Tag Archives: interviewing

Be strong at the interview; Nowitzki vs. James

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During the NBA Finals, I wrote with great anticipation about the Dallas Mavericks hopefully beating the Miami Heat. My son and I wanted the Mavs to beat the Heat because 1) they knocked our beloved Celtics out of the play-offs and 2) we despised the way Lebron James made a circus out of leaving Cleveland, practically claiming to be the chosen one.

Maverick players were getting it done by being demonstrative and touching each other by high-fiving, patting butts, handshakes, etc. I related this to management’s attempt to raise morale as a great thing and that companies need more of it.

Now I’d like to talk about Dirk Nowitzki and Lebron James and how they are analogous to jobseekers vying for the same position. No one will stage a great debate as to whether James is better than Nowitzki; James is a dominant, every-coaches-dream player…at least on paper.

What I’m going to assert is that if you’re not the best person on paper (Nowitzki), it doesn’t mean you’re not the best one for job. I’m referring to your résumé, which may indicate a lack of certain job-related skills. It may not be the best one submitted for the job, but keep in mind that a résumé doesn’t get the job; the interview does.

Although a great résumé helps in getting to the interview, a good one can accomplish this, as well. Let’s go back to James and Nowitzki. On paper James is king, but during the playoffs, Nowitzki ruled. To further the analogy, let’s look at the playoffs as the interview.

Interviewers often look for the intangibles in job candidates. They see that the other candidate for a Marketing Manager position, for instance, has the prerequisite skills, while you’re missing a few and not coming across, on paper, as not the strongest candidate (Nowitzki). What’s your plan of action?

  1. At the interview demonstrate your enthusiasm for the job and mention your strong personal and transferable skills whenever you can. You show initiative, hustle (another word for work hard) and are willing to dive for every ball. You’re a true leader who inspires your colleagues to do their best.
  2. Take every moment to explain your accomplishments and how they raised revenue, saved money, and improved processes at your last job. Quantify your results with numbers, dollars, and percentages. Use the Situation/Task, Action, Result (STAR) formula to tell your stories.
  3. Be prepared to answer the tough questions, one of which will be, “Why should we hire you?” or some deviation of this. You can do the job, will do the job, and will fit in, is the foundation for this answer. Rattle off the requirements you meet, not the ones you don’t; talk about your love for the company and all it stands for; and mention how you were respected, not feared, by all your colleagues.
  4. Appear confident and unstressed by questions regarding the technical skills you may lack. One of which might be your experience with direct mail. Talk about experiences that required total organizational, follow-through, management, and cool-under-pressure skills. Don’t spend the alloted two minutes answering this question.
  5. Do your due diligence: follow up the interview with a thank-you note that reiterates your strong abilities to do the job. Don’t revisit the one area of the position where you lack the experience; rather focus on the ones where you do. Be gracious of the time the employer took interviewing you. Address any potential problem the company has that was raised during the interview; explain in detail how you can help them solve it.

Keep in mind the words of Rick Carlisle, the manager of the Mavericks, “Our team is not about individual ability, it’s about collective will, collective grit, collective guts.” Employers look for the intangibles job candidates have, what they can do for the company in the future. If your lack of experience is insurmountable, take pride in the effort you put forth at the interview. It was Nowitzki and his team that beat James and the Heat, despite how the King looked on paper.

Don’t overlook the value of One-Stop career center job search workshops

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The other day I was talking with a neighbor who has been out of work for over six months. He’s a project manager who worked at a medical equipment conglomerate for five years. I asked him how his job search was going. He told me great; he had sent out more than 10 resumes that day on a number of job boards. I cringed—in to the black hole they went.

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I encouraged him to come down to the One-Stop career center, for which I work, for help with his job search. “The Unemployment Office?” he asked. Obviously he hadn’t been to a career center, where unemployment insurance assistance is one of many services the career centers offer.

“No the career center. We can help you with your job search. We have workshops on all kinds of job-search topics….” I also wanted to tell him that he’d feel very comfortable at our career center. He’d fit in.

Adapting to a Rapidly Growing Professional Job Seeker Clientele

One common misconception of One-Stop career centers is that the only people who attend job search workshops are those who know little to nothing about seeking employment or are non-exempt workers. For a vast majority of people, nothing could be further from the truth.

Increasingly more job seekers who attend workshops are savvy job seekers who come from all types of occupations. Positions like marketing, engineering, sales, pharmaceutical development, document control, manufacturing management, as well as mechanics, construction workers, et cetera.

To better serve the more experienced job seekers, career centers have had to upgrade many of its services. Workshop Specialists (WS) are finding the challenge of serving experienced job seekers to be both exhilarating and mentally stimulating.

They’ve had to up their game and are meeting the challenge. The consequence of not enhancing their knowledge is letting savvy job seekers down and driving them away. Below are some of the more popular workshops that WS’s have developed.

LinkedIn: To answer the demand of the LinkedIn aficionados, many career centers are offering workshops on Intro to LinkedIn and Advanced LinkedIn. The latter workshop addresses the elements that make a LinkedIn profile appealing to employers who are enabling the Hidden Job Market by searching for passive or active job seekers via LinkedIn. Employers are increasingly foregoing the traditional search process and instead using LinkedIn and social media like Facebook and Twitter. Approximately 80% of employers are using LinkedIn.

Advanced Résumé Writing: This is another area of the job search where advanced job seekers expect more than the rudimentary theories on writing this important marketing piece. Many of them have received costly assistance from outplacement agencies and professional résumé writers, so they know the drill when it comes to writing an effective marketing piece. Advanced Résumé Writing workshop focus more on Strategy, Positioning, and Selling one’s skills and experience. Workshop Specialists stress results that are quantified and related to the jobs to which jobseekers apply.

The Interview Process: Advanced jobseekers need to know more about the interview process than simply the etiquette one has to demonstrate at an interview, e.g. steady eye contact, a firm handshake, and good body posture. The importance of researching the job and company comes to no surprise to them, but combining the power of LinkedIn and reading the company’s website for additional details of the job is some food for thought. (The more experienced job seekers have an advantage over the ones who haven’t looked for work in more than ten years.) Behavioral questions and how to prepare for them is often new even to advanced job seekers. Many of them haven’t experienced behavioral questions, and if they have they were often taken off guard.

Networking: There is a clear divide between the experienced and inexperienced job seekers in a career networking workshop. The advanced job seekers have been attending networking groups once or perhaps twice a week, so they’re familiar with organized networking technique. The focus on how networking enables one to penetrate the Hidden Job Market. It’s fascinating to see workshop attendeess’ faces when WS’s talk about today’s hiring process—that 80% of employers are hiring from within, not advertising the very best positions and entertaining only the savviest networkers.

Job Search Letters: Experienced job seekers know the importance of effective written communications, but in this workshop they’re reminded of how important it is to be proactive in one’s job search. WS’s talk about approach letters as a way to network. Cover letters are always sent with a résumé unless instructed otherwise. When asked how many send cover letters with résumés, most don’t raise their hand. Jobseekers are encouraged to go beyond the typical cover letter with the typical first sentence, and write a vivid tagline that grabs employers’ attention. Boring doesn’t win brownie points with employers—it’s simply boring. The thank you letter is the conclusion of the interview process.

The next time you see someone who is biding his time applying online for jobs, suggest that he visit a One-Stop career center; talk to a career counselor; look into training; and, of course, join as many workshops as possible. Jobseekers of all experience levels shouldn’t turn their nose up to One-Stop career centers that are making a great effort to accommodate the expanding number of experienced job seekers…and often succeeding.

Recruiters and staffing agencies say your soft skills are important too

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Based on two recent blogs I read on LinkedIn Today (a great feature), recruiters and staffing agencies are not only concerned about job candidates’ hard skills; they’re also concerned about their soft skills. And this makes sense. Who would want to hire a dud who brings the operation down with his attitude? Jon Prete, “Who would you hire: Charlie or Ashton? It’s all about attitude!” and Jeff Haden, “The 5 Biggest Hiring Mistakes,” both emphasize the importance of hiring someone who will be a good fit.

This said, how should you prepare for the job search with this in mind? Here are five areas of your job search to focus on.

1)       Be the round peg for the round hole: “The outstanding salesman with the incredible track record of generating business and terrorizing admin and support staff won’t immediately play well in your sandbox just because you hired him,” writes Haden.

Let’s face it; if you’re difficult to work for, you have one strike against you already. Look at yourself long and hard and determine what areas in your personality you might improve. Also determine in which work environments you feel most comfortable. If you’re a demanding person with little tolerance, you might consider an atmosphere with other demanding people…where you can’t terrorize other people.

2)      Show it on paper: Many jobseekers say writing about their soft skills on their résumé and in their cover letter is irrelevant. This is bunk, especially with your cover letter. I don’t suggest that you use clichés like, “hard worker,” “team player,” “dynamic.” I suggest you illustrate these traits through your accomplishments. Show rather than tell.

A Manufacturing Manager who has a team-work approach and leadership skills might write: Consistently met production deadlines through collaboration with colleagues in various departments and providing effective leadership to (formerly) unmotivated subordinates. Result: Products were shipped to customers with a 97% return rate.

3)      Talk about your soft skills while you’re networking: “I hate bragging at networking events,” I’m constantly told. “Nobody wants to hear about my personal qualities.” Yes they do. If someone is going to recommend you to a solid contact, wouldn’t you like to be assured that she will tell him that you loved what you were doing; you were a positive influence on you co-workers? Demonstrate your enthusiasm while you’re networking, whether at events or on the sidelines of your daughter’s soccer game. Instead of saying, “I’m innovative”; say, “I came up with ideas that were often implemented and led to significant cost savings.”

4)      Of course demonstrating your soft skills at the interview is important: This goes without saying. Interviewers today are using behavioral questions to find the people with the right attitude. “If crafted properly,” states Prete, “behavioral questions can provide a glimpse into a candidate’s decision-making process as well as their values. [Leadership Development Advisor, Beth Armknecht Miller] believes that a great majority of employees fail in a company because their soft skills and values don’t match those of their manager and company.”

Unlike the résumé where you have limited space, the interview provides you the platform to tell your stories using the STAR (situation, task, action, result) formula. You may be asked about your ability to effectively discipline subordinates. “Tell me about a time when you were effective in disciplining an employee. How did this help the employee perform better?” Have a story ready.

5)      Seal the deal: The interview is not concluded until you’ve sent a follow-up letter, I tell my workshop attendees. This is another opportunity to emphasize your strong personality skills, making you a better fit for the position than other applicants. Many jobseekers fail to send a thank you note, and some don’t get the job for that reason.

A former customer recently wrote me, “The HR person really liked my hand-written thank-you note; said it was rare.” The message here is that you can stand out as a courteous, professional, and follow-through type of candidate simply by sending a thank-you note.

Jobseekers generally think that recruiters and staffing agencies care only about the technical skills. (After all, recruiters can’t present a zebra with orange stripes to their client when a zebra with black stripes is called for.) But two recruiters are telling you that employers want a great personality fit, as well. Take their advice and sell yourself as an all-around employee from the very beginning.