Interview preparation tips
1. Ensure you spend some time familiarising yourself with the discipline and/or team that you are interviewing with you. You can do this by searching for the specialism on the Buro Happold website.
2. Check out our exciting projects! It is a great way to learn more about our work and methodology. This will also give you ideas around talking points during your interview.
3. Make sure you familiarise yourself with the key focuses of the role and the type of work you would get involved in (you can find this in the job advert). It is important to think about previous experience or projects that you can discuss during your interview to demonstrate the relevance of the skills/experience you have to the role. We are happy to hear about real life experience or relevant academic projects you may have been involved in.
4. We sometimes ask candidates to prepare an interview task, the recruitment team would share the details of this with you beforehand. If you need any additional support or guidance, please reach out to the recruitment team.
5. Finally, the interview is equally an opportunity for you to get to know us better too! Feel free to think or note down some questions as part of your interview preparation to ask the interviewers.
Interview questions - preparation
During the interview, you may be asked a variety of different questions that are typically competency-based. There can also be a mixture of opinion question and behavioural interview questions that will allow you to demonstrate the relevance of your skills and experience. This can be through your academic studies/projects, work experience and volunteering examples.
Review the job advert that you applied for to remind yourself of the key criteria of the role so you can prepare your answers.
If you have misplaced this, you can also log into your account on the career page to review your past applications. Alternatively, you can ask your contact in the recruitment team to send you a copy.
A common interview question preparation tool is adopting the STAR Technique when mapping out your answer:
Situation – the situation you had to deal with.
Task – the task you were given to do.
Action – the action you took.
Result – what happened as a result of your action and what you learned from the experience.
Interview structure:
The interview structure can vary from time to time, however the standard format would be as follows:
Introductions -
- We will introduce ourselves.
- Explain how the interview will be structured.
- Talk about what you hope to get out of the interview and what it is you’re looking for
Interview task -
If there is an interview presentation task set, you will kick off the meeting with your presentation shortly after the introductions.
Q&A -
The remainder of the interview will be a series of competency style interview questions based on the role you are interviewing for, assessing both your technical capabilities.
Closing -
After the interviewers have concluded their questioning, they will allocate some time at the end so you have an opportunity to ask any questions you may have.
Decision/feedback -
We aim to get back to candidates within 2-4 weeks of their interview in regard to the outcome. If you have a change of circumstances or simply want a follow up, please reach out to the recruitment team.
The recruitment process
We place great importance on a having a safe and inclusive environment and will seek to make any arrangements that may be required to enable all who work with us to thrive. We have flexible working hours and hybrid working, and welcome applications from all backgrounds and walks of life. If you have any questions about how this could apply to your specific circumstances or
if there is anything we can offer to make the application experience more comfortable for you, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us.
Now you know the process, why not take a look at Buro Happold's open opportunities and apply!