You're Bombing Interviews Because of AI
READ TIME: 4 MINUTES
AI Is Sabotaging Your Interview Prep
I reviewed a client's presentation round last week and couldn't find her anywhere in it.
She had worked hard. She had used AI to help her prepare. And the result was a polished, well-structured response that sounded like it was written by a chatbot — because it was.
I gave her the direct feedback she needed. It almost broke her. She had to go back and rebuild the whole thing.
If she had submitted the original version, the hiring manager would have questioned whether she could actually do the job. That's the tension we don't talk about enough: companies want to see that you're learning AI and bringing it into your work. But they don't want AI to replace who you are.
That's not the point.
Here's what I'm seeing across my clients right now. AI is being used in two specific ways during interview prep — and both of them can quietly set you up to fail if you're not careful.
Using AI to prep your stories
Most candidates are asking AI to take their resume, take the job description, and generate answers to interview questions. What they get back are responses that look decent on paper.
The problem is they aren't their stories.
Or if the content is right, it's written in a way that forces them to memorize something from scratch. It's like being handed a cold call script on day one as an SDR.
You don't own it yet.
You can't perform it under pressure.
In the actual interview, they freeze. They can't recall key details. And because they're applying for multiple roles — AE, mid-market, enterprise, account manager — they end up with ten slightly different versions of the same example.
What should be simple becomes a complicated script they don't know how to learn.
Here's the right way to use AI in your interview prep:
Start by writing down your own examples from memory. Don't open AI yet.
Ask AI what questions to expect based on the job description.
Feed your examples back to AI and ask it to match them to those questions — and flag any gaps.
Use AI to write out your examples in R-STAR™ format (Results, Situation, Task, Action, Result).
You can also use AI to build company knowledge — their positioning, key benefits, the clients they serve, context on the person you're meeting with. That's where it's genuinely useful.
One more: follow-up emails. AI can help you structure one, but if it reads like a template with your name swapped in, it's missing the point. I want to get to know you. That email is your last impression.
Using AI to prep for presentation rounds
Three clients came to me in the same week, all prepping for presentation rounds. All three had used AI to build their responses.
All three were set up to fail if we didn't make changes.
Here's the process I recommend instead:
Read the prompt on your own first. Don't touch AI yet.
Build your own outline. If it's a sales scenario, think through your discovery questions, how you'd drive next steps, what pitch you'd run, how you'd handle objections. Get your thinking down.
Now give the prompt to AI — without your outline — and see what it generates.
Compare. Identify gaps. Note what AI got right that you missed, and what you got right that AI missed.
Upload your outline and ask AI to incorporate your language and your ideas first — then fill in any gaps.
The reason this order matters: the more you start from what you already know, the easier it is to own it in the room.
When you start from AI's version, you're taking a sales call you've run hundreds of times and replacing it with unfamiliar language.
You're memorizing from scratch.
Under pressure, it shows.
AI is also genuinely useful for building a slide deck if one is required, evaluating a dataset, and pressure-testing your thinking. Use it for those things.
What you want to avoid is a response that is 100% AI-generated.
Because then you're performing something that isn't you and it shows.
You Don't Have to Figure This Out Alone
If you've been winging your AI interview prep, you're not alone — and you don't have to figure it out on your own.
I've built an interview prep course that walks you through exactly how to use AI to prepare your stories, and walk into every interview owning your answers. It includes a workbook so you can put it to work immediately.
Setback to Interview Ready is launching in early June.
Join the waitlist → Link
To clarity and confidence in your career path,
Amanda
See you next Sunday.
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