Shopify has a notoriously long interview process, which is clearly explained on their careers website. I think I got about halfway through, which consisted of three interviews. First was a phone screening with a recruiter (typical introductory questions), followed by a video call with the same recruiter for a “life story” interview. This second stage deserves some explanation, although you can find lots of comments about it online—apparently every Shopify candidate does a life story interview. I was nervous about it because, despite researching the process, I really didn’t know what to expect. In reality, the approach was quite refreshing compared to traditional interviews. You’re asked to pick a point in your life (say, high school) and walk the interviewer through some of your experiences and interests—things that led you to where you are today and influenced your career development. It’s all very casual and conversational, and you’ll be asked guiding questions along the way (but it is hard to gauge how you’re doing in the interview, because it mostly seems to be an exercise to see your personality and “fit” with the company—not focused on the role you’re applying for at all). Shopify’s documentation says you don’t need to do anything to prepare for the interview, but I’d recommend at least noting down some talking points and activities or accomplishments you may want to cover. The third stage was another video interview with the team lead. It wasn’t until this time that I got to find out any specific details about the role. And this would be my only objection to Shopify's atypical approach: due to the order of the interviews, you don’t get information about job duties and expectations until the middle of the process. In my case, the position turned out to be significantly different from how it was described in the original job listing. If this had been made clear upfront (“The type of role we’re looking to fill has changed since you applied; are you still interested?”) then that likely would have saved all parties involved a lot of time and effort.