There are different kinds of interviews.

Patterned Interviews: Highly structured, systematic. Same questions asked to each candidate in order to compare. Often used for initial screening of applicants. Frequently used during on-campus interviews.

Non-Directive Interviews: Interviewer asks open-ended questions to allow applicant to express himself/herself in a unique way. “Tell me something about yourself.”

Stress Interviews: Used to analyze the candidate’s ability to handle stressful situations. Used to weed out people who react defensively or are easily injured.

Group or Panel Interviews: Instead of one individual, a committee comprised of managers, co-workers or people from other departments examine a candidate.

Behavioral interviews: An interviewer asks you to describe situations such as “Tell me about a situation where you had a conflict with your family member. How did you handle it?” The recruiter will use the rule- past performance predicts future behavior. If you acted irrationally in the past, the recruiter will assume that you will elicit that behavior in the future. The recruiter will not move to the next question until you have specifically described a situation.

In order to understand better, let us divide the total aspect of facing an interview into: before, during and after the interview.

Article: Interviews Skills