Should I use a virtual background or my real background?

Real background, as long as it is clean and professional. Virtual backgrounds can glitch, especially around your hair and ears. They also make you look like you are hiding something. A blank wall, a bookshelf, or a tidy room is better than any virtual background. The only exception is if your real background is unavoidably messy or distracting. In that case, use a simple, professional virtual background. Not the beach. Not outer space. A clean office look.

Is it acceptable to take notes during a video interview?

Yes, but tell the interviewer you are doing it. At the start of the call, say something like 'I will be jotting down a few notes as we talk so I can make sure I address everything.' Then do it sparingly. Jot down keywords, not full sentences. If you are typing furiously the whole time, you look like a court reporter, not a candidate. Notes should be quick and occasional. The interviewer should forget you are doing it.

What if I do not have a good internet connection at home?

Test your connection speed before the interview. If your home internet is unreliable, find an alternative. A friend's house. A coworking space that rents private rooms by the hour. Some public libraries have private study rooms you can reserve. A quiet coffee shop is a distant last resort. Too much background noise and unreliable WiFi. Also, have your phone ready as a mobile hotspot as backup. Most modern phone plans include hotspot data. Test it beforehand. A phone hotspot is often more reliable than public WiFi.

How do I handle a panel video interview with multiple interviewers?

Panel video interviews are harder because you cannot read the room as a group. A few things help. First, say each person's name when you answer their question. 'That is a great question, Sarah.' This creates a thread between you and that specific person. Second, look at the camera when you answer, not at individual faces on the screen. If you look at one person on screen, the others see you looking away from them. The camera is neutral ground. Third, address the whole panel at the end. 'Thank you all for your time. I really enjoyed the conversation.' This closes the loop with everyone, not just the person who asked the last question.

Should I mention that I am a veteran during a video interview?

If it serves your answer, yes. If you are asked to describe a time you led a team through a difficult situation, it is natural to mention that it happened during your military service. But do not lead with your veteran status or make it your identity in the interview. You are a professional candidate who happens to be a veteran. Not a veteran who is trying to be a professional candidate. The distinction matters. Frame your experience the same way a civilian would. 'In my previous role, I managed a team of twelve...' not 'When I was a squad leader in the Army, I was responsible for twelve soldiers...' The experience is the same. The framing changes how the interviewer receives it.

Video Interview Tips for Veterans: How to Ace a Zoom or Teams Interview Without Looking Like a New Guy

By GetVetsHired · July 2026 · 5 min read

The interview invitation arrives in your inbox. The location is a link, not an address. You have never done this before. The military interviews you in person, in uniform, in a room where you know exactly where to stand and how to address the person across the desk. A video interview is different. You are in your own space, staring at a camera, talking to a face on a screen. It feels less formal but the stakes are just as high. The good news is that video interviews are a skill you can learn in an afternoon. The setup matters. The camera presence matters. Your answers to the questions matter just as much as in person, but the way you deliver them is different. Here is exactly how to prepare so you walk into that virtual room looking like someone who has done this a hundred times, even if it is your first one.

Your setup: the five things that matter more than anything you say

The interviewer makes a judgment about you in the first ten seconds of the video call. Before you say a word, they have already formed an impression based on what they see and hear. Here are the five things that determine that impression. Lighting: your face needs to be clearly visible. The easiest setup is a window in front of you, not behind you. If there is a window behind you, the camera exposes for the bright background and your face becomes a shadow. If you do not have good natural light, buy a cheap ring light. Twenty dollars on Amazon. It makes a dramatic difference. Camera height: the camera should be at eye level or slightly above. Looking down at your laptop camera gives the interviewer a view up your nose. Put your laptop on a stack of books or a stand. You want to look straight ahead, like you are talking to someone across a table, not like you are looking down at a screen. Background: clean and boring. A blank wall is perfect. A bookshelf is fine. A messy room, a kitchen with dishes, or a bed with rumpled sheets tells the interviewer you did not prepare. You would not show up to an in-person interview with your bed in the background. Same rule applies here. Audio: get close to the microphone. If you are using your laptop's built in mic, sit within two feet of it. If your voice sounds distant or echoey, the interviewer will strain to hear you and that irritation colors their impression. A cheap USB microphone is a good investment. Frame: your head and shoulders should fill most of the screen. Not just your face. Not your whole room. Head and shoulders, centered, with a little bit of space above your head. This is the same framing as a professional headshot. Practice it before the call.

What to wear: it is still an interview, even if you are at home

The temptation is to treat a video interview casually because you are at home. Resist it. Dress the same way you would for an in-person interview, at least from the waist up. That means a collared shirt or blouse. Solid colors, not patterns. Patterns can cause weird visual artifacts on camera. Avoid white shirts, which blow out the exposure. A blue, gray, or earth tone shirt looks best on camera. Yes, you can wear sweatpants below the frame. The interviewer will never know. But do not risk wearing a t-shirt or a hoodie. If you have to stand up for any reason during the call, you do not want to be caught. Wear the full outfit. It also puts you in the right mental state. When you are dressed professionally, you act professionally. The psychology works even when the other person cannot see your shoes.

Where to look: the camera is the person, not the screen

This is the hardest part of video interviews and the thing most people get wrong. When you look at the other person's face on your screen, you are looking at the screen, not the camera. To the person on the other end, it looks like you are looking down or away. Eye contact on a video call means looking directly into the camera lens. Here is how to handle this. When you are speaking, look at the camera. Imagine the lens is the person's eyes. It feels unnatural at first because you cannot see their reaction. Practice it. Your voice recordings or a practice call with a friend will show you the difference. When they are speaking, you can look at the screen to watch their face. That is natural. The problem is when you answer a question while looking at the screen. You look disengaged. Train yourself to deliver your answers to the camera. One trick that helps: move the video window as close to the top center of your screen as possible, right under your camera. That way, glancing at the person's face is almost the same as looking at the camera. The distance is small enough that the difference is barely noticeable.

How to answer questions when you cannot read the room

In an in-person interview, you read body language. The interviewer leans forward. They nod. They take notes. You adjust your answers based on those signals. On a video call, those signals are muted or missing entirely. The interviewer might be nodding but the camera angle does not capture it. They might be taking notes but you cannot see their hands. This creates anxiety. You finish an answer and there is silence. You cannot tell if the interviewer is thinking or if the connection froze. Here is how to handle it. First, accept that you will get less feedback. That is normal. The silence does not mean you said something wrong. Second, make your answers slightly more structured than you would in person. Use a clear signpost at the start ('I have three points on that') and a clear close ('So those are the three areas where my experience maps to this role'). A clear close tells the interviewer you are done and signals that it is their turn to speak. Third, if you cannot tell whether they heard you, just ask. 'Did that answer your question, or would you like me to go deeper on any part of it?' That is a perfectly professional question in a video interview. It shows self-awareness and a desire to be helpful. It also breaks the silence and moves the conversation forward.

Military-specific video interview landmines to avoid

Veterans face a few specific challenges in video interviews that civilians do not. First, the instinct to stand at parade rest or sit rigidly upright. You learned to carry yourself a certain way. In a video interview, a too-rigid posture reads as stiff or uncomfortable. Relax your shoulders. Sit naturally. You are not reporting to a commander. You are talking to a peer. Second, the habit of using military terminology when nervous. When you are under pressure, your brain defaults to the language it knows best. You say 'squad' instead of 'team.' You say 'NCO' instead of 'supervisor.' You say 'OPORDER' instead of 'plan.' Prepare for this. Practice your answers out loud before the interview. Record yourself. Every time a military term slips out, stop and replace it with the civilian equivalent. Do it enough times before the interview that the civilian terms feel more natural. Third, the tendency to understate your accomplishments. The military culture of deflecting credit works against you in a job interview. Nobody else is going to tell your story. It has to be you. When the interviewer asks about a challenge you overcame, tell them what you did. Do not say 'my team accomplished' or 'we were able to.' Say 'I led a team that accomplished' or 'I implemented a process that resulted in.' It feels uncomfortable. Do it anyway. The interviewer is hiring you, not your unit.

The tech check: do this thirty minutes before, not thirty seconds

Every video interview platform has its own quirks. Your computer has its own quirks. Do not discover them when the interviewer is waiting. Thirty minutes before the interview, do a full tech check. Open the platform. Test your camera. Test your microphone. Make sure your internet connection is stable. If you live somewhere with unreliable internet, have a backup plan. Your phone as a hotspot. A library or coworking space with good WiFi. Close every other application on your computer. Slack notifications, email popups, and software update reminders have ruined more interviews than bad answers. Turn on do not disturb. Close your browser tabs. Restart your computer if you have not in a while. A clean machine is less likely to crash or lag. Have your resume, the job description, and a few bullet points of notes open in another window or printed on paper next to you. Do not read from them word for word. Glancing at notes is fine. Reading a script is obvious and offputting. Use them as memory triggers, not a teleprompter. Finally, have a glass of water within reach. The interview anxiety will dry out your mouth. Water is fine. Coffee will make the jitters worse. Skip it.

What to do when the tech fails (because it will, eventually)

At some point, the video will freeze. Your audio will cut out. Someone's dog will start barking. The doorbell will ring. You cannot control these things and the interviewer knows that. What you can control is how you handle them. If the video freezes or the audio drops, wait five seconds. Give the platform time to recover. If it does not, unmute yourself and say calmly: 'I think we may have a connection issue. I can still hear you. Can you hear me?' If they cannot hear you, type it in the chat. If the problem is on your end and you need a moment to fix it, say so. 'I need thirty seconds to reconnect. I will be right back.' Then go fix it. Do not panic. Do not apologize excessively. Technical issues happen. The interviewer has dealt with worse. Your composure during the problem tells them more about you than the answer you were giving when the call dropped. One more thing. Exchange phone numbers before the interview if you can. If the video platform completely fails, you can call in and do the interview by phone. A phone interview is better than a cancelled interview. Be the person who makes that call instead of waiting for them to reach out.

After the call: follow through like you would in person

The video call ends. You close your laptop. The interview is not over. Send a thank you email within two hours. Reference something specific from the conversation. A project they mentioned. A challenge the team is facing. Something that shows you were listening, not just answering questions. Keep it brief. Three or four sentences. The thank you email is about showing you are professional and you follow through. It is not about restating your qualifications. They already have your resume. They just spent thirty minutes talking to you. A short, specific, timely thank you note is more effective than a long one sent the next day. If they said they would get back to you by a certain date and that date passes, follow up. One email. Polite. Professional. 'I wanted to check in on the timeline for the role. I remain very interested and I am happy to provide any additional information that would be helpful.' That is it. Do not follow up again. If they do not respond to your follow up, they are not interested or the process is delayed. Either way, more emails will not help. Move on to the next interview. The best way to stop worrying about one job is to have another interview already scheduled.

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