A parent recently contacted me thru private message about her son’s situation. He’s graduating with a very good GPA with an EE degree. The son has had several interviews, but no offers. Conversely, her son’s friends/classmates have received many offers, so maybe he’s doing something wrong during the interviews. His resume must be fine since he’s getting interviews.
So, please share your best interview tips.
Also, please share interview mistakes - mistakes that interviewees do that are a turn-off to interviewers.
Hopefully, others can benefit from this list as well…
Here’s a random turnoff. I was interviewing for an assistant position, and one candidate arrived 30 minutes early. A bit too early, but I was ok with it. Interview went well, but at the end she confided that she had actually arrived 3 hours early and had waited in her car in the parking lot for over 2 hours! We just found that so odd. Ended up hiring a different applicant. Overeager and desperate was a turnoff.
Confidence, knowledge, and personality are the key things. Present yourself professionally and show that you take the interview seriously, i.e. turn off the cellphone, dress appropriately, clean yourself up, arrive on time, and be polite and friendly with everyone you interact with (absolutely everyone, including the receptionist). People will say “be yourself”, but my advice is to be yourself but dial it back a notch. That is, don’t get caught up in excess enthusiasm for non-work related sidebars during the interview. Be aware that you’re there for a specific purpose, as is the interviewer. Get excited about the job-related stuff and related classes you took by all means, but be more brief when talking about your last vacation or where you’re going for dinner later.
Project confidence. Don’t “ummmm” and “uhhhhh”. Don’t fidget. Make eye contact. Sit up straight. Give the inverviewer your full attention. Take a second to consider the question asked and formulate an appropriate answer before shooting from the hip. All of that falls under “present yourself professionally” but college kids probably have no idea what that means and need it spelled out. But also don’t be stiff; you need to be someone that the interviewer can see himself working with in close proximity for the next few years. People hire people, they don’t hire a skillset in a vacuum.
Research the company and job you’re applying for so you can ask appropriate questions about it. Demonstrate interest in the company and interest in the position. Interview the interviewer as much as they’re interviewing you. This also demonstrates confidence - you want to find out if the job and company are a fit for you, not just the other way around. Approach the interview as an opportunity to find out if it’s a mutual fit, not with the intent to simply show that you’re the perfect candidate.
Rockvillemom’s anecdote falls under the “keep it professional” recommendation. That candidate had no real reason to share that she arrived 2 hours early and volunteering that information helped to torpedo her chances.
Go to the career center and take advantage of the one-and-one interview training with video. If the career center doesn’t have that, perhaps the parents could hire a private consultant to work with the kid as part of his graduation present. General tips are unlikely to be helpful; it sounds like he needs targeted suggestions.
My employer does structured interviews with preselected questions. All interviewees at that session will be asked the same questions. There is always one on diversity and one on a problem/situation and how it was resolved, and so on. You would be surprised about how many are not prepared.
He should write down what questions he remembers being asked. Are there any commonalities? How does his education relate to the job he’s interviewing for? Did he research the company? Be prepared to answer succinctly…no tangents.
The career office should offer interview coaching and I agree with PP that if they don’t, he/family should hire someone.
Other than that, nicely dressed, recent haircut, firm handshake, look the interviewers in the eye, and speak with confidence.
People, in general, like speaking about themselves. This is especially true for interviewers. LET THEM speak! LISTEN to what they say! When they are through try to ask a thoughtful question related to something they spoke about. It shows that you are engaged in the conversation and that you care about the person (even if you really don’t).
Is he being interviewed by one person or by a group? When he gets into his car has he been writing down what he did well and where he might have gone wrong? Did they tell him how many were being interviewed?
Can he come up with a brief story describing how he achieved something that matches up with the needs of this job? In one interview I sensed they really liked me so my answers from then on were short and I assumed consent and they would be hiring me. A long rambling story can damage any chance of being considered.
I always thought that getting the interview was a victory since you accomplished your first objective. Find him somebody who can google the company and then do a mock interview with him. Our county has an agency that will conduct these interviews for free and ask him all kinds of questions. Eventually this experience will come in handy in future interviews.
When he leaves how does he feel it went? There are so many variables of why I haven’t hired someone.
I’ll assume he’s dressed appropriately.
A firm handshake, eye contact and having some energy and enthusiasm for the position is a first step. Read the ad again, read the website and have some relevant questions. Research typical questions for engineering interviews. Be positive, be a team player.
Sometimes they interview all finalists on the same day rotating them through interviewers. They may take candidates out for lunch as a group to see how they behave in informal setting. Make sure that you can maintain a conversation and do not order messy food that is difficult to eat. Even geeks and introverts interviewed for STEM role should make an effort to be social.
On another note - did this graduate have any work experience and/or relevant internships? You have to be prepared to talk about everything on your resume. But sometimes it is not that you are doing something wrong but there is always a better packaged candidate so you have to just keep trying.
Be prepared to talk about:your long term and short term career goals
Be able to clearly and briefly explain some problem and how you went about solving it. Employers love problem-solvers.
Make good eye contact and have firm but not crushing handshake
Be prepared to give a believable but not deal-killing answer to a question about your weaknesses.
Don’t start ask about salary/benefits in the first round interviews unless they bring it up. The purpose of the early interviews is to discover whether there is a mutual match between opportunity and skills. You can haggle about the money later when they make you an offer.
Do your homework. Read the company website. Be conversant about the company’s products and business.
Have an elevator pitch ready to give to anyone asking the vague “tell me about yourself” type questions - 2 min who are you and what you are looking for. Practice it so you do it with ease and don’t ramble. Second tip - behavioral interviews - questions run along the lines of “tell me about a time when you had to overcome an obstacle with a project” - you should have 3-5 stories ready - experiences from school, clubs, internships, but recent (not HS). You want to structure the response with situation-action-result. Again, succinct response - xyz was the issue, i did x and y and z and the result was that x increased by y% and we met xyz goal.
^Yes, absolutely listen to what the interviewer is saying. I’ve interviewed candidates often who, when I am speaking, are thinking about the next point they want to make and end up responding incorrectly because they didn’t hear what was said. As others mentioned, practice can help with this. It may sound like a simple thing but I can tell you that I am ready to move on to the next candidate after two or three answers from someone who obviously hasn’t listened. That is a clear indication to me, of how an employee will perform in a group situation.
Also, sometimes candidates try to explain things in a way that ends up backfiring on themselves. Not a good idea.
Here’s an example - this happened about 8 years ago, it was a group interview for a technical position and I was the only woman in the room. We were wrapping up the interview and the candidate was asked if there was anything else he would like to tell us about himself. He mentioned a couple of things, then looked straight at me and said. “And I just want you to know, Ma’am, I don’t have any issues taking direction from women”. Now, it’s 2008, not the 1960s or 70s and it hadn’t occurred to me for even a nanosecond that he or any man might have issues “taking direction from women”. But I sure thought about it afterward. And not in a positive way.
Treat other employees you come in contact with during the interview - receptionists, janitors, cafeteria workers, waiters - with the utmost courtesy and friendliness. If you are rude to my receptionist or treat her as “less than,” you are out cold.
Do your research ahead of time, and have questions ready for when they ask “Do you have any questions for us?” but make sure they’re not obvious questions that could be easily answered by looking at their website.
We interviewed one candidate who was well qualified for the position, but he came off as a cocky know-it-all and talked non-stop and the people in the small office he’d be working closely with decided on a less-qualified candidate they thought they’d like to be around.
H’s firm sometimes has dinners for interviewing purposes which includes wives. It’s always interesting because while the wives haven’t been part of the actual interview about job skills, resumes etc but you certainly form opinions which can kill job chances.
One big turn off is the cocky know-it-all mentioned above.
Or someone with such specific job goals with high expectations that they just don’t appear willing to start nearer the bottom and work their way into that position.
The flip side is someone with both confidence and skills but a bit of humility that is willing to learn the ropes and take some direction. They are joining YOUR team as a rookie, not leading it.
Rather than just guessing, he should ask. Call back or email the interviewer, thank him/her for the opportunity to interview, and ask whether there is anything the interviewer would recommend to help make myself a better candidate next time.
Random thoughts based on 20 years of interviewing - from high school students to professionals with masters degrees :
-give concrete examples in responses to questions, not just generalities. I want to see how a candidate can apply prior experience to situations. It doesn’t necessarily matter if it’s a volunteer or school experience - can you see parallels and apply them?
-don’t lose the interview schedule
-don’t insult former bosses, supervisors, professors
-table manners if interviewing over lunch or dinner (one candidate scooted his chair back, planted his left elbow on the table, resting his forehead in his left palm while holding his fork like a shovel in his right hand and continously shoveled food in–my colleague & I looked at each other absolutely appalled and not sure how to proceed )
-we want to know that a person is well -rounded and has a work/life balance. When asking what do you do in your spare time and hearing “I either take work home or I sit at home and talk to my cat”–that’s an absolute red flag.
-do have an answer of how this position would fit into your career path; as an employer I’m not looking for a lifetime commitment, but I’d like to have an idea if a candidate is planning on 6 weeks, 6 months, or 6 years.
In the engineering forum section, it is sometimes mentioned that any indication of a career goal to move into management can be a turn off when applying for entry level engineering jobs.