An interview for a job or a position, in its truest form, is just selling yourself as a person or asset to a company or organization. Sometime in a hiring or membership process there as several interviews with multiple different people. Each person who interviews another person for a position will have different preconceived notions about the interviewee based on what information they have provided to them (resume, pervious interviews, what they find online). Generally speaking, if a person is offered an interview in the first place they must have some quality the potential employer finds positive. With this in mind, the interviewee should go into the interview process trying to find what this positive thing is and emphasize it during the interview to reaffirm the interviewers positive preconceived notions. The best why to find this positive proception is to ask probing questions to begin and add these questions to the end of your answers of their questions. After, discovering this positive attribute(s) try to tie thing back to it when you answer question. For instance, if the positive attribute is previous experience in the field when situational questions are asked your answer should start with “In a past experience I had alone these line I …” Furthermore, along with the positive preconceived notions their may also be some negative ones. Generally, These negative thoughts are outweighed by the positive notions or at least in doubt or an interview would not of been given in the first place. The best way to find what these negative thoughts are to simply ask what some areas the company is striving to improve in. The answer to this question will often give you information pertaining to common issues with employees or the company as a whole. From here it is easy to briefly explain how you could avoid such pitfalls. After this, it is best to move on and focus more on the positive side especially as the interview is ending to leave the interviewer with a positive thought.
By Max Chmura
BoweryJE22 2 thoughts on “Selling your self (interview)”
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I think this was a great post that did a good job at summarizing the interview process and its relation to sales. I think viewing an interview as simply just trying to sell yourself to the potential employer is a healthy and helpful way of viewing it and will lead to improvement in the interviewing process. It also offers a great way to look at the interview from the perspective of the interviewer.
This is so true! To interview well, you have to understand what the company is looking for and why you would be a good fit for them. Of course, you don’t want to dodge all of their questions like we do in a typical sales conversation, but focusing on the positive traits that qualify you is critical.