Effective Interviewing Stems From Effective Resume Writing

My clients often ask me how they can become better interviewers and wish they sounded more confidant when they answered the questions asked them. They often think that if they were better at “interviewing techniques” like how to sit up properly, how to have effective eye contact or which color of clothing will help them appear to be the most viable candidate.

This is of course a silly approach to effective interviewing. That is not to say that the “interviewing techniques” are not valuable and worth noting. They certainly are, but they are not what is most important. What is most important to effective interviewing is having a deep connection and very clear understanding to their resume.

Writing An Effective Resume

In order to write an effective resume you have to begin with some sort of reflective exercise that challenges you to think about, reflect upon and write down all of the various aspects of all your significant past jobs; even though all of the past job may not be listed on the final version. This reflective process reconnects us to all that we have done professionally and assists us in clearly understanding the various directions our career has taken. When this is done, we are able to communicate about our career objectives based not only on which direction we want our career to go, but also from where these directive decisions came from. The best way to show a prospective employer that you are a viable candidate for a job is to establish a clear sense of how you benefited your previous employers and how that experience will carry over into the new job.

It is just as valuable to express why you chose a career path and where you hope that career will go as it is to state what you did at your past jobs. In fact, having a deep connection or in other words, a passionate zeal about your career intentions is the most important element of the interviewing process. When this occurs, a natural confidence and motivation is expressed by the interviewee that always is appealing to the interviewer. It is impossible to teach someone how to be motivated or confident because these are conditions of the “inner-workings” of our total self. What I can teach someone is how to cause these byproducts to occur frequently. We can cause these outcomes by determining to never give up on a career path, to acknowledge the authenticity of our career needs and by establishing a vision of what our career will be long-term.

Resume Tips

Key Concepts for Powerful, Effective Resumes.

1. Your resume is YOUR marketing tool, not a personnel document.
2. It is about YOU the job hunter, not just about the jobs you’ve held.
3. It focuses on your future, not your past.
4. It emphasizes your accomplishments, not your past job duties or job descriptions.
5. It documents skills you enjoy using, not skills you used just because you had to.
10 Steps in Creating a Valuable Resume

1. Choose a target job (also called a “job objective”). An actual job title & company name works best.
2. Find out what skills, knowledge, and experience are needed to do that target job.
3. Make a list of your 2, 3, or 4 strongest skills or abilities or knowledge that make you a good candidate for the target job.
4. For each key skill, think of several accomplishments from your past work history that illustrate that skill.
5. Describe each accomplishment in a simple, powerful, action statement that emphasizes the results that benefited your employer.
6. Make a list of the primary jobs you’ve held, in chronological order. Include any unpaid work that fills a gap or that shows you have the skills for the job.
7. Make a list of your training and education that’s related to the new job you want.
8. Choose a resume format that fits your situation–either chronological or functional. Functional works best if you’re changing fields; chronological works well if you’re moving up in the same field.]
9. Arrange your action statements according to the format you choose.
10. Summarize your key points at the top of your resume.

Examples of Behavioral Interviewing Questions

1. Describe a situation where you used persuasion to successfully convince someone to see things your way.

2. Describe an instance when you had to think on your feet to extricate yourself from a difficult situation.

3. Give me a specific example of a time when you used good judgment and logic in solving a problem.

4. By providing examples, convince me that you can adapt to a wide variety of people, situations and environments.

5. Describe a time on any job that you held in which you were faced with problems or stresses that tested your coping skills.

6. Give an example of a time in which you had to be relatively quick in coming to a decision.

7. Tell me about a time in which you had to use your written communication skills in order to get an important point across.

8. Give me a specific occasion in which you conformed to a policy with which you did not agree.

9. Give me an example of an important goal which you had set in the past and tell me about your success in reaching it.

10. Describe the most significant or creative presentation which you have had to complete.

11. Tell me about a time when you had to go above and beyond the call of duty in order to get a job done.

12. Give me an example of a time when you were able to successfully communicate with another person even when that individual may not have personally liked you (or vice versa).

Behavioral Interviewing

Employment interviews are changing for the better. The traditional interview questions that deal with simpler things like, “Tell me about yourself,” are no longer enough to satisfy the appetite of organizations seeking new employees. They realize more than ever before that the most accurate predictor of future performance is past performance in a similar situation. Behavioral questions provide a more objective set of facts to make employment decisions than other interviewing methods; the process is much more probing and works very differently.

Important Points About Behavioral Interviewing:

• Employers have a predetermined skill set that they feel is necessary for the job they hope to fill and ask direct questions to assess if a candidate possesses those skills. Talk with alumni, read the company literature carefully, and pay attention during a company’s information session to discover which skills the employer is seeking.

• Your response needs to be specified and detailed during the interview. Don’t give one-word descriptive responses like, “my organizational skills worked well in that situation.” Instead, describe a particular situation that relates to the question. For example, “I found the solution because I input all available information into my Palm Pilot and sync that information to my computer hourly to ensure no information is lost.” Briefly explain the situation, your specific action taken, and the positive result of that action. Frame it in a three step process: 1. Situation, 2. Action, 3. Result/Outcome.

• After the interviewee explains a situation for a few minutes, the interviewer will try to identify the specific behavior(s) by breaking down the situation. The interviewer’s probing process often includes a search for more detail and depth; “What were your questions at that point?” or “Tell me more about the person’s response,” or “Tell me about your decision process.”

• Be sure to listen intently and always answer your questions completely; ask for clarification if necessary.

• Your interview preparation should include identifying examples of situations where you have demonstrated the behaviors for a given company.

• The more detailed and clear your resume, the better it will be in assisting you in answering these questions. Remind yourself about your achievements from the past two or three years and remember that there are many ways to demonstrate the behaviors that the interviewer is seeking. Use examples from past internships, classes, activities, team involvements, community service and work experience. You may also use examples of your special accomplishments like achieving your exercise goals, being the captain of of your high school sports team, artistic achievements, overcoming your fear of heights by sky diving, etc..

Identifying Your Skills, Talents and Personal Qualifications

It can be challenging and sometimes uncomfortable to talk about the things we do well for fear of sounding too boastful. Yet, it is only through understanding our attributes that we can find the job that best suits our individual needs; and our our first priority is to meet our needs without alteration! The ultimate challenge is to find highly creative ways of doing this without being a burden to our loved ones and without doing so at another’s expense.

Regarding the job search, our approach should be, “You can talk the talk as long as you walk it!” That being said, it can still be difficult to pinpoint which skills best reflect who you are personally and professionally. Like many of your colleagues and loved ones, you have not been taught to “boast yourself up,” and to explain the myriad of skills that you possess or to clearly express your profound aptitudes.

Developing Your Skills Language

* Job-Related Skills. These are the skills you need to do a specific job; the ones you have developed in your current or past jobs. A plumber, for example, needs to know how to install pipes and repair fixtures, especially for water, drainage and heating systems. These are all skills that he or she would need to repair sinks. When people are asked what kind of skills they have, they most often respond with job-related skills such as these.

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Adaptive Skills or Self-Management Skills. These are also known as personality traits or personal characteristics, and are the skills you use on a daily basis. They assist the development and maintenance of your relationships and help you adapt to various situations. They are the skills that make you unique. For example, honesty and motivation are traits that employers look for in a valued employee, to assist them in determining if he or she is a good match for their organizational culture. Many job seekers do not emphasize these skills in resumés, but employers look for them.

* Transferable Skills. These skills can transfer from one job or occupation to another, which is important because of how rare it is to find an identical job to a previous one. Writing clearly and the ability to organize things are two examples of transferable skills that you can use in almost any work situation.