State your preference and explain the trade-off. "I prefer trunk-based development because short-lived branches reduce merge conflicts and encourage smaller, reviewable changes."
Look for familiarity with common strategies (trunk-based development, Git Flow, GitHub Flow) and an opinion on trade-offs. Strong candidates prefer trunk-based or short-lived branches for faster integration, discuss the cost of long-lived branches, and describe practical conflict resolution: small frequent merges, communication with teammates, and using tools to understand the intent behind conflicting changes.
Baseline developer workflow question. Candidates who work on week-long branches without merging are likely creating integration headaches. Those who favour trunk-based development with feature flags show modern practices.