First of all – I hope all of you on the east coast have survived your week of earthquakes and hurricanes. For awhile I was beginning to worry that there was some criminal evil genius like Dr. Evil from Austin Powers that had some kind of weather machine…
Working in employment as I do I’ve heard a ton of great interview tips. I’ve also heard some really, really bad ones. The fact is that there are a ton of people that think they know how to ace an interview and are really excited to share their unique (stupid) ideas that they claim will most certainly land you the job. Below is a list of the worst ones I’ve ever heard.
1. Be Creative
I once read an article that suggested you should use unique and creative ways to stand out so that the company specifically remembers your interview. The article described several creative things applicants had done over the years including hiring a band to follow them or brought in homemade cookies. One candidate even went as far as to schedule a second interview by mailing a coffee mug and a Starbucks gift certificate to the hiring manager suggesting that they meet for coffee on a specific date. Unless you are looking to be in a PR job where these skills are needed these antics will most likely have one consequence – you will seem weird! The simple fact is that you should be memorable because your skills and experience stood out. If a company remembers you for anything else – it’s not a good thing.
2. Don’t Discuss Salary or Inflate Your Number So that When they Shoot Low You Get What You Want
The salary issue might be where the worst advice ever comes. It is so bad that I devoted a whole article to it a couple of weeks ago. You can read it here:
The two worst pieces of advice in this area I hear are that you should never discuss salary or that you should inflate your number when asked operating under the assumption that a company will always low ball you. The problem with the first piece of advice is that people suggest that this is an absolute. I agree that it isn’t wise to put all of your cards on the table when asked about salary and tell them the bottom dollar you would accept. However, many people take this advice to mean that you shouldn’t discuss it all. The truth here is that you need to follow the natural course of the interview. If a company asks what you need this is a good sign and you should give them an honest range of where you would like to be.
As far as the second part goes. This one is just dumb. If you want X – tell the company you want something in a range that includes X. Don’t tell them that you want $20K more than that. The odds are that you probably don’t deserve that much and that you will look foolish. This is not the final impression you want to leave in an interview.
3. Act Overly Confident
Someone I know very well was once advised to be assumptive at the end of an interview that you nailed it and have gotten the job. They were instructed that companies are looking for aggressive people that that they want to hear statements like “When do I start” or “Based on this interview I feel that I’m a perfect fit, don’t you agree?” The end result of questions like this are that you look really arrogant or you make the interviewer uncomfortable.
Folks, interviewing is like dating. Do you usually have much success asking to go home with your date after the first date? (Remember this is a rhetorical question…) If you treat an interview like a date and try to make a good first impression you will be in a better position for success.
4. Persistence Makes You Look Like You Want the Job
This is another piece of advice that gets totally misconstrued. You should follow up after an interview. This is very true. It is acceptable to send a thank you email and then after a little bit of time follow up with a phone call to check in. However, anything more than this starts to move into the stalking arena. This kind of moves into the dating metaphor again but if you start calling daily for updates after an interview you will appear desperate and unattractive.
If someone doesn’t respond to your phone calls or emails it means one of three things:
· They aren’t interested
· They are very busy and haven’t had time to call you back yet
· They haven’t made a decision or have no new information
It doesn’t matter which scenario is the case. Continuing to reach out will not change it and will result in a negative impression. Believe me when I tell you that not knowing can kill you but you have to just let things play out on their own timetable.
That’s all I’ve got for today. If you have any questions or comments feel free to leave them below or email me at sthompson@insurance-csg.com.
Check out some of my recent articles on the blog here:
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