Someone close to me just now forwarded me a response from an interviewing manager. Unfortunately, the answer is negative … after almost three stages of interviews he basically got told that “they felt that he was too smart for the role” and that “their concern is that the job may not be able to do justice to his expectations”. Wow … talk about underselling your organization to prospective smart employees. I get approached often for advice on hiring, and not because I am an expert, because my close knit group of friends and my family appreciate my input on most professional things. Out of numerous discussions addressing the “interviewing function” and my own interview experiences, there are a couple of personal rules that have emerged for me. I would like to share them here:
- Dont really say more than you are required to say. Active listening and active conversation based around that active listening - and based primarily around what you hear coming out of the mouth of your interviewer - is the best way to sound confident without really creating a hole for yourself.
- There is nothing like a definitive “Five things you should do to WoW your Interviewer”. And related to it, there is a fine line between “WoWing someone” and “coming across as a professional threat” - in one of many ways. People have professional insecurities, and you dont want those to flare up in your face.
- Ask for advise, follow the tips on the internet, but at the end “follow you heart” and “work with the personality of your interviewer”. If it looks like he/she had a rough day coming into the interviewing, smiling cheek to cheek may not work - even as all sources may point towards the position requiring a happy disposition.
Bottomline, take the first ten minutes to sum up the personality of the person sitting in front of you and then work with him/her as per your understanding of their psychographic profile. Coming back to the story of the close friend, the email goes on to say that while they appreciate his candidness about “wanting definitions and setting goals” - they really want someone who can be a “free spirit” … and this was for an accounting role. Are we not, as a society, suffering enough from the financial irregularities arising from free spirited accounting. Fingers crossed for my friend … hopefully he will hit an interview sometime soon where they will recognize, reward and want “disciplined work ethic” in their accounting assets … I am positive because he has the talent, now it is just a question of him knowing whether “to say it or not to say it …”
If anyone reading this note is actively looking for some great young accounting talent, then please feel free to send me a note at info@manusharma.info I am more than happy to make the introduction with him.
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on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 9:27 pm and is filed under Thoughts/Musings.
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