What do you feel are the primary features and benefits of the Java programming language?

"When I started working with Java three years ago, the first huge benefit was the fact that the Java syntax was based on C++. At that time, I had a great working knowledge of C++ and my transition to Java was absolutely seamless. The other amazing feature that I've come to appreciate with Java is how robust the memory management is in exception handling and automatic garbage collection."

As a company that utilizes Java, PowerSchool and your interviewer want to make sure that you have an understanding of the Java programming language and they do so by asking this question. Obviously a language packed with unique features, talk about the features that you can speak the most knowledgeably about and tie your direct experience to.

Do you have any unique skills or past work experiences that we can't see on your resume that would benefit the team here at PowerSchool?

"In my current role as a data engineer, I have gotten the opportunity over the last five years to work with clients in many industries. One of the industries that I've worked most closely with has been the private insurance industry. This experience and my gaining of insider knowledge in the insurance industry would benefit me greatly if brought aboard the team here at PowerSchool."

This question is providing you the opportunity to potentially set yourself apart from your competition for this position. To do just that, it will be important for you to make sure that the unique skill or experience that you discuss matches with a critical need for PowerSchool and the position that you are interviewing for. Whether you talk about a unique skill or experience, your research on this job will prove vital in your ability to make sure that it impresses your interviewer.

What do you know about our products and how do you think you'll be able to handle a support role surrounding them?

"One of the main things that is attracting me to a position with PowerSchool will be the new opportunity to work solely with cloud based software. With my current experience in supporting server and data storage issues, I am confident in my ability to support the services here based on that experience."

This question allows your interviewer to gain insight into both your interest in this position and the skills that you will be able to bring to the table. To show your interest, be sure to do as much research on PowerSchool as possible and get to know their products. Ensuring that you know the job description from front to back is important as well. Then, talk about how you feel that your skills will apply to working with end users that are contacting about the software.

"Upon reading the job description for technical application support, it was easy for me to see that my skills were a perfect match for the position. It sounds like you are looking for an expert that can provide support on GlobalLink applications and has exceptional experience across many different scripting languages. As you can see from my resume, I have experience using Perl and Python and I feel like these experiences would help make a smooth transition for me into this role. On top of that, my cloud based experience would translate nicely to this role here at PowerSchool as well."

What SDLC models are you familiar in working with?

"During my training in software engineering and in my early career, the waterfall model was the standard. In this model, each phase of the development process happens in a set order and projects using this model are easily managed. But over time, as the development projects that I have led have become more complicated and intricate, I have implemented the spiral model. This model has allowed the ability of end users to give feedback early on and often during development and helps to build a more customized product to our customers."

As a software engineer, you are very familiar with the software development life cycle. For this question, your interviewer is looking to hear what models you have worked on in the past. While there isn't necessarily a right or wrong answer to this question, try to show your flexibility to working with different SDLC models by bringing up your past experiences. Then, show you have knowledge of different models like the waterfall model or agile model. It is also a good idea to use this question as an opportunity for you to learn more about PowerSchool by asking your interviewer which model they work off of.

"In my current position with XYZ Company, my department utilizes the agile model in development life cycle. Since our products are so tailored to the needs of our customers, we get a working product very early on in the process and then I work hand in hand with customers to fine tune the software moving forward. It is a very effective model that has built a great reputation for our software among customers. I also have familiarity working with the iterative model and it has similar advantages to the agile model. If I were hired here at PowerSchool, can you expand on what models you use here in your software development life cycle?"

If you were asked to review a colleague's code that they had written, what key things would you look for?

"As an experienced software engineer, I fully expect my colleagues to reach out to me for my insight and I never hesitate to provide open and honest feedback. When asked to do this, my main focus is ensuring that the code is readable and functional. If there are lines of code that need to be removed, I don't hesitate to let my colleague know that while also giving them feedback on why I feel it is unnecessary."

For this question, your interviewer will obviously be looking to hear that you have adequate knowledge when it comes to coding processes. But most importantly, your interviewer will be looking to gauge your ability to be a team player and focus on the bigger picture when working on a project. In your answer, focus on your attention to detail and your ability to help others when needed.

"When I'm asked to do this in my current position, my main focus is on regulatory requirements that were put in place for the project and security issues. I work with a team of great engineers that are very efficient coders and these two areas are most often overlooked."

What programming languages would you consider yourself fluent in?

"From the start of college, where software engineering grew into a passion for me, I've become very fluent in Java, JavaScript and C++. My current role has me working primarily with C++, but I pride myself on my ability and passion to learn new programming languages and would be able to do so if hired for this role with PowerSchool."

While this question gives your interviewer insight into the diversity of your programming language experience, they most importantly want to know that you are adaptable and able to learn on the fly if needed. Talk about the different languages that you consider yourself fluent in and, if possible, do as much research into PowerSchool as you can prior to your interview and try to speak to the specific languages that they work with.

"During my training to be an engineer and then in my current role since graduating, a majority of my experience falls within Python. My current role delves deeply into artificial intelligence and Python is awesome with this advanced technology. As I understand it from talking to another engineer here at PowerSchool, a requirement would be for me to learn Scala. Though I haven't worked directly with Scala, I believe my experience and willingness to learn would have me up and running in no time if hired for this role."

Do you consider yourself stronger in C++, C#, Java, or Python?

"In my last company, we had a bit of an outdated tech stack and used C# and .NET. I found myself fully immersed in those technologies, but had a strong desire to learn more and become more familiar with modern technologies and how I can apply that in my career. That's what has me so interested in this role. Over the last year, I've taken courses in Java and C++, which I noticed you prefer. I've become proficient in the skills and in side projects, applied my increasingly strong knowledge. I'm probably strongest professionally in C# as that has been where my experience lies, but my passion and dedication is on the Java and C++ side, as I feel that's the more modern alternative. I'm excited about the possibility of applying that knowledge in a role at PowerSchool."

Before your interview, do some research to understand what tech stack PowerSchool uses so you can best prepare and highlight your expertise. If you aren't as strong in one of the skills you feel is necessary, be sure to explain how you've used it and how you are growing your knowledge to become better. Be sure to be honest in your answer, as the company will likely test your strengths.

"I am motivated and excited about this new opportunity because it will challenge me to grow in my (X) skills. I love soccer and enjoy spending time with my teammates. I am interested in continuing my education by studying (Y) to further my career."

Do you have experience working with data in a cloud computing environment?

"My current organization has been using Apprenda, a PaaS, that allows us to develop, test and maintain our software projects. I also have experience mining and converting data off of public, community and private cloud networks. If hired here at PowerSchool, I think I would bring a wealth of cloud based experience to the data engineering team."

Over recent years, more and more companies are converting to cloud based computing services because the conversion allows them to save money and have better auditing trails. As a prospective data engineer with PowerSchool, your interviewer will be looking to hear that you are at least familiar with the concepts of working with cloud based data. Talk in details about the experiences you have while keeping your mind open to working with more in the future if hired with PowerSchool.

How do you keep up-to-date on new technologies and trends in this industry?

"I keep up to date on new technologies and trends through a variety of sources. I follow three different blogs from industry leaders as well as read multiple articles online per week."

One way that a potential employer will gauge 'fit' is by ensuring that you are passionate about your particular industry. Show the interviewer that you are passionate about your industry by openly discussing how you stay on top of industry trends.

"I keep up on new trends in this industry by taking additional coursework online, whenever possible. I also follow a few of my favorite influencers on social media."

Discuss a couple of software sales techniques. Which sales technique do you think is most effective for PowerSchool, and why?

"I recently read that free trial offers can increase conversions by up to 25% and, because, PowerSchool has a straightforward product, I believe it would be very effective to allow people to try it for free for 14 days. The prospective customer would quickly see that it's simple to navigate and incredibly helpful."

The interviewer would like to see that you have researched PowerSchool, putting some thought into the most significant selling features of their products and services. When it comes to software sales closing techniques, you could: - Offer a short trial for free - Have a great email marketing campaign showing off the features of your software - Give product or software demos, but keep the short - Sell pre-paid annual membershipsPerhaps you have some ideas of your own! Discuss which selling options you think would be the best fit for what PowerSchool is offering. Be ready to support your answer with facts.

"Since there are so many customizable features that come with your product, I feel that the best sales technique would be a free 30-minute demo, followed up with a short trial period. I think it would be important for prospective customers to see the product in action, and how it would work for them, specifically."

Here at PowerSchool, we utilize feasibility studies with our customers to consider all impacts of a new system for them. Do you have familiarity working with feasibility studies in your work as a software engineer?

"I do have familiarity with feasibility studies throughout my career as a software engineer. On a current project that I am working on, we utilized a study to analyze if the project we were tasked with could use current technologies available to us while meeting a timeline for completion. On my end, I had to spend time researching the resources that were available, gauge their functionality and come up with a plan for action based on that. Where the project stands today, we are on pace for delivering a revolutionary system for a large security industry customer."

To properly answer this question, make sure you understand the reasons why feasibility studies are important. In essence, a feasibility study helps to determine if conditions are right to implement a project. The study looks at economic, operation, legal and technical aspects of the project to determine if moving forward with the project is best for all involved. If you have experience in the studies, talk about a specific time that you utilized a study, the steps you took and explain why it was important to do in the end. Make sure that your interviewer walks away from the interview comfortable with your ability to utilize feasibility studies in your work.

In a technical support role here at PowerSchool, we expect that you would be able to bring great customer service skills to the role. Describe your customer service philosophy in the support that you would provide.

"To me, my job duties aren't fully satisfied if an end user leaves our conversation without a smile on their face. While any technical support specialist can handle the customer aspect of the job, few have the people skills to do so pleasantly for their customers. In any interaction that I have with a customer, I talk in a calm and boosting manner. If they are upset or mad about a situation, I reflectively listen and never place any blame back on them. By taking this approach, my customer surveys in my current position have been excellent for the three years I've held that role."

While your interviewer will be able to get great insight into your technical expertise during your interviewer, this one question will allow you the opportunity to describe how you will bring solid interpersonal skills to the role. Your interview knows that customers will rely on you to provide quick and sensible support for their needs, but the expectation to do that in a pleasing manner is of utmost importance. Talk from a high level about your feelings on why providing great service is important and give an example or two of ways that you have done that in the past.

"If hired for this role here at PowerSchool, you'll quickly find that my mantra in working with customers is speed with a smile. To do this, I need to be resourceful in providing them with an answer or triaging them to the correct person. I need to be knowledgeable in our product base to give them answers with confidence. And last, but not least, I need to be positive in all interactions with them."

At PowerSchool we value organization. Tell us about a time when you were particularly effective on prioritizing tasks and completing a project on schedule.

"Last week I was asked to lead our team while our manager was away. I created a checklist of things that needed to be completed to reach our deadlines. I gathered the team to discuss our goals and asked for input and ideas to get us there. It was a great experience for me because not only was I able to exercise my leadership capabilities; I was also able to learn more about prioritizing, from my team."

An interviewer needs to hear that you have a plan in place to keep yourself organized. Start off by mentioning that you are typically an organized person. From here, dive into a recent time-consuming project that you were involved with. You might say, 'I recently was involved with a project that required 30 hours of my time in a two week period while I was also in the middle of several other projects.' Tell the interviewer that you started off by ensuring you had your schedule mapped out before you dove into your workload. Discuss if you made a to-do list, updated your calendar, or created a color-coded agenda. Share whatever organization method worked for you! Next, tell the interviewer how you prioritized the work. You may share that each day you sat down to determine the urgent needs for that day and marked them with a letter A. Perhaps you identified anything that would be nice to get done that day with a letter B. And, maybe you just left everything else that could wait for another day unmarked. Tell the interviewer how you diligently stuck with this plan for the duration of the project and how it allowed you to complete the project on time without any stress successfully.

If hired for this position here at PowerSchool, would you be comfortable handling overall project manager responsibilities for new software development?

"Looking to join the team here at PowerSchool directly out of college, I feel very confident in my abilities to manage the entire scope of a new development project. I have leadership experience as my campus' president of the software engineering club. In that role, I developed skills that would help me utilize staff and resources in the best way possible. During my internship, I was exposed to the planning stages of new projects and I have a very good feel of estimating the budget and length of time needed to have a fully functional system."

As a skilled software engineer, you have all of the necessary tools in your bag to be a successful engineer at PowerSchool. This question is allowing your interviewer to get a better sense of your project management skills and people skills if you were to join the team at PowerSchool. In your answer, talk about your ability to estimate the time and cost of a project, the staffing needed and the overall scope of planning for a particular project. If you have direct experience in being the lead on a large development project, be sure to discuss that experience with your interviewer.

"I would absolutely be comfortable if tasked with project manager duties here at PowerSchool. In my last two roles, I have led successful projects that started with great planning and budgeting process and went through to completion with great people and processes in place under my leadership. While it's not a regular duty for me in my current role, I always welcome leadership duties."

How do you ensure that you have a healthy work-life balance in your career?

"As I am passionate about my career as a UX designer, I am also passionate about my family. Any moments outside of work are spent coaching my kids traveling baseball teams in the summer months and then spending as many weekends as possible on the ski slopes. These activities help keep me active, physically fit and keep my mind centered on what it truly important in my life when work weeks get stressful."

In the fast paced world in software and technology development, heavy work loads and potential on-call duties have created a lot of burnout in professionals. Your interviewer is looking to hear that you are cognizant of the risks of burnout and that you do what is necessary to maintain your own personal health and well being and that of your family as well. While you can use this time to talk about personal interests or hobbies outside of work, try to focus on how these items help keep you refreshed for the work that you'll be doing for PowerSchool.

"Having watched many of my senior colleagues over time suffer from work burnout that has caused marital issues and health issues, I make it a priority to maintain a healthy balance between my work and my home life. My free time is spent in the outdoors with my wife, whether that be on the lakes and rivers fishing or biking around town. I consider myself fortunate to be considered for a position here at PowerSchool because I know that you put a focus on your employees maintaining this healthy balance because the organization realizes how important this is to be productive."

What do you think you will like about this role with PowerSchool?

"I look forward to helping companies by analyzing data that will help them make solid decisions surrounding their digital future."

The interviewer wants to hear what you are looking forward to learning and experiencing in this new position. Talk about what excites you! Share how this position will challenge you and help you grow. New opportunities are a chance for you to demonstrate your skills.

"I am looking forward to getting more experience in UI, and feel that PowerSchool is the best place for me. You have a great reputation for creating beautiful and easy to use products."

How do you feel cloud computing has positively impacted the software industry?

"Being in the software industry for over 20 years, I feel like the biggest impact that the cloud has had reflects directly to our customers in the software industry. In days of yore, we spent years working through software updates and releases. And now, I look to how we are continuously rolling out small scale, yet impactful, updates through the cloud and end users are able to see that impact the next day!"

While the reasons are plentiful as to how cloud computing has had a direct impact on developing and refining software for organizations, your interviewer is looking to hear which reasons you are willing to speak most passionately about. However you answer this question, try to either focus on the ease and accessibility for end users or cost savings for organizations in your answer.

"One commonly overlooked area where I feel cloud based systems have brought a major improvement is in analytics. Ten years ago, it took a lot of time and resources to pull relevant data to build analytics and visualization tools. Today, information can be automatically built to pull in the snap of a finger and that is something that I never take for granted in my work."

Here at PowerSchool, we ask our test engineers to follow specific QA protocols. What role do you feel QA plays in software development and testing?

"As a test engineer, I take great pride in my role of ensuring that systems go out to consumers as error free as possible. In my current role, I take the time to learn all of the system specifications that are laid out by our design engineers and customize my testing to follow those specifications."

As an experience software testing engineer, quality assurance should be ingrained in your brain and your interviewer is looking to get a sense of your personal feelings towards it in your work with this question. In your answer, be sure to highlight QA's importance in reducing errors, maintaining specifications, testing failure parameters and preventing defects from occurring. In the end, make sure that quality is your mantra in the eyes of your interviewer by giving an example or two of how you put QA in the forefront of your work.

"In my work throughout my career, quality assurance in my testing was an every minute of every day job on my part. While creating effective testing processes on new software is extremely important in following QA protocols, the recording of defects, issuing of reports and assisting the designers on fixing issues are equally important parts of the process that I'd love to let shine here at PowerSchool."

In Java, why shouldn't you use strings to store a password?

"To store a password, character array is the obvious best choice because character arrays are mutable. If a string was utilized to store passwords, a definite security risk would be present to anyone that would have access to the memory dump from the system."

While this may seem like a rudimentary question regarding your knowledge of Java, your interviewer is looking to ideally hear that you understand the principle differences between string and character arrays. Asking about the storage of passwords within a system gives you the opportunity here to point out the differences between the two. In the end, while explaining the differences, be sure to tie it back to the original question on why strings shouldn't be used to store passwords.

"This question simply boils down to a string being immutable. Because strings are a sequence of characters represented as a single data type, the system requires garbage creation to fully get rid of it out of memory. In my time designing software, I have used Char array and its mutable features to store passwords for the security of our end users "

The next cloud engineer that we hire here at PowerSchool needs to be able build a system that can handle a high amount of traffic. How would you test our system's ability to handle large amounts of traffic?

"Cloud computing has certainly revolutionized the storage of high amounts of data and a key piece that cloud based systems bring to the table are their elasticity for handling large amounts of traffic. I see my job as building a cloud based system to scale horizontally to be able to handle the most data and traffic possible. To test systems, I've used a few different tools that were all very accurate prior to go-live."

This question allows your interviewer to gain insight into your thought process and ability surrounding building a cloud network that has an architecture that can handle large amounts of traffic without failure. Some key points to focus on your answer are your ability to match capacity to system demand and use horizontal scaling in the design of the system.

"In my current position as a cloud engineer, I have utilized internet scale services like Amazon S3 and Elastic Load Balancing to ensure that our cloud systems could handle large volume that fluctuate seasonally. Because of the great functionality of the internet scale services, internal testing wasn't necessary as we knew we were in good hands through those services."

How do you stay organized and on track when working on multiple projects or duties at the same time?

"With any project that I am working on, I make sure to set benchmarks to meet deadlines ahead of time and set early personal deadlines to allow for some wiggle room. To do this, I am a proponent of using the Microsoft Outlook calendar and tasks functions to help keep me organized. I find that this method helps me stay on track with multiple projects while also leaving me wiggle room each day to fight the high needs fires that do come up in this job."

In this role with PowerSchool, you will likely be expected to manage multiple projects at the same time. Your ability to plan, manage deadlines and handle high needs items that come up on a regular basis will be essential to your success in this role and your interviewer is looking to hear how you plan for success. Whether you utilize an electronic tool or a written list, there are no right or wrong answers as long as you can prove in your answer that this method works out great for you.

"For me to stay on track, I make sure to take ten minutes at the end of each day to recap what was accomplished, what new came up on my task list and re-prioritizing my work for the next day. Then, upon arriving the next day and working through emails from the previous evening, I can adjust my task list for the day if needed. I tend to set aside two hours per day to work on long-term project needs while focusing a majority of my time on the short-term needs."

How do you feel artificial intelligence could further our business here at PowerSchool?

"Where I see artificial intelligence greatly impacting social media more in the future is through marketing and support from advertisers. In my current role, I've designed AI to spot popular search trends on our platform and this has enabled our sponsors to create creative and focused marketing campaigns to our users. If hired here at PowerSchool, I would love to continue this focus on AI seeking out popular trends with users."

As an AI engineering expert, you know that AI is now being utilized across many businesses and industries with great success. For this question, your interviewer is expecting that you have done your homework on PowerSchool and hopefully can be an outside the box thinker in coming up with new and creative solutions for their customers. Be sure that you do your research on the software systems that PowerSchool produces and think of creative ways that you can help benefit them.

"As you can see from my resume, I have vast amounts of experience in the financial and banking industries and I think this experience would transition nicely to a role here at PowerSchool. As you are probably seeing with your software here for the industry, the need to reach customers that are banking electronically is a very high need. The days of stopping by the corner bank are now a thing of the past. If hired for this role, I would love to help design chat bots and robotic help for customers. I have a vast amount of experience in designing and training chat bots in the industry and would love the bring that experience here."

PowerSchool uses business intelligence tools to improve sales performance. With which BI tools are you most familiar?

"I am most experienced in the Microsoft Business Intelligence platform, as this is what we use in my current role. I have been working with it for a couple of years now, and fully understand it's capabilities and features including the analysis and integration services, reporting, and its applications for creating and working with analytical data. I would say I am an advanced user in this tool. I see that PowerSchool uses Microsoft BI as well, which is great."

Business intelligence (BI) tools are applications used to collect information, process it, and structure that data in a way that makes sense. Generally, BI tools are used when a company is handling a considerable amount of unstructured data from their system. An example of an organization requiring a BI tool would be a hospital needing to organize patient health records. A useful business intelligence tool will bring a company's information to life through visuals (data visualization). Some of the most popular BI tools include: - Sisense - BIRT - icCube - Domo - Clear Analytics - Gooddata - IBM Cognos Intelligence - Looker - JasperSoft - Microsoft BIExplain to the interviewer with which tools you are most familiar. If you can, rate your knowledge in each as beginner, intermediate, advanced, or expert. This rating will help the interviewer to understand better where your strengths are. If the BI tools used at PowerSchool are mentioned, be sure to address your experience level of those as well.

"I saw in the PowerSchool job posting that you use Gooddata and MicroStrategy. I am an intermediate user in each of these tools. With Gooddata, I have used it for consolidating large amounts of data from the cloud. MicroStrategy is used in my current company to ensure all of our important data is held neatly in one place, where it's easy to sort and access."

As a consultant with PowerSchool, your role will be vital in gather information from our customers in building new technology for them. What would be your goals in an initial consultation with a new or existing client?

"As an experienced consultant looking to break into the technology field, I will break a lot of awesome client focused skills to your team. In an initial consultation, my number one goal is to learn the business of the client and listen to what they are looking for in my products. Once their need is known, I can knowledgeably speak to the products that I work with to help them create a custom solution to fit their needs. If hired for this position, my first order of business would be to work very closely with the design and engineering staff to know the possibilities of customization. From there, my natural ability to consult with clients would take over in a win-win situation for all involved."

Software consultants are the bridge between the end users and the development teams of new software to help come up with new and creative solutions for the business. In this role with PowerSchool, you will be expected to live in two different worlds and this question focuses on how you will work with end users of the companies products. In an initial consultation, focus your efforts on how you will learn the business needs of the client, talk about what can potentially be offered and then how you will start the creative problem solving process with them.

"In consulting with a new client or an existing client looking for system modifications, my number one goal in a first meeting with them would be to lay the framework for how we will move forward and to set expectations moving forward. I would look to understand their business needs and talk with them about all of the solutions possible for them with us as their software provider. From there, I have the ability to set expectations on a time frame for a solution proposal and we can move forward from there. At the end of a first meeting, I want to ensure that the key decision makers are comfortable with me and the business that I represent so they don't hesitate to reach out to me with questions or for clarification on items discussed."

In our consulting services here at PowerSchool, we often have to work with people who aren't very tech savvy. How would you handle a situation like this if hired for this role?

"In my days in software sales and consulting, I've found that the best approach with clients is to always discuss things in terms of their business results as opposed to the processes involved. I've found that clients aren't interested in how a software program works to pull information out of a data table. They want to know the steps they have to take to successfully pull the relevant information to them in their work and I try to focus my efforts on that. If I get the sense that a certain person has a good understanding of the software, I don't hesitate to brag a bit about the creative programs that were designed behind the scenes because they can definitely show appreciation for that."

When working onsite with clients on new software and new technologies, most front line employees working on the new system won't have the technical acumen that you possess. Because of this fact, your consulting services will have to be performed in a fashion that is easy to understand for the clients. Give your answer a personal touch by explaining your ability to work with clients on a one-on-one basis and customizing your approach with them based on their level of knowledge. From a high level, then talk about certain techniques that you've found to be useful in the past.

"Having a lot of experience doing this in my time consulting and training with external customers, there are many tools of the trade that can be implemented. I always avoid technical jargon and use wording that makes sense to a client to explain technical processes. I find that customers appreciate the use of meaningful analogies and presentations that have a lot of visuals to help understand new processes that we will be working with."

At PowerSchool, we rely on a full team effort to deliver top quality products to our customers. Tell me about a time that you worked well as part of a team. Are you comfortable in a similar role here?

"Throughout my career, I've always enjoyed working as part of a larger team on the job and this personal enjoyment started with my love of and participation in team sports like baseball and basketball. Growing up playing sports, I learned that each team member brought a unique skill set that could help us achieve our goals. Through a great coaching staff that knew how to make these individual skills shine, this same philosophy holds true for a team that is looking to design a new software system. I know that my skills as an engineer are just part of the final product and I work very well with designers, architects, analysts and sales to help build the greatest system possible."

While this potential role with PowerSchool will require your to be an independent worker that can think on your feet, you will also need to work as part of a larger team that is working toward one common goal. Because of this fact, your interviewer will want to hear that you thrive in an environment where you work with team members from other disciplines than you are trained in. In your example, stress to your interviewer that you have excellent communication skills and that you fully understand that every person on a team plays a vital role in the organization's success.

"I am a people person by nature and my current role has me working very closely with our engineering and design staff on writing technical manuals for our products. While I certainly can handle long days at my computer in solitude, my desire to work hand in hand with others really sets me apart from my peers in this field. I have excellent verbal, listening and written communication skills that, if hired here at PowerSchool, your entire team would appreciate from my first day on the job."

If you were confronted with a time where you wouldn't be able to meet a deadline here at PowerSchool, what steps would you take when you made that realization?

"In my current position, I am very used to handling multiple tasks and projects on a day to day basis. Last year, my team was tasked with what started as a low priority project. After assembling a team to initially discuss the details and set a deadline for completion with our management, the project unfortunately fell off the radar of everyone on the team with many more high priority projects coming up each week. As the initial project's deadline was within a week of being due, our CEO reached out to me for a progress report. I immediately took full responsibility for letting this fall off the radar and I ensured our CEO that we would have an updated timeline set by the end of the week. In doing this and completing the project to his satisfaction, this was really the tipping point in our department moving forward utilizing a detailed project management tracking system. To this day, I can't say enough about how appreciative I am about utilizing this awesome system. Moving forward, you can rest assured knowing that I take full accountability for my actions and do what is necessary to communicate new expectations and meet them fully."

At some point in any person's career, the inevitable happens and an important deadline needs to be missed. With your interviewer fully understanding this fact, they are solely interested in how you react to this situation and what you do to make the situation right. In your answer, focus on the refocused planning and communication needed while also avoiding blaming others for the situation. Your interviewer holds accountability as a desirable virtue, so be sure to take accountability for actions in your response.

"Having been in this situation before, I would first sit down to gather all the facts possible in the situation. What was the deadline, why wasn't it met and what can be done are all important questions moving forward. From there, communicating to all key parties is extremely important and doing so in a timely manner is critical. In this communication, taking accountability and setting new expectations for delivery in a concise and tactful manner will most often put stakeholders at ease and allow for successful completion."

What skills do you use to cope with the day to day stress and pressure on the job?

"Where many others get overtaken by stress to the point that they can't function in this field, high pressure situations sharpen my focus and that helps me work through them with ease. Last year, I was assigned a high priority, short notice project for a high profile customer. My manager gave it to me because of my proven success in those situations. From the start, I created a timeline for completion and mapped out a plan to make it happen. While staying in communication with my leaders and the client, I was able to create a great system update in just a few short weeks."

In modern technology industries, consumer demand has led to high volume of work and high pressure situations to work on tight deadlines. To prove that you are able to handle high stress, high pressure situations on the job, your interviewer is looking to hear first hand how you handle this type of environment in your own words. As you answer the question, try to turn potential perceived stress into a positive by highlighting your personal skills that enable you to perform well in those situations. If possible, try to use specific examples in your answer.

"I am confident in high stress work situations because of my ability to adapt, communicate and be organized in my work. These skills came in very useful a few weeks ago when our support staff were experiencing an extremely high volume of help desk calls. My adaptability helped me go with the flow and handle items on at a time. My communication skills enabled me to quickly and efficiently call on needed support. My organization skills helped me be prepared for anything on that day and enabled me to work through tickets in a quick and efficient manner."

PowerSchool Interview Questions

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1. What do you feel are the primary features and benefits of the Java programming language?
2. Do you have any unique skills or past work experiences that we can't see on your resume that would benefit the team here at PowerSchool?
3. What do you know about our products and how do you think you'll be able to handle a support role surrounding them?
4. What SDLC models are you familiar in working with?
5. If you were asked to review a colleague's code that they had written, what key things would you look for?
6. What programming languages would you consider yourself fluent in?
7. Do you consider yourself stronger in C++, C#, Java, or Python?
8. Do you have experience working with data in a cloud computing environment?
9. How do you keep up-to-date on new technologies and trends in this industry?
10. Discuss a couple of software sales techniques. Which sales technique do you think is most effective for PowerSchool, and why?
11. Here at PowerSchool, we utilize feasibility studies with our customers to consider all impacts of a new system for them. Do you have familiarity working with feasibility studies in your work as a software engineer?
12. In a technical support role here at PowerSchool, we expect that you would be able to bring great customer service skills to the role. Describe your customer service philosophy in the support that you would provide.
13. At PowerSchool we value organization. Tell us about a time when you were particularly effective on prioritizing tasks and completing a project on schedule.
14. If hired for this position here at PowerSchool, would you be comfortable handling overall project manager responsibilities for new software development?
15. How do you ensure that you have a healthy work-life balance in your career?
16. What do you think you will like about this role with PowerSchool?
17. How do you feel cloud computing has positively impacted the software industry?
18. Here at PowerSchool, we ask our test engineers to follow specific QA protocols. What role do you feel QA plays in software development and testing?
19. In Java, why shouldn't you use strings to store a password?
20. The next cloud engineer that we hire here at PowerSchool needs to be able build a system that can handle a high amount of traffic. How would you test our system's ability to handle large amounts of traffic?
21. How do you stay organized and on track when working on multiple projects or duties at the same time?
22. How do you feel artificial intelligence could further our business here at PowerSchool?
23. PowerSchool uses business intelligence tools to improve sales performance. With which BI tools are you most familiar?
24. As a consultant with PowerSchool, your role will be vital in gather information from our customers in building new technology for them. What would be your goals in an initial consultation with a new or existing client?
25. In our consulting services here at PowerSchool, we often have to work with people who aren't very tech savvy. How would you handle a situation like this if hired for this role?
26. At PowerSchool, we rely on a full team effort to deliver top quality products to our customers. Tell me about a time that you worked well as part of a team. Are you comfortable in a similar role here?
27. If you were confronted with a time where you wouldn't be able to meet a deadline here at PowerSchool, what steps would you take when you made that realization?
28. What skills do you use to cope with the day to day stress and pressure on the job?

PowerSchool Interview Questions

1. What do you feel are the primary features and benefits of the Java programming language?

2. Do you have any unique skills or past work experiences that we can't see on your resume that would benefit the team here at PowerSchool?

3. What do you know about our products and how do you think you'll be able to handle a support role surrounding them?

4. What SDLC models are you familiar in working with?

5. If you were asked to review a colleague's code that they had written, what key things would you look for?

6. What programming languages would you consider yourself fluent in?

7. Do you consider yourself stronger in C++, C#, Java, or Python?

8. Do you have experience working with data in a cloud computing environment?

9. How do you keep up-to-date on new technologies and trends in this industry?

10. Discuss a couple of software sales techniques. Which sales technique do you think is most effective for PowerSchool, and why?

11. Here at PowerSchool, we utilize feasibility studies with our customers to consider all impacts of a new system for them. Do you have familiarity working with feasibility studies in your work as a software engineer?

12. In a technical support role here at PowerSchool, we expect that you would be able to bring great customer service skills to the role. Describe your customer service philosophy in the support that you would provide.

13. At PowerSchool we value organization. Tell us about a time when you were particularly effective on prioritizing tasks and completing a project on schedule.

14. If hired for this position here at PowerSchool, would you be comfortable handling overall project manager responsibilities for new software development?

15. How do you ensure that you have a healthy work-life balance in your career?

16. What do you think you will like about this role with PowerSchool?

17. How do you feel cloud computing has positively impacted the software industry?

18. Here at PowerSchool, we ask our test engineers to follow specific QA protocols. What role do you feel QA plays in software development and testing?

19. In Java, why shouldn't you use strings to store a password?

20. The next cloud engineer that we hire here at PowerSchool needs to be able build a system that can handle a high amount of traffic. How would you test our system's ability to handle large amounts of traffic?

21. How do you stay organized and on track when working on multiple projects or duties at the same time?

22. How do you feel artificial intelligence could further our business here at PowerSchool?

23. PowerSchool uses business intelligence tools to improve sales performance. With which BI tools are you most familiar?

24. As a consultant with PowerSchool, your role will be vital in gather information from our customers in building new technology for them. What would be your goals in an initial consultation with a new or existing client?

25. In our consulting services here at PowerSchool, we often have to work with people who aren't very tech savvy. How would you handle a situation like this if hired for this role?

26. At PowerSchool, we rely on a full team effort to deliver top quality products to our customers. Tell me about a time that you worked well as part of a team. Are you comfortable in a similar role here?

27. If you were confronted with a time where you wouldn't be able to meet a deadline here at PowerSchool, what steps would you take when you made that realization?

28. What skills do you use to cope with the day to day stress and pressure on the job?