How To Make a Great First Impression During An Interview
Here you are, finally! You’ve written the perfect cover letter, polished your resume, and landed a job interview. Now is the moment of truth. The final interview will decide if you get hired, and at what condition. But how to align all the stars in your favor? How can you stand out from the crowd and make an ever-lasting impression on your interview? In this article, we’ll tell you everything you need to know to arrive prepared and let the interviewer know that you are the one they need for this job.
Five Essential Tips For An Outstanding Interview Performance
1. Sell Yourself Like a Marketer
Anyone can boast about their abilities and accomplishments, but if you don’t follow through, you may find yourself falling short. Whatever experience you’re sharing needs to sound unique and great. When given the opportunity to speak about a skill or experience, go above and beyond simply presenting what you did or how
People love a story and interviewers are no exception. Keep going by telling them where you learned that skill, how you developed it, or why you needed it in the past and how you used it in a complicated situation. Finally, show them how they can use your skills to solve their problems and improve their business.
2. Present Your Blind Spots Differently
During a job interview, you may be asked about your strengths and weaknesses. Recruiters frequently begin by asking about your strengths before moving on to your flaws. How can you answer this question honestly without making a bad impression?
Hiring managers are wary of answers like “I’m a perfectionist,” “I’m competitive,” and “I work too hard.” These boilerplate answers won’t fool hiring managers, but you can use them if you add details about the position to show you’ve thought about it.
You could say: “I recognize a tendency to stress, I take things too personally, I am a little too picky,” or “I am extremely demanding of myself and sometimes put myself under too much pressure”.
3. You Can Never Be Too Prepared
In the age of the Internet, there is no excuse for going into a job interview unprepared.
Learn about the company as if it was yours. Go through their website and read articles about the company on other websites. Look for the values of the company and make them yours. Ideally, you’ll make the recruiter feel like you’ve already worked there. Once you figure out how to incorporate these ideas into your own stories, you’ll appear to be a natural fit for the job.
4. Clothes Do Make The Man
While it depends on which sector you are in, the way you dress is paramount. The clothes you wear to the interview can make or break you. Rather than wearing traditional formal attire, search the internet for images of their employees or walk past the location to see what their employees wear. If you’ve understood the values of the company, this will definitely help too. This is another great way for you to show that you fit in this company, and make the recruiter like you at first sight.
5. Ask The Appropriate Questions
Usually, at the end of the interview, your interviewer will ask if you have any questions for them. This is an opportunity to show, first, your interest in the company and the people who work there. Secondly, it gives you the chance to take a more active role in the interview and to show your personality differently. Asking questions they didn’t hear a thousand times is likely to have a good effect.
Ask broader questions about the company as well as more direct, personal inquiries about the recruiter’s role, or his favorite aspect of the company. This not only demonstrates interest in the broader corporate culture, but it will also cause the interviewer to pause and honestly reflect on their own experience, as well as remember the applicant who asked.