#398: DECODE Your Interview Style: The Ultimate Strategy For Tailoring Your Approach for Success with Anna Papalia CEO of Interviewology, Author, Keynote Speaker, & Career Influencer

An interview in the most basic sense is a set of questions about you. The more you know yourself, the better you do. It's that simple. You know you are going to really struggle in interviews if someone looks at you and says what are your strengths and weaknesses? And you're like, you panic. If you have self awareness, it's easier for you to answer these questions. And we know through research that only 10% of people are truly self aware.

Come on this journey with me each week when you join me. We are going to chase down our goals, overcome adversity. Adversity and set you up for a better tomorrow.

I'm ready for my close up.

Hi and welcome back. I'm so glad you're back here with us this week. We've got an amazing guest this week and I'm so excited to dig into this conversation because it is going to totally prep you to be your most confident self when you're in work situations or interviewing to get into a work situation. Today we've got Anna Papaglia, the author of Interviewology the New Science of Interviewing and Career Influencer. She's a career influencer with over 1.5 million followers across social media. She has consulted with Fortune 100 companies, taught at Temple University's Fox School of Business, and coached over 10,000 clients to interview better. Her groundbreaking discovery of interview styles revolutionized the way that we teach and understand interviewing. She's also a public speaker at the Society for Human Resource Management and she lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Anna, thank you so much for being here with us today.

Thanks so much for having me.

Oh my gosh. So let's get into it for everyone listening, if you're like, I'm going to go ahead and tune out. I don't need to interview for something. Pause number one, because I never thought I'd have to interview for anything in my life. When I was a chief revenue officer at 43 years old, named one of the most influential women in radio. And one morning I woke up and I was fired. So the skill set of knowing how to interview is a lifelong skill set that you want to harness and really invest time and effort into people interviewing for promotions. And aren't there other opportunities to leverage the skills that you're teaching?

Well, also, you need to know how to interview as a hiring manager. And my book and my research straddles both. Right. I think that it was very weird that most of the books and most of the advice out there is only geared towards job seekers. So when I conducted my research and discovered interview styles, I Discovered that when you are a charmer, challenger, examiner, or harmonizer, it doesn't matter what side of the table you're on. So maybe you are excelling in your career and you're at the top of the game. But then you need to learn how to be a hiring manager. And we know that 90% of hiring managers have never been taught to interview.

That is so true, because I am living proof of that.

Right.

I was always recruiting for my old career and old company, and I employed thousands of people that were in positions where they were recruiting, and we never gave them any direction. You just kind of assume people know how to interview. Is that part of the problem, why people pick the wrong candidates?

It's the whole problem. The most important business decisions we make is who we hire. Yet we are throwing people to the wolves. Right? We have this weird belief that it's like dating. You know, kiss a bunch of frogs and you'll figure it out. Go on a bunch of interviews and you'll figure it out, but no one really does. What happens is we follow the pack, and when there's a lot of ambiguity, we trust our gut. And then hiring managers just hire who they like because they just kind of default to that. And then they're making really bad hires over and over again. They're continually hiring themselves like mini mes, as we know. And we don't need another you. We have you. We need diversity.

That's such a good point. We always gravitate towards what we know and what we like and see within us. I've definitely been that person. Okay, so let's get into these interview styles. And I love the fact that you're bringing science to a topic that I've never heard. So science applied to before. Can you break that down for us a little bit?

Sure, certainly. You know, previously I was a director of talent acquisition, and I just felt really stumped by the fact that we were making these really important decisions and there was really no science behind it. And I had gone to Penn for psychology. And I left the corporate world with just a simple mission. I wanted to teach job seekers and hiring managers how to interview better. And I started teaching at Temple University. Five, six years. I was doing it like we all do it. You know, do as I say, not as I do. You know, that sort of. And I started to realize that not everyone interviews the same way. And I had this light bulb moment like, what if we do this differently? So I collected tons of research. I talked to 280 students. I wrote a scientifically valid Interview style assessment tested that some more and over 10,000 people have taken this assessment. And that's how we determined these four unique interview styles. So everyone, no matter who you are, job seeker or hiring manager, prioritizes one of these four things. You're either a charmer who prioritizes being liked. You look at an interview like a performance and you're the star of the show, or you are a challenger and you go into an interview looking at it like it's a cross examination. You're going to figure something out and you want to be respected and heard. Or you go into an interview like an examiner who looks at an interview like a test that they are either going to pass or fail. Examiners are very private and they really stick to the facts and the figures and they just talk about work. They are the opposite of charmers. And then lastly, we have harmonizers. And harmonizers look at an interview like a tryout for a team that they want to join. They're warm and collaborative and they are the opposite of challengers, where challengers want to be respected and heard and they want to be themselves and they're constrained by integrity. Harmonizers are the opposite. They want to not rock the boat. They want to get along. And you can see how that would play out in an interview. They don't talk as much, they listen quite a lot, and they really want to get along.

Why is it important that we know which one we are?

Well, I think most of the interviewing advice out there tells us to pretend to be something that we're not or memorize these perfect answers and you'll get the job. And that is bad advice. I mean, where else would you get that advice in your life and think that's really good advice? And I really wanted to, with this book and my research, change this conversation to be no. First, identify who you are. Because an interview ultimately is a set of questions about you. Develop your self awareness and be that. I wanted to empower people to be a charmer, a challenger, examiner or harmonizer. And then from there we all know that we have to use our emotional intelligence in interviews and you have to shift slightly lightly, right? And if I'm interviewing with an examiner who's my polar opposite, I have to calm down some of my accommodating tendencies and give them a little bit more of what they want. But if I know my baseline, if I know my interview style, I can shift more authentically. And it also gives us a sense of place, right? Like if I know this is my baseline, And I can catch myself, oh, I'm going too much over here. Or I'm pretending to be too much more than this or that. It helps us be more authentic when we understand ourselves and think. You know, throughout history, we've looked at archetypes and stories and folklore, movies and TV shows, you know, to see other people, to see, is that me or is that the opposite of me? And I think this really helps people give us an identity of who we are, what we get someone to see us as qualified in interviews.

Is there one type that most people actually fall into?

Well, that's the best part about this being backed in science and research. So there are four styles and each have a variation. And it wouldn't be scientifically valid if, like, everyone was really charmers. Right? That's not true. So we have a normal distribution in our data, which is wonderful. And I went into this when I collected the research thinking, well, I'm amazing, and I'm sure everyone that interviews well is going to interview like me, and I'm just going to discover the one great interview style. And I was very happy and humbled to find out that of all the interview styles, there's a normal distribution of who gets jobs and who's good at this. So everyone has the power of interviewing really well. We all obviously, in my book, I unpack strengths and overuse strengths. Right. You can imagine what a great charmer does in interviews. And you can imagine, like the smarmy charmer, I tell a story in the book of a charmer I interviewed once who winked at the HR director during his interview twice.

Epic fail.

Yeah. So, like, you know, you can be charming to a point, and then it gets, you know, like all of us, right? So you have to know your strengths and then how they become overused strengths.

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I asked you to try to find your passion. That's very funny and it's almost like a cartoon version of that type. That's so interesting. But if you lack self awareness, I could see how that could happen, that you think you're just leaning into your strength when in fact you're dismantling your interview. So I was thinking about this while I was listening to you explain. I used to give people advice when they'd be interviewing. People would ask me, you know, Heather, you hired, what are you looking for? I always gave the exact same advice. To your point. I didn't stop to understand who they were. Right. And think about, like, how could they amplify certain things or, you know, pull away from certain things to improve their opportunity. I would always say the same thing. I'd say, practice, because you need to get yourself as confident as possible ahead of time. Right. And I would say write out. I remember this. Write out stories to illustrate examples for every question that they're going to ask you so people know that you're actually telling the truth. You're not just giving some BS answer. Because I remember I hated that when I would interview people that just come in with one word, oh, yeah, I've done that. You know, what does that mean? Right. Give me an example of what that looks like. Oh, and then the other thing I would say is, and this is my background, sales. So of course, I lean into my sales expertise and apply it to anything I'm doing, but I wasn't realizing I was doing at the time. I'd say, go in. We'll research the person ahead of time because you want to know as much about them in the culture and about the position ahead of time to show that you do your work, you know, and try and advance. But then when you're in the office, look at the pictures, look at the significant photos or awards around the office and bring them up and bring them into the conversation to try to get that person to empty their glass to you and open up to you. Tell me how bad that interview advice is.

Oh, I don't think it's bad. It gives me insight into what your style is. So through that, I'm assuming that you're a charmer with challenger tendencies. Charmers are the type who will look around someone's office and find things to make a connection with. I tell a story in my book that one of my previous students who was applying for an internship looked around the executive's office and saw pictures of what he assumed was her son playing soccer. And he said, oh, hey, is that your son? Is that the such and such league? And she's like, yes, it was. And then they just struck up a conversation for 20 minutes about soccer. And this kid played soccer all through college, and he got the internship. And that is what charmers do. Charmers look to make a connection because they want to be liked. And then that challenger aspect of you is, what did you really do? Back it up. Don't just tell me the story or say that you did it. But, like, I want to know. Give me some proof. And that's the challenger in you. And so knowing your interview style knows what your preferences are, what your biases are. You know, the type of interview advice I used to give my students was based in me being a charmer, where much different than if an examiner or harmonizer was giving advice about how to interview. A harmonizer may tell someone, just go in and be really quiet and listen a lot and find out a lot of information to see if you might want to fit into this organization. That's much different advice than you and I would give.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, my gosh, it's completely different. But to your point, now that we know that there's these four different types, the advice needs to be tailored to who that individual is, not this generic advice like I was spouting off to people.

Well, don't we all feel better when we feel seen and validated and known? And isn't that what strengths finders or Myers Briggs or Enneagram or any of these personality assessments give us? And I always loved that stuff. We use disc quite a lot in my old corporation, and I was inspired by that. You know, why don't we have a tool based in science and research to help people with the most important business decision? And when I started testing this, my students would get the results and go, oh, my God, I didn't know other people did this. Like, I thought this was just me. And doesn't that make you feel better? And it makes you feel validated. And then when you trust this, you can then work from that baseline versus just a lot of these books that tell you, just memorize these answers and you'll get the job. That's not what it is. And we all have a complicated relationship with work now, and we need to evolve both sides of the table. We need to evolve how we conduct interviews and how we behave in them.

So one of the things that I'm sure people are thinking about is I get nervous even thinking about going into an interview, right? Because it is one of those. It's similar to like being on stage. You're being put in the hot seat. What are some of the tips or tricks or advice that you give people around how to overcome that fear and how to show up as a more confident version of yourself?

I share lots of free tips and tricks on social media. Over a million followers on social. And I just did a video yesterday about. This is very interesting. The number one fear of Americans is public speaking. And the second most popular fear is dying. So people would rather die than speak in public, which is crazy, right? And I've met with lots of clients that tell me that interviewing feels like public speaking. And I remind them it's not. Interviewing is not public speaking. It's often an intimate conversation with one, two or three people, and it's a conversation about you. It's generally very formulaic. You can prepare and practice all of these questions ahead of time. You know, you are not being put on a spotlight on a stage with thousands of people looking at you. It may feel that way. And if that's how you react to it, unpack some of those feelings and practice. The best way to decrease your nerves in an interview is to practice. Record yourself on your phone, recruit a friend, practice in the shower, wherever. Just practice those standard interview questions. What are your strengths and weaknesses? Why should I hire you? Why do you want to work here? Where do you see yourself in five years? Just go through those, do the reps and you'll get better, and it decreases the nerves. People are really, really, really nervous in interviews when they haven't thought about any of these questions and they put themselves in their own hot seat and they put so much pressure on themselves to come up with something amazing in a boardroom with an intimidating executive staring at them like, no way in hell would I ever do that, Right? I'm going to prepare and practice ahead of time because you're always going to be a little naturally nervous because it's an interview, especially if you really want the job.

When someone really does want the job and they know, you know, I'm going to go in there, I'm going to practice, I'm going to prepare. I'm going to be that most confident version myself. I'm just going to put my best foot forward and the interview's going really well. What kind of advice do you give them? Do you suggest that they try to close on the spot? Do you suggest that they ask for a Follow up call or how do you advise people who are going into an interview they really, really want that job?

I mean, it really depends on the industry, the position and the person. Again, giving global interviewing adv advice is bad. It gets us into trouble. You know, if I say to everyone, close on the spot and tell them that you really want the job, that may push someone away. You know, an examiner is never going to do that. Right. So I think it's about understanding who you are. If you're in a sales position and you're interviewing for a sales role, yeah, you, you all know, right? You gotta close on the spot. But if it's an accounting position, I mean, you can easily say at some point in the interview how interested you are in the position. The work looks challeng challenging and fascinating and you see yourself at that company in five years. That's closing for an accountant, Right. Versus a salesperson. So it really depends on you and the role that you're interviewing for.

Yeah, that's good advice. So how has interviewing changed as a result of COVID in all of the virtual meetings that go on and how does that impact people?

Well, obviously most if not all interviews went virtual for quite some time. We know that a lot of jobs are coming back in person. In person interviews are coming back. But for the most part, interviews, whether they're in zoom or in person, are really the same thing. I mean, zoom feels less intimidating because you don't have to get dressed from the waist down. Like, you can wear sweatpants if you want to.

Right.

And how nervous can you really be if you're sitting in your bedroom or, or your room? It's. I mean, you'll be nervous, but not as nervous. And a zoom interview, you can have tons of notes and a lot of people read off of scripts, which I do not advise on. Zoom. And everyone knows you're reading, right?

So.

So these are some ways it's changed, but it's certainly coming back. And unfortunately, you know, hiring managers are still not trained enough and they're not conducting structured interviews the way they should be.

I believe that most, at least in my experience, most hiring managers have zero training at all.

Yeah, and here's the other thing. The average job seeker is looking for a job for about six to nine months. They'll probably go on 20 or 30 interviews. The average hiring manager, if they have low turnover, they might only interview once or twice a year. And if HR is involved, they do most of the screening interviews. So hiring managers are only interviewing what, five times a year? Maybe 10 or 15, you know, not if you have a huge department and that sort of thing. But think about that. You're in a position of power. But the job seeker has more experience doing this. And often the myth out there is that job seekers are the ones that are unprepared. Well, in my experience that is not the case. It is most often the hiring managers. I've seen hiring managers walk in interviews, reading the resume as they walk into the boardroom. They don't have questions prepared and all they do is talk at the person. Let me tell you about the company, let me tell you about the role, let me tell you about all this stuff. They talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and they never ask the candidate one good question. And according to the eeoc, an interview is a test and should be conducted like a test. You need to ask questions and let the person answer. But if you're unprepared and untrained, you don't know what questions to ask. So you just go in and have a conversation and then you just hire someone that you like.

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That you just shared, that would be a red flag. As someone interviewing, I wouldn't want to work for an individual that would manage an interview in that regard. I mean, do you see some of the practices as Wait a minute. You need to pause for a second and think, do you want to work.

For someone like that? For sure. But put yourself in a job seeker's position. What if you need a job? What if you've been laid off? What if you've been searching for a job for three months and this is the only companies that scheduled you an interview? Right? When you're in a position of power as a hiring manager, you can get away with really bad behavior.

Oh, it's so true and so unfortunate. Double down on the amount of resumes you're sending out. Double down on the amount of jobs you're applying for. Increase the frequency there's more and better companies out there, I definitely think so. How do you think now that you've helped so many people when they are able to understand their styles? Do you have any examples how they've transformed themselves or how they improve themselves with their interview that you can share with us?

Sure.

Well, my book is chock full of client stories, right? It would be a really boring book if I just talked about the interview style. So I like to share lots of client stories. And one in particular that I'm very proud of. The examiner that I write about in my book, he had failed at interviews before coming to me and he was an excellent student, very, very motivated because the interview he was coming up for was going to set his promotion and his pension. And in the process, I had to explain to him that as an examiner, he really prioritized, being really factual. And his answers were really short, like 15 seconds, 30 seconds. It took me many sessions to encourage him to open up that people want to see your personality. We're not just hiring someone who could do the job. We're hiring someone who can fit into the company culture and these things. And he confessed to me in our coaching that years ago he had done stand up comedy. And I was like, what? I was like, let's do more of this, please, please, and show me more of this performer. Just tap into a little bit of it. And his interview answers went from 15 to 30 seconds to nice, like couple minute long stories that he started telling. And I was so proud of him. He got the promotion and he made himself proud. He was so worried that he was going to bomb another interview. And often that's also what happens, right? You, you retreat into the thing you're most comfortable in. I'm going to, to say as little as possible because I'm terrified of saying too much and they won't hire me. And often what you actually have to do is you have to push yourself out of your comfort zone. You have to do something that feels really uncertain in the moments when you're most stressed out. And he was such a great example of someone who did it. As uncomfortable and as scared as he was in those moments of uncertainty, he was like, okay, he trusted me. He was like, I trust you. If you're telling me I got to open up more, I'm going to try, try it. And he did it and he succeeded beautifully.

That's incredible. First of all, it's incredible that he had that stand up comedy. I mean, that is talk about fear. I've done, I took a Stand up comedy class. That is super intimidating, super out of your comfort zone. So I'm so glad that you were able to uncover that for him so that he could leverage that past experience to really bolster him for that future experience. It makes sense that he would nail the interview then at that point. So for people who have had the stand up comedy experience or background, how can they unlock that same ability to storytell, ability to step into things and share who they are a bit more?

Well, let's take the opposite, for example. I'm a charmer. I assume you're a charmer as well, with maybe some challenger tendencies like we talked about. I'm the opposite of that person. I'm not an examiner. And my priority in an interview is to make a connection and get someone to like me. And I tell stories, and that's easy. I'm a performer. So I would have to tap into what he did naturally, which is talk about the details and what makes me qualified in the projects that I've worked on. I have to remind myself that I have to also, oh, yeah, I gotta tell them why I can do this job right. And I have to go back to my resume, for example, and share metrics. And, you know, it's not just I taught students at temple, it's I took the higher rate from 84% to 100% and this is how I did it. That is not naturally how I think to talk. So charmers, you know, have room for improvement in a different direction. We need to do what examiners do naturally. And you see, as I discovered all of these interview styles, what I discovered is I need, and we all need to be more open minded, that we need all interview styles and you interview really the best when you can tap into all parts of those styles. We all prioritize one over the others, but it's really about understanding all of them so you can really tap into those different aspects because it's all there in you. And knowing when to pull that out, knowing when to ask yourself, ooh, maybe I should be more of a harmonizer in this moment. Or a challenger, for example. So good.

Okay, so for people that are listening and they're saying, oh, my gosh, I know, but I've gone on interviews and I've been rejected. So many people fear rejection. How do you coach people to get back up from a rejection and put themselves back in the ring again?

I truly believe that rejection is redirection. I really believe. And I would coach all of my students and clients that trust them. I have Been the person rejecting people. And trust that they saw something in you and they knew you wouldn't be a good fit. Trust them that they saw something in you and you wouldn't be a good culture fit or you didn't have the technical skills that they needed. Trust that this rejection opens you up to be available for the next thing that's going to come along. I truly believe that if you get rejected, it's not meant to be. That wasn't going to be a good job. The timing was wrong. And you will find something else, but you'll only find something else if you maintain the momentum and keep those applications flowing and keep networking and yeah, of course, take a day or two to, you know, lick your wounds and not be happy. Absolutely. But. But just look at it as like fine tuning your search. Right. This one didn't work. Maybe I gotta fix this. And it's just constant feedback. I really think that, you know, especially HR recruiters and corporate hiring managers are very good at understanding who they, you know, what they want and who they need. And if they're passing on you, there's a reason.

That's great advice because I was thinking to myself, the one thing that stuck out with rejection is people wouldn't know. I was thinking about the team and how this new hire would impact a team. Not only would this person be able to produce and achieve well in that role, which they probably could if they're sitting there. They made it that far with you. But I'm thinking, how are they going to interact with others on the team? And I've said no to people that were incredibly qualified, all stars that I'd love to have, but I knew if I blended them with a couple other people that I had on the team, it would be catastrophic to everyone. So we would end up saying no. And hopefully they would not take that personally, knowing that, hey, it had nothing to do with their skill set, their abilities, but more about how it fits into the company.

Well, that's another great point. It's absolutely never personal, ever. I mean, I've hired thousands of people. It's never personal. It doesn't come down to that. But rejection feels personal. But at work and in business and for job interviews, it's not. So you have to really unpack that. This really hurts. I feel triggered. This feels uncomfortable. This is triggering all these old wounds of rejection. That's fair. Unpack that. It's not a personal decision.

So true. So even though it's tough in the moment, feel it. But you gotta let it go. And you gotta get back out there again for sure. Okay, so who did you actually write this book for? Like, who is the person that needs to get this book?

That's such a great question. I have to say that, you know, first of all, I collected the research and discovered interview styles mainly inspired by all of my students and clients, right. That I was teaching to interview better because I was trying to answer that question. How do I make these people feel seen and validated and give advice that works for them? And I knew I wanted to write a book and I had collected all this research and then I launched the product and I was going to all the conferences and selling all these consulting services. And then Covid happened and I was like, well, I was going to write this book, you know, in a couple years, but might as well do it now. I have all this extra time on my hands. So I wrote the book during nap time, during my kids nap times, during COVID lockdown. And I tried to summon the feeling of those people that feel really lost and uncertain and they don't really know how to feel empowered. And I open the book with a chapter called an interview can change your life, because I truly believe it can, because an interview changed my life. I moved out at 15 and I got into an Ivy League school in my college admission interview and it changed my life. I got into an Ivy League school, I moved to Philadelphia. And I think that if people are empowered to know themselves and build up their self awareness, they can change their lives. I just had this feeling in this picture of these people, right, that I had coached so many times before that felt somewhat lost, didn't really know who they were, didn't know how to talk about themselves. And that's who this book is for. It's for all the job seekers that are really trying to get the careers that they want. I want them to be able to harness this important energy in an interview.

You just mentioned self awareness. What role does that play in the interview process? And how can people become more self aware?

It's everything. And that's one of the things I thought was missing in a lot of interview books. Right. In teaching at the college level for so many years, I realized that an interview in the most basic sense is a set of questions about you. The more you know yourself, the better you do. It's that simple. You know, you are going to really struggle in interviews. If someone looks at you and says what are your strengths and weaknesses? Is. And you're like, you panic. If you have self awareness, it's Easier for you to answer these questions. And we know through research that only 10% of people are truly self aware. And this is a problem, right? So I wrote a personality assessment to help my clients figure out who they are. What impression are you really making? And I also think that this is a universal feeling when you leave an interview. We've all been in that moment, right? You leave an interview and you're like, I really hope I came across the way I intended. I really hope that, you know, I made this impression the way I wanted to. And that comes from self awareness. It comes from getting feedback and having great mentors. And not everyone has that. So I wanted to have a tool and a book that people can refer to and give you these light bulb moments. Oh, yeah, that is what I prefer. And that's how I'm qualified and that's how I get someone to see me as, you know, qualified or why they should hire me.

Can you go back to that stat that you just revealed? Because that was shocking. Only 10% of people are self aware.

There's different types of self awareness, right? But yeah, on the whole self awareness, true self awareness is pretty hard to achieve. And obviously one of the easiest and fastest ways you can achieve a bit of self awareness is to ask people around you, co workers, your boss, your husband, your friends, your kids, whatever, you know, what impression do I make? How do I come across? How do I make you feel? But that's the rub. People don't want to ask those questions because they're afraid of the answers. They're nervous, they're scared. And that's where coaching can really help you. And that's also where, like I said before, recording yourself, answering some basic interview questions and watching it back is really the best, the absolute best practice in developing your self awareness, especially when it comes to the impression that you make at work and the way you perform in an interview.

Meet a different guest each week. I asked you to try to find your passion. Oh my gosh. For everyone listening, put yourself through this exercise, reach out to people in your life and ask these questions because it is so worthwhile. And don't be afraid of the answer you're going to hear. Be excited about it because it could unlock something unknowing in you. I remember it's interesting, I went to a stand up comedy class, as I mentioned, and I did it because someone said to me, oh, you'll never want to do this, will you? And I said, oh gosh, no, it sounds terrible. And they said, then that's why you should do it. And I thought, oh, it sounds like you're right. But I feel like I want to throw up. This sounds horrible to me. So if I don't want to do something that bad, I need to make myself do it. To build up my confidence, to build up, you know, my ability to overcome challenging situations. I went in and did that weird class. And yes, it is so weird, I can't even get into it. But some of it, I mean, they had you crawl around on the ground and pretend you're an animal. Like, weird, weird things I don't do. So I remember at one point, though, there was this exercise that the teacher had us do, and you're in a packed room at a comedy club, and they said, okay, everyone get up and you're gonna take the stage, and we want you to talk and we'll tell you when you hit six minutes, talk about anything you want. You can tell stories, you can tell jokes, you can literally recite the Alphabet, whatever you want. And when you hit the time limit, we'll tell you. For me, that was really easy. So I just got up and started telling, you know, a story about what was going on that year in my life. I don't know, it was just very easy. Anyways, I went way over and the teacher called me over after and he said, what? That's a gift of yours? And I said, what do you mean it's a gift of mine? Can't everybody do that? And so it was one of these great examples to your point, of what you're talking about is of seeing yourself through the rose colored glasses other people view you through. We so often feel like, oh, everyone can do that. That's no big deal. Like, why would there be any value associated with that? That when you take that step back and allow people to offer that feedback to you, you get to see there is value to that. I just assumed everyone else, you know, had these same abilities. When we find out that's actually special, unique and different about you, it can be a really exciting moment where you can feel really proud of who you are.

Absolutely. That's such a perfect example. And I think often people are too hard on themselves and they see themselves in a negative way. So when they do receive positive feedback, it's almost sometimes more shocking. You know, I conducted over 8,000 mock interviews when I was teaching at temple. And we would record the students answering standard interview questions. They would come, it was a total dress rehearsal in their suits. And then we would play it back and I would give them feedback and if it was great, I would tell them, this was amazing. And let me walk you through everything that you did. Well, those people's responses were often more aghast than when I was like, what the hell were you doing? You didn't prepare, you know, like when I really did a Simon Cowell on them, which was not often, but like, you know, when you need the feedback, you need the feedback. But when people were getting this, like glowing praise and positive, they would often say, well, well, tell me something I did bad. What was something negative? Because we all have this negativity bias. We all do. And often our inner self image is way worse than what it really is. Unless you're a total psychopath or narcissist.

But that's a different subject for an episode. That's the Rebecca Zung episode on narcissism that we've actually covered. So, yeah, that's so interesting. It does make sense. But you're right, having exercises like this where you can kind of expose yourself to that positive feedback. Accepting a compliment is a form of confidence and building your confidence. Right. So step into these uncomfortable situations. Be open to the feedback. If it is negative, we can find ways to learn from it and get better. And if it is positive, you are worthy of accepting praise and worthy of noticing what's special, different and unique about you. So I love that you shared that.

It's interesting because people are most afraid of negative feedback, but often that's what's going to help you improve faster. And when you get positive feedback, people have a tendency not to believe it or it doesn't really help you very much. Right. Like when I get all these like positive, glowing comments or feedback, I'm like, okay, but it doesn't really move the needle. But if someone says you need to do this differently, I'm like, ah, thank you, that was very helpful. So we're afraid of the thing that's actually going to help us change. What's that? Great quote. The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure that you seek. And so when it comes to interviewing advice, people get really nervous about, like, you know, going into an interview, someone rejecting them. There's the fear of rejection and then there's also this fear of like, you know, this negative feedback or this, like you're not as qualified as you think you are and all this stuff and this is all blown up, usually out of proportion, out of your heads. That's why I always encourage people like you do. Talk to friends, talk to family that are outside of your head to Get a different perspective and they may see something totally different than you've never even thought of. And you're like, oh, right.

But make sure to qualify the person you're reaching out to. I've made this mistake before. I reached out to my mother when I was writing a book. She's never written a book. Right. So sometimes I think because of fear and because of just tendencies and natural who we speak to, we think these individuals are going to have the right advice on everything. Be thoughtful and intentional about it. And make the phone call to the Amy Morin if you're thinking of launching a new book, which both you and I did, and she endorsed both of our books for us. Right. Reach out to the person that sold a million copies of a book so that you can say, I know that you know this arena really well. What advice, directions or feedback can you give me so that I can improve? Because that will save you so much time and allow you to leapfrog over these other things that can slow you down.

One of my other favorite things is to ask someone. I mean, people come to me a lot for advice, not just because I'm paid to do it and I do a lot of coaching and consulting, but I often start with, when someone comes to me, I always say, are you looking for comfort or solutions right now? And so to ask yourself that, like if you're in angst about something to say, who am I going to go to? Do I need comfort? I'll go to my mom. Do I need solutions? I'm going to go to Amy Morin. Right. And maybe call both of those people and you get both things. But I feel like knowing what you need is also part of self awareness. Right. And that comes from practice. That's so good.

All right, what's the most interesting thing or surprising thing you've learned from creating interviewology and going down this road?

I realized that I was so cocky and so wrong 10 years ago. And I wish I could stretch back into time and tell myself all the amazing things I learned through this process, which is be more open minded. Your way is not the only way. And it's really important that you open yourself up to many different possibilities. You know, I think in certain times in your career, in your late 20s to mid-30s, when you're really becoming this expert and you're really at the top of your game, you have a tendency to feel pretty cocky. Right? And I've met many CEOs and I've seen all those articles that we've all seen like this CEO has the exact right interview questions to make sure you hire the right person. And I know for a fact, and I've done thousands and thousands of interviews and, and researched this and conducted tons of research on this, that the more you think you know, the less you actually know. And that was one of the biggest realizations for me, that making complex decisions about who to hire is very, very difficult. And the more you think you've nailed it, the less you actually know.

I love that that's a humbling moment, but I'm certainly right there with you. That's advice that I could have used long, long time ago. Anna, tell us, where can people get interviewology? Where can they get the book? Where can they get more of you?

Well, you can find me and you can take the interview style assessment at our website, the interviewology.com my book on Amazon or any of your preferred retailers. You can also get it through my website, the interviewology.com and please follow me on any of the social channels. Tik tok, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, all of them. I post free tips every single day and I interact with people and I go live quite often. So love to hear from you and love to connect that way also.

Well, thank you for all the work you're doing to empower people with confidence in this process and interviewing something that's going to be so intimidating and your tips and tricks are life skills that people should incorporate. Get the book Interviewology. It's out now until next week. Keep creating your confidence. I decided to change that dynamic. I couldn't be more excited for what you're gonna hear. Start learning and growing. Inevitably something will happen. No one succeeds alone.

You don't stop and look around once in a while. You could miss it.

Come on this journey with me.