t make your resume standout from the rest. Make your resume easy to read by avoiding decorative or fancy fonts, using white spaces and headings to separate different sections of your resume and keeping things neatly aligned in tables (+1 point for invisible borders).
• If you aren’t sure, follow the one-page rule. This is especially important when you are submitting your resume directly to the company. There is nothing inherently wrong with a two or three page resume, IF the job experience warrants it. When you’ve only worked as a cashier or a lifeguard during college then you should not have a two-page resume. When in doubt follow the one-page rule. Avoid creating resumes that are 1.5 pages long. If your resume is slightly over a page then fiddle with the font size, margins and gutters and get the resume to fit on a page.
• Keep your resume current. There’s nothing worse than writing your resume after you’ve been laid off. Update your resume after major projects or promotions; ignore the one page rule for the time being. When it’s time to find another job you’ll be ready. Sometimes the hardest part is getting started, use the following to help you get started: “Resume.doc, Resume.pdf.” Find a format you like and get started!