Getting it right!
I REALLY don't believe it! A bare month after my last article on what to say at an interview, I get hit amidships with a tonne of mail asking what to say at an interview! This time, I wish some kind soul takes out chunks of what I write and emblazon it on hoardings at busy intersections for my correspondents who have this amazing and impressive felicity of forgetting!
First: one of the best things to do well is to do a cross-dress act! I don't mean you have a sartorial gender change but that instead of thinking that you are a candidate; think of yourself as the interviewer!
What you want is what they want!
If you do that you'll know what you want to hear, and you'll end up with an accurate idea of what they want to hear from you! Don't you as the interviewer want to know if the candidate can do what is expected of him? I mean the guy might be a handsome personable young man, but if he doesn't know what to do, what's the point? So now reverting to your candidate role, practice trying to demonstrate this essential fact! If you do know how to handle the work, it's not enough; you need to be able to convey that effectively! And, listen, if do this well so that they get the message that you're head and shoulder above the others, they'll take you! So, how do you do this? Quite easily actually:
Generally people maunder on about the things they can do rather than tell me what they have done! Think about it! If you were the interviewer, would you like people to say `I can do this, this and this, and occasionally this too.' I know I wouldn't because anyone can say this! What I want to hear is "This is what I have done with the skills that I have developed." Examples, anecdotes, and most importantly, results. Provide these and you can be reasonably certain that you'll be a front-runner. If you cant say what you've done because you haven't done them, you are sunk! Oh, by the way, make sure you can prove what you have said! And be wise; NEVER be untruthful, because if you are caught out in a lie, you've had it! Would you hire someone who lied to you?
Custom fit!
When extolling the many mountains you may have scaled, get real! Does what you say have any relevance to what they are interviewing you for? If not, leave it out! No point telling a panel about how well you take care of homeless puppies unless you are trying for a job at an animal shelter! Much better you stick to what they want to hear about; things like you improved a production line, how you trained people to sell better and overall figures improved as a result, about how you instituted a more efficient way to order supplies that saved your old employer several thousands, or how easily you were able to adapt to a new system that was necessitated because of a change in the law. These titbits are exactly what a panel wants to hear so tell them!
Research and ye shall find
If I've said it once, I've said it a hundred times before, but candidate must do their research. Just the other day a candidate said how much he enjoyed my articles and how helpful he found them (flattery gets you everywhere!) but then he began to ask me what the company for which he was being interviewed does! He had not bothered to do any research at all, and even if he had read my name at the end of the article in that Wednesday's edition, he certainly had not read the article! Which indicated right away that he wouldn't get my vote at any rate! What should happen after a proper research is that candidates should be able to glean from all the collected information how their particular abilities can help the company in some way. Who wouldn't hire a person who fits the bill so exactly?
Be the Zing Thing!
As an interviewer, wouldn't you like to hire an enthusiastic, high-energy person? If you wouldn't, you wouldn't be hiring right! So give them what they want and show how bright eyed and bushy tailed you are! Your evidence of your finding out about the company will show them that you are interested, tell them about the anticipation of what you feel this job will do for you, and demonstrate that if they missed you out, they would be the losers! The latter has to be done very tactfully because otherwise you might trip yourself up by appearing too smart!
Negatives are a no-no!
I was a person who used a lot of humour against myself. I made little of my achievements and had actually raised self-deprecation to the heights of a fine art. Bad idea! Terrible because when one is young, these statements are misunderstood (or interviewers are sometimes so tired) that they assume it's the truth and decide that you are not worth hiring if you have such a negative view of yourself! Today, with what little hair I have grey, and lines criss-crossing my face like a maniacally ploughed field, people think that I am so witty and so modest about my abilities. My advice here is to avoid all negativity and dwell always on the positive. Your self-marketing will blow up in your face if you try self-deprecation!
Bygones begone!
Try to avoid whinging about your present or past employers. This is a bad practice that will certainly get you rubbed out of the job-race. If they ask why you left a job so quickly after joining, you could say that your boss there had a method of working that was too unconventional for you to compromise your values on. That way you have hinted that you have a good value system and that your boss was trying to set you on a divergent path.
Interviewers like to hear about what you can do for them. That's because they know what they can do for you. Don't put up your skills and abilities for display; present them with the ones most appropriate for their need. It makes their job so much easier!
So next time you walk into an interview, prepare yourself to be one of them and you'll not feel alone. If you like what you say and see how fitting it is to the need of the company, you'll hire you! And so will they!
ABHIMANYU ACHARYA
abhi.hyd@cnkonline.com
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