In this article
Before you start
Why interviewers ask this
A candidate who cannot say how a company works will struggle to work there, so Netflix tests the fit between your habits and its written culture. Its new-graduate page says interviewers "will evaluate your technical (if applicable), role-specific, and behavioral skills" (the internships page says "will be evaluating"), and both say you may be asked which aspects of the culture memo resonate most with you "or not" (Netflix new graduates page, read Oct 2026; Netflix internships page, read Oct 2026).
A weak answer repeats the memo's words. A strong answer shows one behavior with a real story, names its cost, and offers an honest view of a part of the memo that is harder. The same logic drives other written-values loops, such as Amazon's leadership principles.
The Netflix culture memo from first principles
- Culture memo
- The Netflix culture memo is the public document in which Netflix describes how it expects its people to work, built around four principles and eight values, and it is the reference its careers pages point candidates to before an interview.
- Informed captain
- An informed captain is the memo's term for the one person who is accountable for a major decision, after gathering opinions and disagreement from others, so that decisions have a clear owner.
In plain words
Think of a sports team that publishes its playbook. Anyone can read it. A recruit is judged on playing it, not on reciting it. The memo is that playbook, and your stories are the recruit's game tape. The analogy breaks in one place. A playbook scripts each move, but the memo states values and a few practices, not the moves for your situation.
So you show the behavior in your own work. That is why a recital of the values scores less than one specific story. The interviewer cannot see your work, only hear your account of it. In one sentence, the memo is a public list of behaviors, and a good answer evidences one with a true story, a decision and a cost.
Step 1: Read the memo itself
The first step is to read the memo yourself and write one line per value in your own words. The input is the public page; the output is eight lines you could say aloud. The page names four principles: the dream team, people over process, uncomfortably exciting, and great and always better.
It lists eight values: selflessness, judgment, candor, creativity, courage, inclusion, curiosity and resilience, each with a short description (Netflix culture memo, read Oct 2026). Candor, for example, is giving and accepting feedback openly and admitting mistakes. The page shows no publication date and says the culture will change as the business grows, so re-read it in the week of the interview instead of trusting a summary from last year.
Step-by-step description
- Read the memo itself.
- Prepare what resonates and what does not.
- Map prompts to the eight values.
- Build a story bank.
- Tell each story with its decision and cost.
- Read the culture memo itself.
- Prepare which parts resonate and which do not.
- Tell each story with the decision and its cost.
Step 2: Prepare for the question about what does not resonate
The second step is to prepare an honest answer to "which parts of the memo resonate, and which do not?". The input is your own reading from step 1; the output is two short answers. The pages for interns and new graduates tell candidates they may be asked which aspects resonate most "or not" (Netflix internships page, read Oct 2026).
For the first half, choose a value that is true of your work and give one concrete example. For the second half, name a part you find harder, such as the keeper test's speed, and say what you would want to understand about how it works in practice. Do not attack the memo and do not flatter it. The honest view, with a reason, is the evidence.
Step 3: Map prompts to values
The third step is to match each value to the kind of prompt that would evidence it. The input is the eight values; the output is a list of questions you can practise aloud. The prompts below are our illustrative wordings, not a Netflix list, and the pages read here publish no scoring guide. One prompt can touch several values, so one story can serve more than one. Practise saying each answer aloud with a real story, a decision and a cost, because a prompt you have only read is not one you have rehearsed. The next step turns the list into a bank of stories.
| Memo value | Illustrative prompt |
|---|---|
| Selflessness | Tell me about a time you gave credit or help that cost you something. |
| Judgment | Tell me about a decision you made with gaps in the data. |
| Candor | Tell me about feedback that was hard to give or to hear. |
| Creativity | Tell me about an idea nobody asked for that you built anyway. |
| Courage | Tell me about a time you challenged a plan you disagreed with. |
| Inclusion | Tell me about a time you made sure a quiet voice was heard. |
| Curiosity | Tell me about learning a new area quickly. |
| Resilience | Tell me about a setback and how fast you recovered. |
Step 4: Build a story bank that covers the eight values
A story bank is a short list of true stories from your work, each outlined rather than memorised, that together evidence every value. The input is your last few years of work; the output is a grid of stories against values. The worked example below tests the arithmetic on an invented bank of six stories, and four of them cover all eight values.1 Two values, creativity and inclusion, rest on a single story each, so a follow-up that probes either one leaves no second example. Choose stories where you made a decision with a cost, changed your mind or disagreed and then committed, because those carry several values at once.
Step 5: Tell each story with the decision and its cost
The fifth step is to tell each story so the decision and its cost are clear. The input is one outlined story; the output is a spoken answer built on the STAR structure with most of the time spent on what you did. The memo gives you the vocabulary: it describes an informed captain as the one person accountable for a decision, and it describes "disagree then commit" as a norm. So say who decided, what context you had, what options you weighed, what you chose, what it cost and what you would change. A story with no cost sounds rehearsed. Say "I" for your own actions, and for a team result, say what you contributed.
Knowing it is half the job. Saying it is the other half.
Interview Clozo is an AI interview copilot for real interview rounds: it hears the question and puts a strong answer on your screen, and you say it in your own words. See the features or how it works.
Start Free Trial →Worked example
The six stories below are invented to show the method; your stories come from your own work. Each is tagged with the values it can honestly evidence, and a short script searches for the smallest set that covers all eight.1
| Story | What it shows | Values evidenced |
|---|---|---|
| A | Reversed a launch decision after reading the data | Judgment, Candor, Courage |
| B | Ran a design review where a junior colleague's idea won | Selflessness, Inclusion, Curiosity |
| C | Prototyped an onboarding flow nobody had asked for | Creativity, Curiosity, Courage |
| D | Owned an outage and shared the write-up | Candor, Resilience, Selflessness |
| E | Chose one of three projects and said no to two | Judgment, Resilience |
| F | Challenged a manager's plan, then committed to the decision | Courage, Candor, Judgment |
Taking stories best first, coverage rose 3, 6, 7, 8, 8 and 8, so the first four stories reach all eight values and the fifth and sixth add nothing new.1 There are exactly five sets of four that cover everything: A, B, C and D; A, B, C and E; B, C, D and E; B, C, D and F; and B, C, E and F. Stories B and C appear in every cover, because creativity appears only in C and inclusion only in B. Together they miss judgment, candor and resilience, and no single story evidences all three, so no set of three works.1
Text description of the diagram
- Taking stories best first, coverage rose 3, 6, 7, 8, 8 and 8.
- Two values, creativity and inclusion, rest on one story each.
The lesson is not "prepare four stories". It is that the thin values are the risk: creativity and inclusion have one story each in this bank, so a probing follow-up would end the example. Find a second story for each thin value.
Real stories will not tag so neatly. Treat the output as a method for finding gaps, not a target number.
Trade-offs and edge cases
The memo is a guide to what Netflix values, not a scoring sheet. The pages read here describe the process for internships and new graduates, and they say nothing about every other role, so treat the details below as a pattern to confirm with your recruiter.
| Fact | New graduates | Internships |
|---|---|---|
| First stage | take-home assessment | take-home assessment |
| Interview rounds after it | two | approximately two to three |
| What is assessed | technical (if applicable), role-specific, behavioral | technical (if applicable), role-specific, behavioral |
| Culture advice | prepare for which memo aspects resonate "or not"; ask interviewers about culture | prepare for which memo aspects resonate "or not"; ask interviewers about culture |
Three edge cases matter. First, a story told in the memo's vocabulary but with no cost reads as a recital, so use the values as verbs in what you did. Second, "candor" cuts both ways: an answer that blames a former colleague is candid about them but not about you, so include your own part. Third, the memo says it will change, so a quote you learned last year may be out of date, and the careers pages say interview details are per role, so ask your recruiter what to expect for yours (Netflix careers pages, read Oct 2026). For broader loop structure, see the interview loops guide.
How to answer it in an interview
Which parts of our culture memo resonate with you, and which do not?
Candor resonates most: last year I told my manager a launch date would slip, it cost us a week of goodwill, and the tested release worked a month sooner than the rushed one would have. What I find harder is the keeper test, because speed of separation can leave little room to learn from an honest mistake, so I would want to understand how feedback arrives before it matters. I do not read that as a flaw, only as the part I would ask the team about. Either way, I would rather say what I think than recite the values.
Weak and strong answers side by side
A strong answer differs from a weak one in evidence, ownership and a named cost. Take the prompt "Tell me about a time you disagreed with a plan." These are illustrative examples about an invented candidate, not real answers.
| Answer | What the candidate says |
|---|---|
| Weak (illustrative example) | "We disagreed about the roadmap, and in the end the team decided to change it. I value candor, so I spoke up. It went well." |
| Strong (illustrative example) | "Our lead planned a launch for March. I pulled the last three releases' defect counts, showed that the date meant skipping testing, and proposed a two-week slip. She chose the slip. It cost us a partner demo, and I would raise it a week earlier next time. Once decided, I committed and ran the test plan." |
The figure below follows the strong answer in the order it was told: the evidence, the decision, who chose, the cost and the lesson.
Text description of the diagram
- The strong example pulls the last three releases' defect counts.
- It proposes a two-week slip and names the cost, a partner demo.
- It ends with what the candidate would raise a week earlier, then commits.
| Dimension | Weak | Strong | Senior |
|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | A value named, no story | One dated, specific story | A story with numbers someone could check |
| Ownership | "We decided" | "I did X" | Says what I did and what the team did |
| Decision and cost | No cost mentioned | Names the cost | Names the cost and the option rejected |
| View of the memo | Praises everything | Names one part that is harder | Gives a reason and a question to ask |
| Follow-up readiness | One story only | A second story for the value | Knows which value each story is thin on |
The spoken structure is: one value you can evidence, one part you would question with a reason, and an invitation to learn more.
Common mistakes
"I love everything in the memo." (wrong) Praise with no example proves nothing and skips the "or not" half of the question. (right) "Candor resonates most, and here is a time I used it; the part I would ask about is the keeper test."
"We decided to change the plan." (wrong) The interviewer cannot tell what you did. (right) "I made the case with the data, and I committed once the decision was made."
"Everything went well." (wrong) A story with no cost sounds rehearsed, and the memo's candor value invites you to admit mistakes. (right) "It cost us two weeks, and what I would change is how early I raised it."
"I will memorise the memo." (wrong) The page can change and recital is not evidence. (right) "I re-read it this week and picked stories that show the behaviors."
Follow-up questions
What did you do differently from earlier attempts at a change?
Name what the earlier attempts did and why they stalled, then the one specific thing you changed, such as who you involved first or how you sequenced the work. Finish with the result as a number. The question tests whether you learned from others' failures.
How do you work with product on priorities?
Say how you bring evidence, how you push back, and how you decide when engineering and product disagree. A strong answer names the informed-captain idea: who owns the call, what context they got, and how everyone commits afterwards. Use one story, not a principle.
How would you measure the success of a recommendation engine?
Choose one headline metric tied to the product goal, add guardrail metrics that would catch harm, and say what you would check when the headline rises but a guardrail falls. The recommender systems guide covers the technical side.
What if my best story involves a mistake?
Use it. The memo lists candor as admitting mistakes and sharing lessons, so a mistake with a clear lesson is evidence. Keep the proportion: a short account of the error, a longer account of what you changed.
What should I ask a Netflix interviewer about culture?
The careers pages encourage candidates to ask their interviewers about culture. Ask for a concrete example of how leaders give people context to decide instead of approving each decision, from the interviewer's own week; the questions to ask the interviewer page has more, and the leadership interviews guide and telling your story help with the rest.
- Netflix's public pages say interviewers assess behavioral skills and may ask which memo aspects resonate "or not".
- Read the memo yourself; it lists four principles and eight values and shows no publication date.
- Prepare an honest view of one part you would question, with a reason.
- A story bank of four stories can cover all eight values in the example, but thin values need a second story.
- Tell each story with the decision and its cost, in "I" statements.
Sources
- Netflix Culture Memo — Netflix (no page date shown; date = read date), 25 Oct 2026
- Join our New Grads Team: interview process — Netflix (no page date shown; date = read date), 25 Oct 2026
- Join our Internships Team: interview process — Netflix (no page date shown; date = read date), 25 Oct 2026
