The day my mock interview script fell apart in front of 3 strangers

Last month I signed up for a mock interview session with actual recruiters at a career center in Austin. I had my answers memorized, STAR format, all that. Then the first question was about a time I failed a project, and I froze, totally blanked on my script. I just started rambling about a group project in 2022 where we missed a deadline because our Slack channel got deleted. The recruiter actually laughed and said that real answer was way better than the canned one. Has anyone else found that ditching the script helps more than practicing it?

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graceprice11d ago

Laughing at how relatable this is... I spent a whole week memorizing answers for a practice interview once, and the second they asked me something unexpected, I bailed on the script and told them about the time I accidentally emailed the whole company asking where the "good snacks" were. Shockingly, they liked it way more than my rehearsed corporate nonsense. Honestly, the canned stuff sounds like a robot wrote it, and recruiters can smell that from a mile away. Maybe the trick is to just memorize the key points and then let your brain go off-script when it needs to.