5 Ways to Ace Your Interview
Posted by Lai Han Sam (Ms), PCC
Working with clients on their upcoming interviews is part and parcel of supporting them in making the transition from one role to another in my role as a career coach. To ace your interview, it is important to be clear about your value proposition and professional brand. An interview is also a great opportunity in finding out more about the potential role and the organisation you are potentially joining.
Here are 5 interview tips to ensure a smooth and fruitful interview.
Work with a Career Coach
Learning how to ace a job interview from a career coach is crucial in sharpening your message during your evaluation. Your career coach may ask you thought-provoking, inspiring, supportive and powerful questions to help you to change the way you portray yourself in an interview.
Often, I find that candidates then to play down their achievements or avoid talking about a failure situation. This is because of the mindset of thinking that the day to day work is not interesting to the interviewer. The key is to get to the gist of the learning you are getting from the work experience – achievement or failure. This shows up as a willingness to learn and having a growth mindset.
Know the organisation (and the interviewer!)
Understanding the strategy, culture and values of the organisation is crucial in making sure your answers are relevant and precise to their perspectives. It is important to research about the company and know what they stand for. Know someone who works in the organisation? Talk to them to understand and know more about the ins and outs of the organisation.
If you know exactly who is your interviewer, find out more about their background and role in the organisation. Knowing where they are coming from will help in how you frame your answers, leading to a successful interview.
Case studies demonstrating your skills and experience
Asking about your past successes and experiences is a common question. This is the best way for interviewers to see if you know what you are talking about and share how you think. It is especially important to balance your technical and people skills – even if you know what to do, the interviewer would want to know you if you fit in with their team or not.
If you have experience leading a team, have ready examples that would demonstrate your leadership skills. Think through and prepare actual case studies that will help you to talk through your experiences.
Prepare for hard questions
If you have been asked a question that threw you off in a past interview, you are not alone. Sometimes, these questions are thrown in to check your adaptability, flexibility and creativity.
One of the ways to tackle unexpected or hard questions is to not answer the questions immediately. Take a pause and a breath, after listening to the question. Pausing will not only help you to look calm and thoughtful, you would have bought time to think as well.
When asked if you have questions, make sure you prepare a few to ask. This project interest and do take the opportunity to showcase your thoughtfulness as a leader and employee.
Practice, Practice, Practice
It is extremely important to practice for an interview. You want to answer authentically and thoughtfully. Here are a few ways you can sharpen your interview skills.
- Record your answers to commonly asked questions. In fact, if you can record a video, dress up as if you are going for the interview and do a mock run. This way you can playback and tweak your presence and answers.
- Practice in front of a mirror to check your gestures and posture – essentially your body language. You want to show up confident and strong. If you have a friend or family who can help, ask them for feedback.
- Learn to ask clarifying questions. As the interview may feel intimidating, learn to relax and practice asking questions about the organisation. Remember that this is a conversation. While the organisation is checking if you are a fit for them, you too are checking if the role is a fit for you.
Preparing your interviews with the above 5 tips will help you to be more confident, relaxed and sharp about your brand. Good luck, and may you find what you are looking for!
About the Author:
Han Sam, aka Sam, has been coaching professionally for more than 8 years with more than 300 clients and more than 900 hours under her belt. She specializes in mid-life and career transitions, working with corporate and private individuals in areas of self-awareness, personal brand, and leadership development. Her style of coaching is intuitively in the moment, with a creative flair and focused on pragmatic results. Clients love her strong yet supportive manner.Sam has more than 20 years of experience navigating the corporate world with a NASDAQ listed company, leading high performing teams and coaching associates in sales, marketing, operations, support, and client management. These are valuable skills she brings to the coaching process. Sam’s last role as a Senior Sales Executive, was responsible for market direction and strategies related to the Singapore healthcare market, managing a pipeline worth SGD$140 million dollars.
