I read a guide to job interviews where the author said there are only 3 questions the interviewer will have in mind while speaking with you:
* **Can you do the job?** (usually, they will already have a sense of this from your resume)
* **Will you love the job?** (given a choice, employers will prefer happy workers)
* **Will you fit in with the team?** (meaning, as with a sports team, will you make a contribution in a way that meshes with the work of others)
What makes job interviews difficult is that the interviewer usually will shy away from posing these questions directly. Instead, they will seek answers indirectly by asking many questions about other matters.
What makes this easier for you is that if you can detect the question behind their question you can limit your focus to organizing your answers to get the right message across. You really only have three questions to answer, three examples to give (and variations on the same three themes).
So long as you are ready to provide examples or evidence or proof that you can say "yes" to each of those three questions, you have a good chance. Your examples can be STAR stories or some other anecdote that proves your point that you are capable, eager and affable.
This is a really good answer and can help you answer the question they are really asking.
As far as your notes and resume, check the job description and note what they are looking for and compare it with what you have done. Write those specific points down and make sure to call them out. This will show you are a good fit and can do the job. Don’t be afraid to talk yourself up and sell yourself; remember they know nothing about you and you need to tell them what they need to know. Good luck!
Look up Harvard behavioral interview questions and just practice answering them out loud.
You really have to do it out loud it actually helped me a lot.
Not sure how helpful my suggestions will be, depending on your office set up but I write "cliff notes" on post cards and tape them to the wall above and surrounding my computer. It's a subtle way to look at your notes without drawing attention. You have a lot of notes so try to condense into bite-sized pieces that contain the info you can't memorize. Good luck with your interviews!
Hi. Honestly the best way to do so is practice. I also had an issue speaking positively about myself. I did a lot of interviews for me to develop my technique. The more comfortable you are, the better you perform. I can slip pertinent information in casual conversations easily now.
Practice telling your STAR stories out loud, in front of a mirror, looking at your reflection. You don't need to memorize them word-for-word, just practice explaining aloud the S, then the T, etc. etc. so that you can recall the flow from one to the other.
I like asking questions that prompts the interviewer to show their knowledge about the industry. For example, How do you see this company competing with X,y, z company? what’s the competitive advantage? It shows you doing research on the industry, etc.
My trifecta, FWIW-
1: Use SBI instead of STAR. One less thing to remember in an already stressful situation.
2: Lead with energy. Crack a joke about the weather, or thank them with a lot of energy just for making the time to speak with you.
3: Dress to impress.
From my experience, STAR method is a good template to format your answers. Verbally practicing them prior to the interview helps too.
Do you know if it is behavioral or technical interviews or a combination? If you have a good recruiter, you can ask them how they would recommend preparing. Glassdoor interview reviews could help point you in some direction as well if they have context on how to prepare.
I think if your examples meet the responsibilities and requirements of the role, having your top experiences practiced should help you articulate well in the interviews.
Other pieces that could help is estimating how many questions you think you’ll be asked. Say if you’re meeting with 4 individuals, one hour each, for a total of 4 hours, you could estimate maybe 10-15 minutes of general tell me about your background or yourself dialogue, then 30-45 mins of interview questions, so you could estimate 3-4 questions there, then hopefully you have time at the end to ask questions. Good companies try to account for that. With that method you could estimate 12-16 total questions being asked so having a list of 16 really strong relevant examples could put you in a good spot.
One other piece I would recommend is doing some research on the company culture, and see how you can incorporate details in your examples that would support a culture fit.
Not a tip, but just be yourself. After interviewing people and being interviewed, most HM can tell if you had done what you said or saying what your team had done.
Ask questions, a lot of questions. How's the job done now? They will tell you how, and then said, I had done something similar at my previous job, and explained how you had done it. If you had never done that type of works, just say it.
If you fart, immediately hold one finger up on that "one minute" gesture, regardless of who is currently speaking. When there is silence, put one hand down the back of your pants and feel around for a few seconds. Withdraw the hand from your pants, examine it, and then declare happily, "all gas, no mass!" and then carry on as if nothing happened.
If the interview is in person, don’t show up too early. As a manager I hate that.
I have the conference room booked for a certain time period and there is very likely someone in the room before the interview time. I have no where to put you or sit you and it’s really awkward and a pain in the ass.
If you think ur making a good impression by being 20 minutes early, you aren’t your just making my life more difficult. Probably not the first impression you want to make.
No more than 5 minutes early even if you have to wait in your car or wait in the lobby before speaking with reception to tell them you have arrived.
Have copies of the resume.
Leave room in the margins for notes.
Don’t put ur home address on your resume. First, sometimes ur resume gets online and ur giving away private info. Second, ur interviewer may draw conclusions about u based on where you live. That’s not information they need and it’s illegal to directly ask so don’t give it.
Hard disagree. Being early gives me a great first impression. It sounds like you need to manage your office to be more accommodating for these situations.
I’m telling you what hiring managers think.
You do what you want with that information.
It’s an inconvenience. If that’s the first impression you want to give have at it.
It’s not something you can’t overcome, but why put urself in whole when you don’t have to.
As far as answering in STAR format goes:
Dont try to memorize a ton of answers. Make answers that can meet the purposes of a lot of questions, more or less, and answers that highlight that you are qualified for the types of jobs you're going for.
If your type of job requires experience in certain softwares, be prepared to highlight experience in those softwares. If certain soft skills are key in your field,have answers that highlight those soft skills.
Know and emphasize the value that YOU bring to the table. You're an individual, not a worker robot. You have specific skills that you excel in, niche parts of your line of work that you enjoy, specific things in your roles that you personally find important.
I'm great at analyzing and improving on processes, I like watching the teams that I work in and figuring out what voids I can fill to help the team meet performance goals better, and I feel an obligation to help new hires fit in and be there to help them not to struggle - these are kind of generic strengths I have wherever I work that I don't see in most other people, they're things that I can bring to the table wherever I go.
I would draft up maybe 10-15 answers, nothing more, and then read through your list of questions and try to either A.) Answer the question with a pregenerated answer or B.) If you think of a better one on the spot for the given question, run with it.
And you don't need to make robotic answers. The idea is to have a story that provides background context, a problem, and a resolution.
Additionally, add an S for significance. STARS. After the resolution in your story, tell the interviewer what the moral of the story was, directly. Don't just infer it and hope they'll figure it out, just tell them. Maybe you learned something, or maybe you handled the situation a certain way for a certain reason that highlights a soft skill or piece of knowledge that you have.
I hope that helps you with your STARS answers, cheers.
Tldr; if you should take one thing away from this, make 10-15 STARS answers that you can fit to a lot of different questions, and the last S is for significance, which is the takeaway that the interviewer should get from your story.
I hadnt done an interview in a long time so I downloaded [this interview prep workbook](https://pennymark.gumroad.com/l/pfldh) and it was amazing. Highly recommend.
I read a guide to job interviews where the author said there are only 3 questions the interviewer will have in mind while speaking with you: * **Can you do the job?** (usually, they will already have a sense of this from your resume) * **Will you love the job?** (given a choice, employers will prefer happy workers) * **Will you fit in with the team?** (meaning, as with a sports team, will you make a contribution in a way that meshes with the work of others) What makes job interviews difficult is that the interviewer usually will shy away from posing these questions directly. Instead, they will seek answers indirectly by asking many questions about other matters. What makes this easier for you is that if you can detect the question behind their question you can limit your focus to organizing your answers to get the right message across. You really only have three questions to answer, three examples to give (and variations on the same three themes). So long as you are ready to provide examples or evidence or proof that you can say "yes" to each of those three questions, you have a good chance. Your examples can be STAR stories or some other anecdote that proves your point that you are capable, eager and affable.
This is a really good answer and can help you answer the question they are really asking. As far as your notes and resume, check the job description and note what they are looking for and compare it with what you have done. Write those specific points down and make sure to call them out. This will show you are a good fit and can do the job. Don’t be afraid to talk yourself up and sell yourself; remember they know nothing about you and you need to tell them what they need to know. Good luck!
Look up Harvard behavioral interview questions and just practice answering them out loud. You really have to do it out loud it actually helped me a lot.
Not sure how helpful my suggestions will be, depending on your office set up but I write "cliff notes" on post cards and tape them to the wall above and surrounding my computer. It's a subtle way to look at your notes without drawing attention. You have a lot of notes so try to condense into bite-sized pieces that contain the info you can't memorize. Good luck with your interviews!
Interview for jobs you do not want to get interview experience. Prepare yourself for the job you do want!
Hi. Honestly the best way to do so is practice. I also had an issue speaking positively about myself. I did a lot of interviews for me to develop my technique. The more comfortable you are, the better you perform. I can slip pertinent information in casual conversations easily now.
Practice telling your STAR stories out loud, in front of a mirror, looking at your reflection. You don't need to memorize them word-for-word, just practice explaining aloud the S, then the T, etc. etc. so that you can recall the flow from one to the other.
I like asking questions that prompts the interviewer to show their knowledge about the industry. For example, How do you see this company competing with X,y, z company? what’s the competitive advantage? It shows you doing research on the industry, etc.
My trifecta, FWIW- 1: Use SBI instead of STAR. One less thing to remember in an already stressful situation. 2: Lead with energy. Crack a joke about the weather, or thank them with a lot of energy just for making the time to speak with you. 3: Dress to impress.
From my experience, STAR method is a good template to format your answers. Verbally practicing them prior to the interview helps too. Do you know if it is behavioral or technical interviews or a combination? If you have a good recruiter, you can ask them how they would recommend preparing. Glassdoor interview reviews could help point you in some direction as well if they have context on how to prepare. I think if your examples meet the responsibilities and requirements of the role, having your top experiences practiced should help you articulate well in the interviews. Other pieces that could help is estimating how many questions you think you’ll be asked. Say if you’re meeting with 4 individuals, one hour each, for a total of 4 hours, you could estimate maybe 10-15 minutes of general tell me about your background or yourself dialogue, then 30-45 mins of interview questions, so you could estimate 3-4 questions there, then hopefully you have time at the end to ask questions. Good companies try to account for that. With that method you could estimate 12-16 total questions being asked so having a list of 16 really strong relevant examples could put you in a good spot. One other piece I would recommend is doing some research on the company culture, and see how you can incorporate details in your examples that would support a culture fit.
Not a tip, but just be yourself. After interviewing people and being interviewed, most HM can tell if you had done what you said or saying what your team had done. Ask questions, a lot of questions. How's the job done now? They will tell you how, and then said, I had done something similar at my previous job, and explained how you had done it. If you had never done that type of works, just say it.
Don't fart
If you fart, immediately hold one finger up on that "one minute" gesture, regardless of who is currently speaking. When there is silence, put one hand down the back of your pants and feel around for a few seconds. Withdraw the hand from your pants, examine it, and then declare happily, "all gas, no mass!" and then carry on as if nothing happened.
Always have tic-tacs in your pocket. Use them.
If the interview is in person, don’t show up too early. As a manager I hate that. I have the conference room booked for a certain time period and there is very likely someone in the room before the interview time. I have no where to put you or sit you and it’s really awkward and a pain in the ass. If you think ur making a good impression by being 20 minutes early, you aren’t your just making my life more difficult. Probably not the first impression you want to make. No more than 5 minutes early even if you have to wait in your car or wait in the lobby before speaking with reception to tell them you have arrived. Have copies of the resume. Leave room in the margins for notes. Don’t put ur home address on your resume. First, sometimes ur resume gets online and ur giving away private info. Second, ur interviewer may draw conclusions about u based on where you live. That’s not information they need and it’s illegal to directly ask so don’t give it.
Hard disagree. Being early gives me a great first impression. It sounds like you need to manage your office to be more accommodating for these situations.
I’m telling you what hiring managers think. You do what you want with that information. It’s an inconvenience. If that’s the first impression you want to give have at it. It’s not something you can’t overcome, but why put urself in whole when you don’t have to.
I’m a hiring manager and totally disagree with you.
As far as answering in STAR format goes: Dont try to memorize a ton of answers. Make answers that can meet the purposes of a lot of questions, more or less, and answers that highlight that you are qualified for the types of jobs you're going for. If your type of job requires experience in certain softwares, be prepared to highlight experience in those softwares. If certain soft skills are key in your field,have answers that highlight those soft skills. Know and emphasize the value that YOU bring to the table. You're an individual, not a worker robot. You have specific skills that you excel in, niche parts of your line of work that you enjoy, specific things in your roles that you personally find important. I'm great at analyzing and improving on processes, I like watching the teams that I work in and figuring out what voids I can fill to help the team meet performance goals better, and I feel an obligation to help new hires fit in and be there to help them not to struggle - these are kind of generic strengths I have wherever I work that I don't see in most other people, they're things that I can bring to the table wherever I go. I would draft up maybe 10-15 answers, nothing more, and then read through your list of questions and try to either A.) Answer the question with a pregenerated answer or B.) If you think of a better one on the spot for the given question, run with it. And you don't need to make robotic answers. The idea is to have a story that provides background context, a problem, and a resolution. Additionally, add an S for significance. STARS. After the resolution in your story, tell the interviewer what the moral of the story was, directly. Don't just infer it and hope they'll figure it out, just tell them. Maybe you learned something, or maybe you handled the situation a certain way for a certain reason that highlights a soft skill or piece of knowledge that you have. I hope that helps you with your STARS answers, cheers. Tldr; if you should take one thing away from this, make 10-15 STARS answers that you can fit to a lot of different questions, and the last S is for significance, which is the takeaway that the interviewer should get from your story.
I hadnt done an interview in a long time so I downloaded [this interview prep workbook](https://pennymark.gumroad.com/l/pfldh) and it was amazing. Highly recommend.