Make the Interview Easier For the Person Interviewing You

Start structuring your answer to deal review interview questions differently. 

Stop thinking about how you explain the deal.

Start answering in the format that your interviewer is looking to hear. 

Let's take a basic question like....

"Tell me about a time when you closed a deal that you were proud of"

Or, for CSMs...

"Tell me about a renewal/upsell you closed or helped close that made you proud"

When you begin to structure the answer to this question, think about who your audience is and what would make things easier for them. 

Whether it's a hiring manager/peer/recruiter, they're all (hopefully) looking for keywords and taking notes. 

When you're listening for keywords, are you paying attention to the overall story or trying to pick out the keywords? 

MAKE THIS EASIER FOR THEM.

Put the keywords at the beginning of your answer.

This allows them to write down what they needed to hear and TRULY digest how you orchestrated what you did. 

What does this look like?

For AEs

Interviewer: "Tell me about a time when you closed a deal that you were proud of"

You: "Of course. Last quarter I closed X for $1.2M in TCV ($600k in ARR). I worked with their CFO/CIO and the deal took 7 months. Here's the 3 minute story"

For CSMs

Interviewer: "Tell me about a renewal/upsell you closed or helped close that made you proud"

You: "Of course. Last year we renewed X for $1.3M which was a 30% increase YoY so we brought in $300k of nnARR. We worked with the CFO/CIO and we started the renewal 6 months before the renewal date. Here's the 3 minute story." 

Because you say this at the jump, the interviewer writes the stats down and can now listen to the how.

Make listening to your answer easier and your interviewer will hear what you want them to.