Chapter 8. Sixteen Tips About Interviewing
There are three types of interviews, as we saw in the previous chapter:
¦ Interviews for fun or practice, done with people who are passionate about the same thing you are;
¦ Interviews for information, done with information specialists, experts in the industry that interests you, or employees holding down the same job as you are exploring; and
¦ Interviews for hire, done with employers in general, and the person who has the power to hire you for the job you want, in particular.
This chapter is about this third kind of interview, the one for hire. Here are sixteen tips about that kind of interview:
An interview resembles dating, more than it does buying a used car (you). An interview is analogous to two people trying to decide if they want “to go steady.”
An interview is not to be thought of as marketing yourself: i.e., selling yourself to a half-interested employer. Rather, an interview is part of your research, i.e., the data-collecting process that you have been engaged in, or should have been engaged in, during your whole job-hunt. While you are sitting there, with the employer, the question you are trying to find an answer to is: “Do I want to work here, or not?” You use the interview to find out. Only when you have concluded Yes, do you then turn your energy toward selling yourself.
An interview is not to be thought of as a test. It’s a data-collecting process for the employer, too. They are trying to decide if you fit. They are using the interview to find out “Do I want him or her to work here? Do they have skills, knowledge, or experience that I really need? Do they have an attitude toward work, that I am looking for? And, how will they fit in with my other employees?”
An interview should be prepared for, before you ever go in, by taking these three steps:
1. Research the organization or company, before going in. Go to their website if they have one, and read everything there that is “About Us.” If your town has a public library, ask your local librarian for help in finding any news clippings or other information about the place. And, finally, ask all your friends if they know anyone who ever worked there, or works there still, so you can take them to lunch or tea or Starbucks and find out any inside stories. All organizations love to be loved. If you’ve gone to the trouble of finding out as much about them as you can, they will be flattered and impressed, believe me—because most job-hunters never go to this amount of trouble. Most just walk in the door, knowing nothing about the organization. I knew a man who ran a large organization in Virginia; he said to me, “I’m so tired of people coming in here, saying, Uh, what do you do here? that the next person who comes in here and has done some prior research on us, I’m going to offer a job.”
He called me a week later to say, “I kept my word.”
2. When it is you who is taking the initiative in setting up the interview, specify the time you are asking of them—unless they ask you to stay longer. Experts recommend you only ask for twenty minutes, and observe this commitment religiously. Watch your watch or timepiece like a hawk! Stay aware of the time, and don’t stay one minute longer than the twenty minutes, unless the employer begs you to—and I mean, begs. Always prepare to end it at the time you specified, with, “I said I would only take twenty minutes of your time, and I like to honor my agreements.”
This will always make a big impression on an employer!
3. As you go to the interview, keep in mind that if this is the person-who-actually-has-the-power- to-hire-you, then they are just as anxious as you are. Why? Because, the hiring-interview is not a very reliable way to choose an employee. In a survey conducted some years back, among a dozen top United Kingdom employers,[27] it was discovered that the chances of an employer finding a good employee through the hiring-interview was only 3 percent better than if they had picked a name out of a hat. In a further ironic finding, it was discovered that if the interview was conducted by someone who would be working directly with the candidate, the success rate dropped to 2 percent below that of picking a name out of a hat. And if the interview was conducted by a so-called human resources expert, the success rate dropped to 10 percent below that of picking a name out of a hat.
No, I don’t know how they came up with these figures, and maybe they are flat wrong, but I don’t think so. They are totally consistent with what I have learned about the world of hiring during the past forty years. I have watched so-called experts make wretchedly bad choices about hiring in their own office, and when they would morosely confess this to me some months later, over lunch, I would playfully tease them with, “If you don’t even know how to hire well for your own office, how do you keep a straight face when you’re called in as a hiring consultant by another organization?” And they would ruefully reply, “We act as though it were a science.” Well, let me tell you, dear reader, hiring is not a science. It is a very, very hazy art, done ineptly by most of its employer- practitioners, in spite of their own past experience, their very best intentions, and their carloads of good will.
What this adds up to, is that the hiring-interview is not what it seems to be. It seems to be one individual (you) sitting there, scared to death, while the other individual (the employer) is sitting there, blase and confident. But what it really is, is two individuals (you and the employer) sitting there supremely anxious. It’s just that employers have learned to hide their fears better than you have, because they’ve had more practice. But this employer is, after all, a human being just like you. In most cases, they were not hired to do this. It got thrown in with all their other duties. And they dread making the wrong decision.
The employer’s fears include any or all of the following:
A. That you won’t be able to do the job: that you lack the necessary skills or experience, and the hiring- interview won’t uncover this.
B. That if hired, you won’t put in a full working day, more often than not.
