Category Archives: Interviewing

Interview Tools

Job Search Tools that Can Land the Job You Deserve

Interviewing, Job Search, Quotes

Job Search Tools: Are stuck in your job search?  Perhaps the list of tools in the article will help you land the job you deserve.

Powerful Resume

Powerful Resumes: Are you sending out dozens of resumes and not getting job interviews. You might find the suggestions in my article “Powerful Resumes: The Critical Details for Getting Job Interviews” helpful.

In my “See All Posts” archives, you will find close to thirty articles on how to write a resume that will get you interviews.

Research Tools

Research gives you a critical advantage over people who don’t research companies, contacts, and job opportunities.

Before approaching a company directly, research it thoroughly. How is it structured? Bottler, distributor, direct, or broker sales? Public or private? Do you have a referral to help you get your foot in the door? Who are the key managers for the job you are seeking? To whom do these people report?

I remember driving to the main library in Houston.  This library had the information I needed to identify companies to pursue. With further research, I could learn what types of jobs these company offered and the products and services they produced. I could learn information about the key officers in the company. Often, I could find the addresses to send resumes.

With the Internet, I can get so much more information without leaving my desk.

I can still use the library.  I signed up for a library card. Now I can read library books on line.

With a little bit of effort, I can uncover information about companies to show the recruiter why I am the most qualified person for a job.

Job Search Tools

Read the want ads in the local newspaper, national publications, and especially trade journals. Job search engines and job boards will have job opportunities all over the country.  Become an expert on what is in the job market.

Lay out your goals as specifically as you can but be aware that the more flexible you are in terms of money, location, and opportunity the more opportunities you will have available to you. Understanding your goals will make you more effective in identifying job opportunities.

Recruiters

Types of recruiters: Contingency recruiter or retained recruiter?  Contingency recruiters work under contract for payment and successfully filling a job. A retained recruiter works under a contract that pays the recruiter a retainer fee to initiate a search and complete payment after the new hire starts to work.

Typically, contingency recruiters work on middle management searches.  On the other hand, retained recruiters are conducting searches where the compensation is above $250,000.

In practice, how a recruiter is compensated is not important.  The key information for you to know is whether the recruiter has contracts (contingency or retained) for conducting a search assignment.

Before you call a recruiter, be aware of the limitations that working with a recruiter might place on you. On the other hand, you should know the services that recruiters offer job applicants.

Do reference checks on recruiters. Recruiters are humans. Some you will like. Others you may not like.

Network Building Tools

Start with a list of all the people you believe can help you. These are people you know well enough that they will need no reminder of who you are. From there, make a list of everyone you have met since beginning your career.

In creating your list, include the phone number, email address, and mailing address of each of these people.

Ask for referrals of every person you contact.

From there, begin to use social media to identify people who can help you.

Be Organized

Make a list daily of your contacts, what you discussed what action you have taken and what action needs to be taken.  You might create a status board similar to the one in my article titled “Status Board.”

Interview Practice: How to Prepare for Success

Interviewing, Quotes

Interview Practice: What can you do to prepare and practice for your job interview? Here are some ideas that will help you.

What good are your talent and skills if no one can see them? ~ www.jaywren.com .com

How You Benefit from Interview Practice

No one can know with any certainty what questions to expect in an interview. However, interview questions tend to fit into categories.  For the most part, these questions fit into a range of questions.

Essentially, interview preparation come under four categories:

  • Everything about you
  • Everything about the hiring company

These points will become clearer in the discussion below. Here are examples of questions under these two categories.

Everything About You

Workplace Relationships: Keep your answers positive.  The interviewer is trying to understand how well you work with others.

  • How would you describe your workplace relationships?
  • Who was the best supervisor you have ever had?
  • Tell me about the worst supervisor you ever had?
  •  How would your peers describe you?
  • Tell me about a conflict you faced at work and how you dealt with it.
  • What do you expect out of your team/co-workers?
  • describe your expectations of your future manager?
  • What qualities to you seek in building a team?

Your Character and Emotional Intelligence: These questions help the interviewer understand your individual professional and personal qualities.

  • What is your management style?
  • Have you ever told a lie?
  • What motivates you? Whom do you most admire?
  • Tell me about yourself?
  • How do you deal with stress?
  • To what do you attribute your success?
  • How do you describe your perfect day?

Qualifications:  In asking questions about your qualifications, the interviewer is looking for specifically skills and experience that qualify you for their job opening and your potential for long-term success with their company. Here are some sample questions.

  • What is your greatest strength?
  • Describe your greatest achievement?
  • How do your qualifications make you the best fit for our job?

Your Growth Potential:  In this case, the interviewer is examining how well you can grow short-term and create long-term value to the company.

  • What are your long-term goals?
  •  Describe the things you do you do to grow professionally?
  • What are your career passions?
  •  When you were a growing up, what did you want to become?
  •  Can you describe your typical day?
  • Tell me about your greatest weakness?
  • Where do you see yourself in five years?
  • Are you willing to relocate?

Questions about Why You are Making a Job Change:

  • Why are you leaving your current job?
  • Were you laid off?
  • What are you looking for in your next job?

Everything about the Hiring Company

Taking all of the questions above, you should direct your preparation on how your answers to those questions show why the company should hire.  You must show that understand the opportunity.  Additionally, you must know the company’s products, distribution channels,

Putting your knowledge of the opportunity together with your knowledge of company, you must show how you fit the company’s short-term and long-term goals and needs.

The answers should show, based on your knowledge of the job opportunity and the conditions at the company, that you are the companies best possible hire.

Here are some sample questions.

  • Why do you want to work for [insert company name]?
  • What is your dream job? Should indicate why you the hiring company is the place where you want to work?
  • Could you describe your plan for the first 90 days on the job at our company?

Mental Attitude and Interview Practice

Interview practice will help you think more clearly.  Furthermore, the practice will strengthen your ability to think on your feet.  Interview role playing with another person and in front of a mirror will help you feel more poised.

Going to the Interview

Interviews are like batting in baseball. Who knows what pitch is coming next? Often the pitcher does not know where the next pitch is going until it gets there.   As professional baseball players do, take a deep breath. Stay loose. Trust yourself.

Qualifications

Quit Struggling to Get Jobs Below Your Qualifications

Interviewing, Job Offers, Popular Posts, Quotes

Qualifications: Quit Struggling to Get Jobs Below Your Qualifications. Are you frustrated, because hiring companies will not see you for jobs you can do easily?  Are you overqualified for these jobs.  There risks to you and the employer in hiring people who are overqualified.

Risks to Employers

Speaking as a recruiter, I can tell you that my clients focus on specific skills.  These clients want to hire qualified candidates. However, they avoid overqualified applicants.

Why? Overqualified people are a risk of leaving as soon as they find a job at their skill level.   Vacancies are a burden.  They damage morale and productivity.  Filling vacancies takes time away from other company efforts. Furthermore, staffing fees are costly, especially when searching for highly qualified candidates.

The Risks to You for Interviewing Job Below You Qualifications

Taking a job below your qualifications damages your career.  You risk creating a picture of yourself as backslider.  You raise questions about your ability to continue to grow.  Furthermore, you may raise questions about what happened to push you back in your career.

How to Get Great Interviews with Companies Who Need Your Experience

Case Study:

Bob (not the real name): “How I should format my resume for the greatest success?”

Me: “As a person with advanced degrees and advanced qualifications, you should consider two formats for you resume: A Curriculum Vitae (CV) format or a resume format. Here are two articles that may help.

Bob: ”How should I list my skills in a resume?”

Me: “Be specific. For example, I once had a search for a company that sold perishable products (products types are different from this example). I had a resume for a general manager who was perfect for the job. His resume showed that he had canned goods experience.  However, his resume did not show is that he also had the required perishable foods experience at the same company.

After I filled the job, I learned that he was qualified for the job.

Bob: “How do I select companies?”

Me: “My recommendation is that you target specific jobs, not just every job opening. Identify roles that match your skills and get to know people who work at places that hire people for those roles.

Use your current close professional and personal network more frequently than you use a broad network of people on LinkedIn.

When introducing yourself via a referral, first ask for permission to use the person as a reference.

Where you have friends, who want to help you, ask them to forward your resume to a professional at a place where you want to work. Additionally, ask them to copy you on the resume.  Then you follow up directly with the new contact.”

Open-Ended Questions

Open-Ended Questions: Solving Problems and Creating Leadership

Interviewing, Job Skills, Leadership, Quotes

 

Open-Ended Questions: What are they? How do they create opportunities for greater understanding in solving problems and creating leadership?

One of the most important skills in leadership is the ability to answer open-ended questions. ~ www.jaywren.com

Examples of Open-Ended Questions

Open-ended questions enable a person to give meaningful, well-developed answers.  The person uses knowledge, feelings, creativity, and skills of self-expression.

Furthermore, these questions show how well a person can think . That is, to see not just one solution, but multiple solutions.

Examples:

“What are business problems that you have solved? How did you solve them?”

“What would you do if you never had to work again?”

“Why should I hire you?”

Examples of Closed-End Questions

People use convergent thinking to answer closed-end questions. Additionally, closed-end questions have one answer.

“What color is your car?”
“Blue.”

“How many fish in the bowl?”
“Three.”

“Did you leave at 4:30?”
“Yes.”

The Importance of Developing Skills for Open-Ended Questions

Some brilliant people have very poor skills for answering open-ended questions. They have vast amounts of knowledge.  They know the facts and can solutions.

However, their careers falter, because they cannot express their knowledge and their ideas.

For example, financial executives must have skills to know the accuracy of their calculations.

CFOs must be able to explain to a board what the numbers mean.  Additionally, they must be able discuss how the company got into a financial position and how to manage the company’s finances going forward.

Presentation Skills

The place to start learning how to answer open-ended questions is presentation skills.  Developing these skills with help you do many things.

  • Sell more effectively,
  • Interview more effectively,
  • Become a more effective public speaker,
  • Be a leader in workplace meetings.

In short, you will be more successful when you develop your skills to answer open-ended questions.

In conclusion, here are articles that will help you become more effective in answering open-ended questions.

Solutions 2

Solutions: How Successful People See the World

Interviewing, Leadership, Quotes

Solutions: Viewing the world as a series of problems is discouraging, even scary.  How can we change our outlook for greater success?

People who see solutions do not view the world as a series of problems. ~ www.jaywren.com

My Story

When I was a Navy bridge officer on a carrier, I had a commanding officer who required that all the bridge officers recognize the times when we needed to let him know about a problem. Sometimes, urgency required that we tell him before we had a solution. However, he also demanded that we bridge officers give him a solution when we could develop one.  Furthermore, he asked that we give him more than one solution.  He asked that we give him options.

His requirements for dealing with problems taught us to see more than the problems we met.  We learned to think tactically.  We developed skills to find solutions.  This growth experience in problem solving prepared us to manage greater responsibility.

Perspective

Recognizing problems when they are real is a practical view of the world.  Acting to solve problems is also practical.  This action reduces our anxiety and clears our mind to make better decisions.

Resources

In many cases, we have what we need to deal with problems, if in fact, they ever happen.  For example, there are solutions to reducing stage fright.  When we fear speaking in front of other people, we are focusing is on how other people will judge us.

However, none of us can control how other people will judge us.  On the other hand, what all of us can do is to stay in the present moment and prepare for interviews and presentations.  When we know our material, and when we can present it with confidence in front of a mirror, giving our presentation to an audience becomes easier.

Solutions

When we see a problem ahead, we should always tell our supervisor long before the problem happens.  Doing so gives them the time to find solutions.

Furthermore, we should not wait to find a solution to every problem before notifying our supervisor.

However, we can let supervisors know that we are working on a solution or that we have a recommended solution.

Problem Solvers Gain Respect

People who live with a head full of anxiety lack confidence.  Expressing anxiety to a supervisor or team members weakens the confidence that these people have in us.

However, people who show others have how to solve problems gain respect and emerge as leaders.

Composure

Composure: How to Overcome Meeting Anxiety

Interviewing, Leadership, Quotes

Composure: Whether they make mistakes or simply must deal with intimidating people, everyone has stressful moments in meetings. How can you stay composed?

Composure creates poise under pressure. ~ www.jaywren.com

Composure: How to Overcome Meeting Anxiety

Anxiety in meetings can be a problem for anyone.  However, whether you have natural poise or suffer social anxiety, you can stay composed for success.

Breathe

You don’t have to stop for a 20-minute mindfulness meditation to use breathing to gather composure.  Anxiety can suppress our breathing.  A lack of oxygen creates even more anxiety.  However, replenishing oxygen with a breath can reduce anxiety.

Breath in slowly and quietly.  Mentally focus on your breath.  The process will give your body the oxygen to burn the adrenaline from anxiety.  Furthermore, focusing on your breathing redirects your thinking from your anxiety to a calming breath and allows you to become spontaneous.  You will appear poised and gain composure.

Listen with a Purpose

Focus on what people are saying.  Ask yourself why they are saying those things.  Think of how the contributions of other people is useful to you.  Seeing the benefits in another person’s message takes your focus off your insecurities and creates positive feelings about what you are learning.

Practice Intelligent Silence

Intelligent silence is powerful.

Attending meetings and never speaking decreases your value to the meeting.  However, people who listen and speak when they have something meaningful to say strengthen the power of their contributions.

Additionally, allowing yourself to be silent and think before you speak will increase your composure.

Bring an Agenda

Come to meetings with a list of things that you want to know and things you want to say.  This approach is especially helpful when you are attending a job interview.

Become the Facilitator

Giving your support to other meeting attendees takes your focus off your insecurities and makes you valuable to the success of the meeting.

Developing the skills of a facilitator helps you as a public speaker, helps you in building professional relationships, and helps you in becoming a better friend or family member.  Furthermore, becoming the facilitator gives you leadership power in a meeting.

Interview Preparation

Interview Preparation: Three Steps That Will Land You the Job

Interviewing, Job Search, Job Skills, Quotes, Resumes

Interview Preparation: Are you frustrated with rejection when you have the qualifications for the job? These three steps will help.

Fifty percent of the effort for the best interviews is in the preparation. ~ www.jaywren.com

There are three distinct steps in preparing for an interview.

#1 Interview Preparation: Everything About You

In the first step, review your qualifications.  This step will organize your thinking about the things you want the interviewer to know about you.

In writing your resume, you will have begun to work on this step.  Ensure that you can discuss from memory the dates and places where you where you have worked.  Furthermore, prepare to present your qualifications as accomplishments.

In the United States, applicants for jobs in research, education, and medicine often use a curriculum vitae.

# 2 Interview Preparation: Everything About the Company

The second step in preparing for an interview is to research the company and research the people at the company where you are interviewing.

The Internet is a powerful tool in this step.

Research the directions to location of the interview. Your smartphone can direct you to the location.  However, having to follow your smartphone in traffic is stress that you don’t need.  Additionally, know where to park before you arrive at your destination.

Furthermore, is this a location where you want to work?
Then, research the details of the company business.  What is unique about the company?  Why do you want to work for this company?  Can you explain to the interviewer the reasons you find the company attractive?

Additionally, learn about the people you will meet.  Are these people you want to work with every day? Can you tell the interviewers why you are excited to meet them?

Thoroughly understand the experience and qualifications listed in the job description.  If the company does not publish a job description, find job descriptions for similar jobs at other companies.

#3 Interview Preparation: Everything About the Match

Prepare to discuss how your qualifications are a match for the job and for the company that is interviewing you.  In this step, merge the preparation you have done on presenting your qualifications with your research on the company.

Furthermore, show how you experience makes you the perfect match with the job requirements.

Based on your research, make a list of the things you don’t know about the job and the company.  Prepare questions that you fill in the gaps between what you know and what you need to know.

Do mock presentations.  Become confident that you can show that you are the best candidate for the job.

In Conclusion

You are competing against other candidates.  Most of them have the qualifications to get the job.  Separate yourself from the competition by using the steps in this article to prepare for the interview.

Interview Feedback 2

Interview Feedback: How a Thank You Letter Can Land You a Job

Interviewing, Job Offers, Quotes

Interview Feedback: Have you had interviews and have no idea how well the interview went? A thank you letter can help you land the job.

“If you need interview feedback, sometimes all you need to do is ask for it.” www.jaywren.com

Interview Feedback: How A Thank You Letter Can Land You a Job

After an interview, you should always send a thank you letter to your interviewer. You are in competition with other candidates.  Therefore, setting yourself apart from those candidates is important in getting a job offer.

A Thank-You Letter Can Help You Do Several Things.

You can reinforce your interest in the job.  Additionally, you can reinforce your qualifications for the job.

Also, the thank you letter gives you an opportunity to ask for interview feedback and to ask for another meeting.

Who Gets an Interview Thank You Letter?

Send a thank you letter to everyone who met you.  If you are working with a recruiter, send the letter to the hiring managers and a blind copy the recruiter.  Recruiters have an interesting role between you and the company.  They can help reinforce your interests and your qualifications for the job.  Keeping the recruiters informed is important to enabling them to help you.

Note that both letters have a call to action: that is, you ask for a time to meet again.

Email or Postal Letter?

A thank you email helps you respond promptly.

A thank you letter is more formal and more impressive.

These formats will help you write a post-interview thank you letter in either format.

Sample Email Thank-You Letter

Name of Recipient:

The purpose of this email is to thank you for meeting with me to discuss my qualifications for the [name of position].

I am excited about your opportunity.

When may I meet with you again to discuss your opportunity further?

Thank you,

Your Name
Phone Number
Email address

Postal Thank-You Letter

I created a lengthier, more detailed discussion that might help you remind the hiring manager of your qualifications and your interest.  You can add a discussion like the one in the postal cover letter to the email cover letter as well.

Your information

Street address
City, state, zip
Phone number
Email address

Date

Contact’s information

Name, titles
Company name
Street address
City, state, zip
Phone number
Email address

Dear [Name of Hiring Manager]:

Thank you for meeting with me this morning.  After our meeting, I am even more excited about the possibility of working for your company.

I believe that I can contribute at once to your business.  Furthermore, I have accomplishments in the following areas that crossover to the job you have available:

Increased administrative efficiency 20%
Reduced 3rd-party contract costs 30%
Trained 6 new hires, all of whom have been promoted
Four-year member of the President Sales Club.

Your description of the responsibilities, the team environment, and the growth plan for your company tell me that your job is the job I want and that your company is the place where I want to work.

I look forward to being invited back for another meeting.

When may I speak with you again?

Thank you again for your time.

Sincerely,

Your Signature

Your Name Typed

In Conclusion

In these examples, I created two bodies of content.  The shorter you make your letter the better. However, if you believe that making the letter more detailed, and therefore, longer to read will help you get to a job offer.

The Best Job Applicants Do These Things

The Best Job Applicants Do These Seven Things.

Interviewing

The best job applicants do things that land them job offers. Furthermore, they set themselves apart from other job applicants to be the person companies want to hire.

“In a job interview, it is far better to get a job offer than to have to learn from your mistakes.” ~ www.JayWren.com

The Best Job Applicants Do These Seven Things.

#1 Show they are interested in the job.

The best job applicants come prepared with information on the job.  Furthermore, they may come prepared with information on the people who are interviewing job applicants.

Research on companies is easy.  Additionally, when the best job applicants know the names of the people they will be meeting, they research the profile of these people on Facebook and LinkedIn.

#2 Thoroughly understand the job description.

Additionally, they know the requirements of the job and how they have the qualification for the job.  They prepare to how their qualifications are a match for the job.

#3 Bring the right tools to the interview.

What you bring to any business meeting will make or bring your success in that meeting.  Getting to a business meeting to discover that you do not have the things you need is not only embarrassing, it is often a business-meeting killer.  I recommend that you buy a portfolio case or a briefcase that you use just for meetings.  Keep the case stocked with the materials that you will take to every meeting.

#4 Listen to the interview questions.

Some of the feedback I got on candidates is that they do not answer the questions the interviewer asked.  They gave answers about the subject in the question.  However, the best job applicants listen to the interviewer and answer their questions.

#5 Ask for the job.

I have had countless applicants fail to get a job offer, because they left the hiring manager uncertain about whether they had an interest in the job.

You are not the only applicant in the interview process. If three equally qualified applicants compete for a job and only one is expressing an interest in getting the job, the hiring managers have an easy decision. They will offer the job to the person who wants the job.

They simply say that they want the job and state why they want it.

#6 The best job applicants send a thank you note.

A thank you note can remind the interviewer of your ability to do the job.  Furthermore, a thank you note shows interest in the job and respect for the interviewer’s time.

#7 Arrive Early.

Arriving early is an infinite amount of time.  Arriving after the time of your appointment means you are late.  The best job applicants arrive early.

5 Steps to Getting a Job Offer

Interview Tips: How Do You Get from a Handshake to a Job Offer?

Interviewing, Popular Posts, Success

Interview tips: Do you have a job interview coming up and are not sure how to prepare? Even worse, are you getting interviews but no job offers?  These tips will help you get a job offer.

Interview Tips: How Do You Get from a Handshake to a Job Offer?

Use these 5 interview tips to cross the maze to getting a job offer.  Hiring managers want to hire you when they invite you to an interview.  Make their job easy.

Say That You Want the Job.

This tip for getting a job offer sounds obvious.  However, I have had countless applicants fail to get a job offer, because they left the interview with the hiring manager uncertain about whether the applicants had an interest in the job.

You are not the only applicant in the interview process. If three equally qualified applicants compete for a job and only one is expressing an interest in getting the job, the hiring managers have an easy decision. They will offer the job to the person who wants the job.

Simply say that they you want the job and why you want it.

Use Facts of Your Accomplishments.

Don’t use a list of adjective about yourself.  Avoid describing yourself as outstanding, motivated, organized, etc.  These words have no value.

Use the facts of your success.

For example, you doubled the business.  At the same time, you reduced costs twenty-five percent.  You hired six people who got promoted.

These facts show the hiring managers you can do a great job at their company.

Show How Your Skills Match the Job Description.

Before you go to the interview, study the job description.  List your skills with each qualification the hiring company requires.

Prepare a presentation either on paper or on your laptop to show hiring managers how your skills match what their company is looking for in the person they are hiring.

Ask Questions.

Don’t make the interview about you.  Have the good manners to ask hiring managers about themselves and their career.

Certainly, ask questions about the company.

Say some good things about the hiring manager’s comments and about the company.  Humility is a valuable trait for getting a job offer.  Hiring managers want to hire people who fit in with other people as well as people they like.  Show the humility to show an interest in the hiring manager and the company.

Avoid Jargon.

Every company has its jargon.  The people in the company fall into using these words as part of the workday.

If you are transitioning from the military or interviewing for a job that is in a different industry, be especially careful about avoiding jargon that will confuse the interviewer.

Did You Pass or Fail that Interview?