What to Do Differently in an Internal Interview

Do you have an internal interview coming up? Are you wondering what should I expect? Are these different from external ones and what will they ask? Well, today I will teach you six high impact strategies to ace internal interviews and stay to the end for the best question you should ask in an internal interview because sometimes you don't know what you should ask when you already work there. Strategy number one, this gives you a massive advantage. If you're doing an internal interview, talk to the hiring manager. When you hear that a role is open on their team that strikes your fancy. I want you to email that manager and get on their calendar. Share that you saw that X role is open on their team and you were thinking that it could potentially be a good fit and wondered if they have 10 minutes to quickly chat about the role. Use that meaning to understand what they're working on and what they're looking for in that role. I am warning you here, even if this is a casual conversation, this is actually your first interview, so don't go to Travis Birkenstock on that. So unexpected. I didn't even have a speech prepared. Prioritize making an excellent first impression and come prepared to the meeting. I will link a free informational interview guide below to help you get prepped. And I'm curious, have you ever done an internal interview before? Let me know if you have by commenting I have or not yet. And if you have, I'm curious how different it felt from a normal interview. Strategy number two Treat your internal interview like an external interview. So when you're an internal candidate for a job position, it's often really easy to approach the interview more casually, prepare less and share less detail about your work experience because they've seen it with their own eyes, right? That work should speak for itself, right? Absolutely wrong. Call that work the Little Mermaid because it's not speaking. If you want to hear the humiliating speaker story of how I failed an internal interview because of how terrible my nerves were and thinking that the years of great work I had done an organization would make up for my inability to think properly in an interview. Yeah, you can watch that. I will link that below. Strategy number three in an internal interview, explain your work as if you don't work there. So a lot of us breeze over our experience because we think that our coworkers know and remember the good work we've done. Nuh. Folks are too busy logging their eighth meeting of the day, getting together the TPS report and trying to craft an email with the right balance of periods and exclamation marks. People forget your value and they want you to lay it all out. So connect the dots to your current role and allow them to expend as little energy as possible. Understanding exactly why you are the perfect candidate. You can say something like I realize you're likely familiar with this work, but I'll explain it like I'm an external candidate to make sure we we both are completely aligned. Err on the side of offering a little too much information rather than not enough. Strategy number four Reshape your reputation Be aware of your reputation before going into an internal interview and reshape it even if you are seen as competent. You may need to rebrand yourself if you are going for a different type of role or even a higher level role. If your role before was mostly people oriented and this new role needs to be analytical, you need to sure you are heavily emphasizing that other side of you. In the interview I remember one internal candidate applied for a role and was rejected and the feedback she was given is that she didn't seem to have enough experience in the field. After she was given that feedback, she then started taking initiative in the organization to take on stretch assignments, do some shadowing, and even build her own programming that was in line with the role she interviewed for. But all of these things could have been done prior to to the hire, which would have secured the role for her. You need to ask for special projects in the area of this new role before pursuing it, and ignore that little voice in your head saying I have no time to do a special project or My boss would never let me branch out. I have managed many people in my career and I have trained many employees on how to be effective managers. The number one reason why managers often fail to professionally develop their employees is they don't know what the employee wants. And that's because the employee often doesn't know either. Or at least they don't know how to vocalize it. So speak up, carve your own path and this will dramatically increase the likelihood that you will land the job. Strategy number five Dress up. Work is getting real casual these days, especially if you're working remotely. The rule that always works is dress one step up from the typical day to day outfit. For example, let's say your employer is happy with you coming to work in a jeans and T shirt every day. So for the day of the interview you should be dressed maybe in a button up shirt. Maybe the material of your pants or skirt is seen as a step up from blue jeans. This is a rule that still applies if you already work at the company because it just shows that you're taking the opportunity seriously. And I know it's totally goofy, but it does send a sincere signal. So trust me on this one. Strategy Number six Thank you Emails Even if you already work for the company, and even if you talk to your interviewer every day, you still send thank you emails after an internal interview. And I don't want to hear any excuses. An interview is two ways, so after the interview they are excited at the possibility of you taking this role and they want a signal from you that you are eager to A thank you email is the perfect way. You can watch my video on how to write a thank you email for the perfect way to explain express your interest and gratitude and I'll link that below. Now let's delve into the commonly asked questions and answers you need to prepare to ace your internal interview. Oftentimes, interviewers will ask questions to help them familiarize themselves with you and your work with questions like Walk me through your resume or Tell me about yourself. So walk through your resume as if you're not already co workers. They are busy people with a million things going through their heads. They likely don't remember your past roles and even if they do, they could probably use a refresher in this context. Only take two minutes to emphasize the experience that is most relevant to the role you are pursuing and I will link a whole guide on how to create the best possible answer here. Next up are matchmaker questions. In an internal interview, you will be asked matchmaker questions, and I call them that because interviewers are trying to ensure that what you are looking for matches what they are offering. Why? Because it's so much easier to motivate and retain someone who enjoys their work and knows it's the right next move for them rather than someone who is muscling through it or toe tapping until the clock hits 5pm These are questions such as what do you know about our team? Why this role? And how does this align with your career goals? I remember a person working in customer support knew they wanted to transition internally in the company to some role, but his answer as to why he wanted to transfer into human resources was something along the lines of I want this role to make a difference and I'm great with people, so I think this could be a good fit. Nothing in this answer showed that he did his research to be sure this role would be the right match for him. What he could have done better is name projects that the HR team has done recently that interested him. He could have also discussed how he has been taking classes in his free time about the skills for this new role and giving further concrete reasons as to how he arrived at this being his right next step stat. I have a video on how to answer why this role and so I will link that below and then you are likely to be asked the question Tell me about a time when or Give me an example of these behavioral interview questions. You might think it's impossible to predict what an employer might ask you here, that you need to go full ASAP and prepare stories for every single possible scenario. But the secret is you don't really need to do that at all. All you really need to do each time you are asked this type of question is to follow my story toolbox formula where you essentially have a series of examples from your career that you have strategically selected to work for nearly all behavioral interview questions. And now I have created a free digital download which will give you what you need to start building out your own story toolbox. And I have a video that explains the whole story toolbox in detail and so I will link both the download and the video below. When done building this story toolbox, you will never be stumped by a Tell me about a time when question again. Your interviewers may also ask you critique questions in internal interviews. They'll ask you to critique yourself, your work, the company, or even the outcome of a project. They're asking this because they want to know more about your ability to think critically, also having self awareness and being able to learn from the past. So don't sabotage yourself by laying your weaknesses on the table and leaving the employer to decide if they want to graciously accept you for who you are. Respond with an answer that outlines a skill you're working on, but you're building towards that skill and the progress you've already made. This shows that you are self aware and that you're great at taking feedback from your employer. I mean, who wouldn't want that? Since employers are always looking for ways to assess your critical thinking skills, that means you need to be excellent at asking questions in the interview and and this alone can sometimes get you the offer to get you started, here's a great question to ask your internal interviewer from your perspective. How closely do my experience and skills line up with what you're looking for in this position? Are there any gaps you're seeing? Typically, interviewers are more honest with internal candidates since they have a deeper relationship with you and you may be at a company that encourages this open and honest dialogue and they also already know that you're employed and that you're just continuing to explore. This question helps to show that you are a high value candidate because first, you're showing that you're humble and realistic. You know that there's no such thing as a perfect candidate so you're coming off as practical and self aware. Second, if they say you're lacking something, you can address that on the spot. It's possible that you have what they're looking for and it's just not something that you focused on in your interview and so now you have the opportunity to address it. Third, if they say no, there isn't anything else we could possibly want from a candidate, you are now prompting them to do that analysis on the spot and they're verbalizing it and getting them to internalize the fact that wow, this person really is the right candidate for this role. You've got this wi fi high five.