We asked job seekers what they wanted to know.

I observe interview boards and note where qualified candidates fail the job interview. I created Interview Ready to help you understand and avoid those failure points.

Job offers don’t always go to the best-qualified candidates. They often go to the candidate who presents the best case for their candidacy by coming across as credible and memorable.

Most competitors tell you to think of questions you may be asked, or give you a long list of common questions to pick from.

Interview Builder lets you build a targeted set of job-specific interview questions for each job you apply for, in about ten minutes. You identify your best examples and practice your answers to the job-relevant questions. The follow-up questions help you pull out the rich details interviewers need to feel confident in selecting you.

Take the free assessment and see the topics it addresses. If you are confident you know each one, you are extremely well prepared. If you are unsure, Interview Ready can be a huge help. Avoiding simple mistakes is a key part of having a great interview.

Understand what the company does, who their customers are, what challenges they are experiencing, and what is being said about them in the news. Employers take notice when a candidate can tell them a lot about their organization — it shows motivation, and that you know how you can add value.

Your answers should clearly demonstrate what you can do for the employer, not what they can do for you. Another way to stand out is to ask great questions at the end of the interview; untrained candidates miss that opportunity.

Users have told us the Interview Builder tool was extremely helpful in building their confidence. It let them create job-specific interview packets and practice out loud. The follow-up questions helped them provide the rich details employers needed to hear to feel confident extending a job offer.

The common failure points are: not knowing how to prepare and trying to wing it; being unable to mention at least three items listed in the job description; not asking about the interview format when the invitation arrives; not knowing how to create a favourable impression in the first minute; not realising the interview started with the invitation; not knowing the best way to answer “tell me a little about yourself”; not understanding biases or how to read the interviewers; not knowing how to engage them; not knowing how to read a job description to identify interview topics; failing to connect skills to job requirements; giving canned answers that come across as fake; not asking great questions at the end; and sending generic thank-you notes that fail to offer a solution to the employer’s key challenges.

Today’s interviewers are trained. Organizations large and small understand that the people they hire directly impact their success or failure.

Trained interviewers target three areas: can you do the job, will you do the job (motivation), and will you fit — with their culture, team and management style. Untrained interviewers tend to go over your resume and ask hypothetical questions. Understanding how to excel in both is your competitive advantage.

Recruiters are looking for a fit between your background and the job opening. Use Interview Builder to build a set of job-specific questions based on the situations and tasks listed in the job description, identify your best examples for each, and practice your answers out loud. The more you can show how you fit the requirements, the greater the chance of being invited for a formal interview.

You have a lot of transferable skills you acquired at school — you just weren’t being paid. You met deadlines, wrote reports and essays, made compelling arguments, made decisions that impacted your projects, led teams and designed campaigns.

Interview Builder lets you build job-specific behavioral and traditional interview questions and practice your answers out loud, instead of wasting time answering random questions.

Moving into a senior leadership role involves demonstrating proficiency with a set of management competencies. Interview Ready for Managers and Executives includes those competencies and targeted behavioral interview questions, so you can anticipate the questions and identify your best example for each.

Ageism is real, and today it starts around 45. Mature workers need to prepare for the hidden questions that may be in the back of a recruiter’s or hiring manager’s mind. An untrained interviewer may ask a younger worker “how long do you plan to work here?” and a mature worker “how long do you plan to keep working?” — notice the difference.

The astute job seeker tells the interviewer they applied because they are passionate about the job, and explains how they plan to add maximum value through knowledge, mentoring and contacts, as well as working effectively for a younger manager.

Take the free assessment — the questions will show you the topics you would need to research. Interview Ready offers 20+ years of insight from training employers on how to hire, tested and used by leading global employers, and it took two years to build. It includes video clips of career advisors from MIT, Harvard and Williams College, as well as advice from hiring managers and recruiters at global firms.

The cost is roughly one day’s wages. If it shortens your job search by a single day, it has paid for itself. In the US, many job search expenses are tax-deductible — check with your accountant. And you may be competing against a national or global pool, since many jobs now offer remote work. According to a Glassdoor report, a corporate opening can attract 250+ resumes; four to six candidates get interviewed and one is hired.

Untrained interviewers tend to ask traditional questions: why are you the best person for the job, why should I hire you, where do you see yourself in five years, how would you handle a problem customer.

Interview Ready teaches you to answer those with real examples from your education and experience. Providing real stories in answer to hypothetical questions removes doubt and makes you memorable. Employers hire people they feel confident can do the job, will do the job, and will fit in.