Interview glossary

Interview terms, explained.

Plain-language definitions of the words that come up across job, coding, behavioural, IELTS and visa interviews — so nothing on the day is a surprise.

Behavioral Technical Process Abroad & English

Behavioral

STAR methodaka STAR technique: A four-part structure for answering behavioural questions — Situation, Task, Action, Result. You set the scene, state your responsibility, describe what you personally did, then quantify the outcome, so a “tell me about a time…” answer stays tight and memorable.
Behavioral interviewaka behavioural interview, competency interview: An interview that asks about real past situations (“Tell me about a time you…”) on the premise that past behaviour predicts future performance. Answers are best delivered as short structured stories using the STAR method.
Competency: A specific, assessable skill or behaviour an interview is scoring for — such as ownership, collaboration, communication or dealing with conflict. Job descriptions usually hint at the competencies a company will probe.
Situational questionaka hypothetical question: A “what would you do if…” question about a hypothetical scenario, rather than a past event. You're being scored on judgement and approach, so reason out loud through your assumptions, options and trade-offs.
Elevator pitch: A 30–90 second self-introduction answering “tell me about yourself”. The cleanest version follows a present–past–future structure: who you are now, the experience that makes you a fit, and why you want this specific role.

Technical

System design interview: An open-ended round where you architect a large system (e.g. a URL shortener or a news feed) end-to-end. You're assessed on requirements gathering, high-level design, data modelling, scaling, and the trade-offs you weigh — not a single correct answer.
Big-O notationaka asymptotic complexity: A way to describe how an algorithm's running time or memory grows as the input grows, ignoring constants — e.g. O(1) constant, O(n) linear, O(n log n), O(n²). Interviewers use it to compare the efficiency of your approach.
Time & space complexity: Time complexity is how the number of operations grows with input size; space complexity is how much extra memory it needs. In coding interviews you're expected to state both for your solution, usually in Big-O terms.
REST APIaka RESTful API: An architectural style for web APIs that models everything as resources addressed by URLs and manipulated with standard HTTP methods (GET, POST, PUT, DELETE). It's stateless — each request carries everything the server needs.
Idempotency: A property where making the same request many times has the same effect as making it once. It matters for reliable APIs — a retried payment or a re-sent PUT shouldn't charge twice or duplicate data.
CAP theorem: A principle stating a distributed data store can guarantee at most two of Consistency, Availability and Partition tolerance at once. Because network partitions are unavoidable, real systems trade off consistency against availability.
Live codingaka coding round, whiteboard coding: A round where you write and explain code in real time while the interviewer watches. You're judged as much on how you communicate your approach, handle edge cases and test your work as on reaching a correct solution.

Process

ATS (Applicant Tracking System)aka applicant tracking system, resume screener: Software companies use to collect and filter applications, often ranking résumés by keywords before a human reads them. Matching the job description's exact terms (and avoiding heavy formatting) helps your CV get through.
Phone screenaka recruiter screen, initial screen: A short first-round call (with a recruiter or AI screener) to confirm the basics — your background, motivation, availability and salary range — before you meet the hiring team. It's a filter, so be concise and specific.
Take-home assignmentaka take-home test, work sample: A task you complete on your own time — a coding project, a case study or a written exercise — to demonstrate real work. Interviewers look for clean structure, clear reasoning and that you followed the brief.
Panel interview: An interview conducted by several people at once — often HR, a technical lead and a hiring manager — each probing different areas. Make eye contact with whoever asked, then address the group when you answer.
HR roundaka fit interview, values interview: A conversation focused on motivation, culture fit, expectations and logistics rather than deep technical skill. It's where enthusiasm for the specific role and honest, well-framed answers about your goals matter most.
Whiteboard interview: A problem-solving round where you work through a question on a whiteboard (or shared doc) without running code. Thinking aloud, clarifying the problem, and structuring your approach count for as much as the final answer.

Abroad & English

IELTS Speakingaka IELTS speaking test: The spoken part of the IELTS English test — a ~11–14 minute interview in three parts, scored 0–9 on fluency & coherence, lexical resource, grammatical range & accuracy, and pronunciation. It's required for many study, work and visa applications abroad.
IELTS band score: IELTS results are reported as a band from 0 to 9 (in half-point steps) for each of the four skills and overall. Most skilled-work and university routes ask for an overall band around 6.0–7.5 depending on the country and role.
Visa interviewaka consular interview: A short interview with a consular officer to decide a study, work or visitor visa. Officers assess whether your plans, funds and ties are genuine and consistent, so calm, honest, concise answers that match your paperwork matter most.
Accent-fair scoring: Grading an answer on what you say — its content, structure and clarity — rather than how your accent sounds. Aevrofy scores content and English separately and coaches clarity, so a non-native accent never lowers your readiness score.
Readiness score: Aevrofy's 0–100 headline number summarising how prepared you are after a mock interview, blended from your content and communication scores across every answer. It comes with a study plan targeting your weakest areas.

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