You have your job interview scheduled—congratulations! Now it’s time to prepare, have a great knowledge of your target company and its product, and, of course, know exactly how to convey that you’re the perfect fit for the job.
Here are a few tips to make sure you bring your A-game:
- Understanding key information about the company you’re interviewing with can help you go into your interview with confidence. Spend a few hours learning everything you can about the company—from as many sources as you can. Talk to friends and contacts, read current news releases, and, yes, spend some time on Google.
- Get a sense of “who” the company is and how to embody a similar personality during your interview.
- The key to a successful interview is preparation, preparation, preparation. This involves defining what it is you want to achieve from the interview, in-depth research into the topics you’re going to cover and research into the industry expert themselves.
- Reread the job description. You may want to print it out and begin underlining specific skills the employer is looking for. Think about examples from your past and current work that align with these requirements.
- Use the STAR method in answering questions. Prepare to be asked about times in the past when you used a specific skill and use the STAR method to tell stories with a clear Situation, Task, Action and Result.
- Be prepared with examples of your work. During the interview, you will likely be asked about specific work you’ve completed in relation to the position. After reviewing the job description, think of work you’ve done in past jobs that you have experience and success doing the work they require.
- Prep a go-to interview kit for your purse or briefcase. It should be large enough to hold your everyday essentials, plus your interview musts, such as extra resumes.
- Being genuine during interview conversations can help employers easily relate to you. Showing positivity with a smile and upbeat body language can help keep the interview light and constructive.
- While it can seem tempting to embellish on your skills and accomplishments, interviewers find honesty refreshing and respectable. Focus on your key strengths and why your background makes you uniquely qualified for the position.
- Professional Strengths- The best answer focus on one or two skills and provide direct examples of occasions where they demonstrated these skills and how it affected the outcome.
- Come up with a go-to phrase that’ll help you avoid dead air if you need time to stall and gather your thoughts.
- Your interviewers might require you to submit a list of references before or after your interview. Having a reference list prepared ahead of time can help you quickly complete this step to move forward in the hiring process.
Oh, and get some sleep. This sounds like something your mom would tell you, but there are few things that will throw you off your game like sleep deprivation.