7 tips for successful interview
Congratulations! You’ve made it to the next step!
We love your CV and are happy to meet you for the job interview.
Well, great news but sometime also quite a concern…
How do I make so fabulous impression that they see me as THE candidate for the job? How not to sound insecure and how not to trip over some questions that later on seem so obvious…
We quite regularly see really good candidates who despite their brilliant track record and impressive career path struggle during interview. The reality is that in stressful situations everyone may seem lost, even if discussion relates to areas of her or his expertise. It happens that simple issue makes candidate to lose focus and further communication flow is heavily impacted.
From the list of all important things, we chose the ones which seem to be obvious when you read them, but we all tend to forget about them when preparing for interview.
Memorize details of your CV
Yes, surely all facts in your CV are correct and true but let’s keep that impression every time recruiter asks you for a date or number. As strange as it may be, a lot of people have troubles to fluently provide dates when they started and left certain job role. Refreshing your memory and recall dates, number of people in the team, how many times you won employee of the month prize or by how many percent you improved some process may certainly help to boost recruiters confidence in you as a well-organized person.
Read job description once more
Obviously you’ve read it before applying but how many similar job descriptions you’ve came across and how many you’ve applied for when looking for a new job? Usually descriptions sound very similar but it’s definitely worth to pay attention to tiny details that may differentiate them and make sure you refer to the right one during the interview. You may also use such review to think about the questions you may want to ask recruiter to get better understanding of the details of the role.
Know your interviewer
It’s definitely worth to know who will conduct the interview. Maybe you attended the same school or are both interested in dancing?
Checking social media may also give you a glimpse at career path and allow to find common points (industries, companies, roles etc.) or assess if this person has history of analytical roles and you should be very rational in responses or maybe rather show more of your soft skills. If you find photo you may also be sure that your personalized greeting by name will relate to proper person. All of these will help you to break the ice and make interview more a friendly chat than a cold call.
Practice answering
You may be sure that you know exactly what your personality, experience and skills are, however, facing stressful situation and not having at least some practise may end up with unstructured, mumbly answer after long time of thinking.
To make sure that what you say is what you really mean and to say it the way you want it to say, you have just one option – practise. Skip singing in the shower, use this time for answering questions that you expect to hear during the interview. Important thing is, do it out loud as in our own head everything sounds better. You may also organize training sessions with your friends or professionals.
Prepare your beverages
One of worst things you may experience during the interview is throat so dry you can only cough, can’t speak anymore.
Preparing a glass of water is the best solution, juice, tea or coffee may work as well. And this is serious! Don’t let something so trivial make you suddenly even more stressed! And besides, don’t drink too much before the interview 😉
Check needed tools
You receive the link to videoconferencing, try to log on and find out that you forgot the password. When reset is completed you learn that you use old version and need to download update. You finally join teleconference only to find out that your microphone is not really working… Sounds like nightmare?
Give yourself some time to test your webcam, microphone, speakers or headset and check internet connection. Make sure you remember all needed passwords and try to join the meeting early to make sure you have all necessary software and plugins installed. Pay attention to the quality of your video – background of bright window may not be the most proper setting.
Keep your mood on the bright side
On The Day treat yourself with a bit more sleep, have a nice breakfast and do something you really enjoy. Have enough time to get prepared, so that you don’t jump into the meeting in a hurry. Spend few minutes just before the interview clearing your mind and calming your nerves.
Breathe…
Stay calm and positive even if some part of the interview goes wrong! People who you are just about to meet think you are interesting enough to spend an hour of their precious time together. They see you as a potential employee and they are humans too 😉
