May 2009
Nailing Your Interview
By
President of Workforce Associates
May 2009
Nailing Your Interview
By
President of Workforce Associates
I've avoided writing about the interview process for the last few years for several reasons:
1) There are untold books that cover this topic in far greater depth than I can muster in one article or even several;
2) Since interviews are not Internet-based per se, I haven't felt that it was a topic that needed my attention.
But I've changed my mind because getting to the interview stage is becoming more and more difficult. And also because I'm hearing from you that although I've helped in preparing you well with finely crafted electronic resumes and dazzling cover letters, I've left you in the lurch when interview time does arrive. So, I decided to do some research to see what the latest interviewing world is like. In a word, it's not a pretty sight.
According to your emails and articles I've read, those who make it up the ladder to the interview stage often blow this golden opportunity by making comments that defeat the reason that they're in the hot seat - to get a job!
You'd think that interviewees would have calmed themselves mentally about being laid off from their previous position and would keep salacious comments about their bosses and company to themselves but I guess that that is NOT happening. In fact, interviewees are coming on far too strong with their aggressive comments and overt bitterness which hurts them greatly in moving forward, which is what the interview process is supposed to accomplish.
Here are many tips for successful interviews:
1) Vent with your family and friends well before you arrive at your interview. Carrying that mental baggage with you is a big warning sign for a potential new employer that you're not mentally ready for instant new challenges in a new job.Here are more details to nail your interview!
2) Don't arrive any earlier than 10 minutes before the interview. Arriving earlier suggests that you're desperate and don't have anything else to do! And it's not fair to the interviewers who have scheduled only a certain amount of time for you. Arriving an hour early doesn't suggest eagerness. It suggests that you want to extend the time of the interview, which will turn off interviewers even before the interview starts!
3) A firm handshake always works. Practice yours before you leave home. You don't want to crush someone with exuberance but a weak handshake also doesn't work well either.
4) Regardless of the ugliness of how you left your last job, be positive throughout your interview about the skills you bring to your new position and what you learned from your last job about resiliency. Demonstrating flexibility and reflection will serve you well with the interviewers.
5) As I've stressed non-stop in previous articles, do your homework about this new company. Check out business publications about this company, their own website thoroughly, their annual reports, their competition, and trends in the company's industry. Ask friends and neighbors for inside information about why this company would be hiring during tough times.
6) Differentiate yourself from others being interviewed by stressing your accomplishments in your past jobs, not just the time you spent on those jobs. How did you make your previous company more successful? What contributions did you make to their bottom line? Try to quantify your accomplishments as much as you can. Charts, spreadsheets, and photos to show these accomplishments will help enormously.
7) Use your previous accomplishments to give concrete examples of how you can help your new company reduce costs or increase its profits. Be creative and sensible at the same time!
8) Be sure to have your list of references with you. Letters of support from these references will go a long way to make you stand out in your interview.
9) Research the salary scale for the present position well before your interview. Check out job boards and www.salary.com for ranges where the company is located. Forget salaries in San Francisco or New York if you're applying for a job in Indianapolis, for example. Housing costs and the cost of living are different from place to place.
10) Try to avoid discussion of salary and benefits in your interview. Concentrate on displaying all the ways in which you bring value to this company. Wait until you get a job offer to nail down specifics.
11) Stress how you've been upgrading your computer skills, business reading, exercise and health routing, plus lots of volunteering while you're between jobs. Check out www.handsonnetwork.org or www.dosomething.org for ways to become usefully engaged in your community.
12) Rejoin the chapter of your local professional organization and make sure that the interviewer knows that you're an active participant. Stay involved with business networking groups during your job search to keep your sanity while you wait for a response from the interviewer.
13) Immediately send a hand written thank you note to the interviewer by the end of the same day that the interview occurred. Make sure that you've written clearly and concisely your appreciation for their time. Don't make any spelling or grammatical mistakes! If there were points that you didn't have a chance to emphasize during the interview, include a short sentence about additional qualities, accomplishments, etc. to whet their appetite. Remember that a thank you is a note, not a long letter! Be concise -
14) Write up your comments about the questions they asked you and your responses. Assess the strengths and weaknesses of your response. That way you'll have a record to refer to you if the interviewer calls you for clarification about something they or you said in the interview. Full notes will stand you in good stead!
15) Wait at least one week before contacting the interviewer for an update. Use only the interviewer's business line. Calls to their home or cell phone will automatically eliminate you from further consideration.
Out-psyching your interviewers.
Try to outpsych your interviewers. Find out as much as you can from your networking colleagues re their experience in the firm or having interviewed recently. Try to learn the backgrounds of the people you'll be interviewing with. Look for those common threads so you can strike a positive chord in each person you meet with. For better and worse, people tend to like people with whom they have something in common, whether it's an alma mater, a past employer, a former colleague, or a passion for obscure '70s punk and new-wave bands.
Be prepared with concise answers to these questions.
It's a good idea to have rehearsed answers ready to these typical interview questions:
o What prompted you to apply to our company?
o What are some of the qualities that you value in an employer?
o How would you describe your work style and your work ethic?
o How do you continue to stay current with trends in your field?
o How well have you researched our company and our major competitors?
o What have you done in the last year to continue your learning/education?
o If you had only one word to describe yourself, what would it be? Why?
o What challenges do you foresee in this type of job and how would you overcome them?
o What are the clues you have come to recognize you are under too much stress?
o Would you feel comfortable with us contacting your Boss (es)? Peers? Subordinates? Customers?
o What do you think they (above) would say about you?
o Describe an instance when you had to overcome a difficult situation. How did you do it?
o What do you like most about your current position? Why? What do you like least? Why?
o When did you last receive feedback at work that made you feel proud? When did you receive criticism that upset you?
o Describe a situation where multi-tasking was necessary to complete a specific goal. How did you feel about that situation?
o Do you have any specific salary requirements?
o What resources do you use to manage your time? Be prepared to show them in a follow-up interview?
o What is your motivation to succeed?
o What do you need your next employer to provide for you to succeed?
o Rate yourself in the following areas: 1 being weak, 10 being strong
o Organization Skills: ____ Interpersonal Skills: ____o What have you done in the last year to improve the weakest of the above skills?
o Creative Thinking: ____ Technical Skills: ____
o Analytical Thinking: ____ Time Management Skills: ____
Turn the interview around.
Don't use the job interview as a chance to rehash your resume's highlights and tell war stories. Look at it this way: If they didn't think you had the basic skills, you wouldn't be there. You need to focus on what you can do to help the company and to find out what each interviewer wants from the person in this position.
When the interview starts to wind down, have your questions ready. Yes, you must ask a few questions. It is a recognized part of the interviewing process. Here are probing questions that are frequently asked by candidates:
o Is this a new or existing position?
o What are the chances for advancement/promotion from within?
o How many hours per year are scheduled for training and professional development?
o Hours? Is flexible scheduling available? What is the company's policy re telecommuting?
o Why do you the interviewer like working here?
Thanks for alerting me to the new challenges at interview sessions. Hope that these tips make the anxiety creating interviewing process work for you -
Sincerely,
Jane M. Lommel, Ph.D.
jlommel@WorkforceAssociates.com
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