Page 2: interview tips
Wrap these findings into one tidy sentence. You must start your interview by establishing yourself as confident and assertive. This sends tremors of fear up the spines of some. “I’m not brash and aggressive. I don’t dance on table tops, tell terrific jokes, and slap people on the back. I’m not confident and assertive. All is lost.” Relax. No one said you had to be loud and obnoxious. Anyone, I repeat, anyone – including those who are reserved, quiet, even a little shy – can come across as confident and assertive in an interview. And it doesn’t take a radical overhaul of your personality. You don’t even have to put on an act. You can be yourself, even if you’re quiet.
Consider the question literally. “Tell me a little bit about yourself.” What is the “little bit” that would be most helpful? That’s easy – it’s the most impressive and substantiated thing you can say about yourself. What is it you do best? And what’s your proof? Before you ever get into an interview, have answers to these questions firmly in mind. They are your ammunition. Don’t be afraid of the open-ended question. Hear it as an opportunity. You have been invited to tell the employer why he should hire you. Do it. “The most important thing that I am eager to say is that I’m very adaptive and respond well to pressure and change. As a sales clerk, I worked in three different departments and under two different managers. I had to learn new product lines quickly and, at the same time, different sales approaches preferred by a new manager. I found this challenging and exciting and my portion of departmental sales grew steadily. My manager commended me for how well I handled the pressure. Retail is always changing and I think I’m very well-suited for such a career.”
This kind of answer – even if stated quietly – gets you off to the all-critical right start. The employer will sit up and take note. You will have distinguished yourself from the herd. You are confident and assertive. You are special.
We’re all special. Each of us knows that we have some special qualities or characteristics that cut us away from the crowd and make us good prospects. We’ve seen the proof time and time again in our lives. The beginning of an interview, when responding to an open-ended question, is the one time in life that it’s not boorish to be right up front with it. The employer wants to know why we’re special. Tell her.
All other interviewing advice pales in comparison to this. If you do everything else right, but don’t get this down, you’ll be stuck with mediocre results. Conversely, if this is your only preparation, you’ll still be a shade or two above most.
Presuming that you’d like to have a wider margin of success than a mere shade or two, let’s cover a few other points. These tips can be roughly divided into three groups: before the interview, during the interview, and after the interview.
After carefully preparing to identify and substantiate your main strength, concentrate on three other areas of preparation.
Get inside employers’ shoes. What do employers care about? This is not a great mystery. They have been asked this question many times and their responses are generally quite similar, giving more weight to interpersonal skills and other personal characteristics than to objective measures such as grades, institutional reputation, and past work experience. For example, in a recent study conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers, here’s how employers rated the importance of various qualifications using a five point scale:
In a related question, employers identified the personal characteristics that are most important to them. They are, in order:
All this emphasis upon personal qualities doesn’t mean that you have wasted your efforts accumulating a lofty GPA or stacking up an impressive work history. Far from it. But it sure does mean that you cannot rest on these laurels alone. Instead, see them as contexts from which you can draw examples that prove you have the traits employers seek.
Before interviewing, look at the above lists and sift through your experience, inside the classroom and out, identifying situations that prove that you have what it takes. For example, the fact that you maintained a solid GPA while holding down a part-time job says something significant about your time management skills and your motivation, as well as your work ethic. Your teamwork skills might have shown through on a class project. Perhaps you exhibited initiative and leadership skills while holding an office in a student organization. Your experience will be as valuable as you make it by translating it into proof that you have the skills employers seek.
Research the job and the organization. Learn what you reasonably can about the nature of the job. Ask if a written job description is available. Talk to others. Visit the organization’s website. If you have been given or directed to printed materials, be sure to read them. Don’t get carried away with this task. You don’t have to become the world’s leading authority on the subject. Just make sure that you understand what the job entails so that you can envision yourself in it and that you have a clear understanding of what the organization does. That will keep you from looking like a know-nothing.
Anticipate the questions and practice. Look at it this way: Almost all of the questions will be about you – your goals, skills, work attitudes, education, expectations. You are the expert. No one knows more about this subject than you. Still, a little practice can help. Get friends to simulate interviews and ask you predictable questions. You can even do it by yourself in front of a mirror. Don’t strive for rote answers to the questions. Instead, aim to get the main points of your desired responses into your head where they can be easily recalled. Evaluate honestly, but don’t worry about the fine details. Look for evidence that you are answering with poise and clarity, coming across as comfortable and confident. Your answers need to be clear and concise, directly responding to the questions.