Did you know that your questions are more important than your answers when on interview?
“I was disappointed I was not offered the job as I was able to answer all the questions”.
As a headhunter I have often received this disappointed reaction. The flaw is where the candidate understandably interpreted the interview as a ‘question time’ session. The more questions they answered correctly, the more likely they would be short-listed for the role.
But stand back for a moment and rethink the process. When I invite a candidate for interview, I have read their CV in detail. I am aware of their technical ability, their education and their experience and I have decided that all these attributes match the profile of my job description. But what I don’t know is their personality. Are they friendly, truculent, articulate, talkative, relaxed, nervous, confident, arrogant, focused, distracted? These are a selection of the common traits we demonstrate consciously or accidentally whilst being interviewed.
An experienced interviewer will have identified from their research the personality qualities needed to successfully perform the duties and responsibilities. For example, if a software engineer manifests a quiet, reactive persona then that would be regarded, by the recruiter, as compliant with the personality type they are seeking. If I am seeking to recruit a Business Developer, I would expect them to be conversational and highly interactive. But however taciturn or outgoing the candidate, it is important to ask intelligent and relevant questions about the role, for example the key tasks, duties and responsibilities, the major challenges and perhaps the scope of the role.
However, interview coaching is a difficult subject to know how to prepare for and where advice and feedback can only be situational, circumstantial and individual. Having grasped all these many permutations I have devised a unique interview coaching template which looks at interviewing from a different perspective. I redefine an interview as an opportunity to perform rather than a situation to be tested. This new approach has achieved an over 80% success rate for many thousands of candidates who received job offers.
The Interview Template is outlined on the jobcoach.org.uk website.
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