How to Act During a Technical Interview: A No-Nonsense Guide

Technical interviews can be high-pressure situations, but they don’t have to be. Whether you're interviewing for your first role or aiming for a senior engineering position, success comes down to a few key behaviors: preparation, communication, and composure.

Here’s a straightforward guide on how to act during a technical interview—and actually leave a great impression.

1. Focus on Fundamentals

Before you walk into the interview, make sure you’ve got the basics down. You’re not expected to know every advanced algorithm off the top of your head, but you should be comfortable with:

• Arrays, strings, linked lists, and trees
• Hash maps and sets
• Recursion, iteration, sorting, and searching
• Time and space complexity (Big-O analysis)

For more experienced candidates, system design concepts may also come into play. Prepare accordingly.

2. Talk Through Your Process

Interviewers want to understand how you think—not just see a correct answer. From the moment the problem is introduced, start talking:

• Rephrase the question in your own words to confirm understanding
• Ask clarifying questions before writing any code
• Discuss your plan, edge cases, and trade-offs out loud

If you run into problems or change your approach mid-way, explain why. Clear communication can often make the difference between a pass and a fail.

3. Don’t Panic Under Pressure

Getting stuck is normal. Everyone does at some point. What matters is how you respond:

• Pause, take a breath, and review what you’ve done so far
• Try to debug systematically—use print statements, trace logic, test inputs
• If something doesn’t make sense, ask for clarification. Silence hurts more than questions.

Interviewers aren’t just testing your knowledge—they’re observing your problem-solving process.

4. Write Clean, Understandable Code

You won’t be judged on flashy tricks or ultra-optimized one-liners. Instead, focus on writing code that’s:

• Well-structured and easy to follow
• Properly indented, with clear variable names
• Modular and logical
• Covering common edge cases (as time allows)

Think: “Would someone else understand this code without asking me questions?”

5. Ask Questions

Good candidates ask questions. Great candidates ask the right ones:

• Confirm problem constraints and expected input/output
• Bring up edge cases proactively
• Show curiosity about the team or role at the end of the interview

This shows you’re not just trying to “pass”—you’re engaged, thorough, and collaborative.

6. Stay Real, Stay Professional

There’s no need to pretend. If you don’t know something, say so—but follow it up with how you’d go about learning it. Keep your tone positive and focused:

• Be respectful and concise
• Don’t over-sell or underplay your experience
• Be yourself—but the professional, team-friendly version

Confidence is good. Humility paired with clarity? Even better.

Bonus: Need Help? Try Ghost Coder

If you're still feeling stuck or anxious about technical interviews, you're not alone. The pressure is real—but you don’t have to face it alone.

Ghost Coder is a real-time technical interview assistant that helps you stay on track, catch mistakes, and build confidence without giving you the answers. Whether you need help structuring your solution or getting unstuck mid-session, it’s like having a calm, experienced engineer in your corner.

Use it to sharpen your interview skills, reduce stress, and walk in with a plan.