Job Interview Advice in Both the Virtual and the Real World

So everyone, welcome to today's session. What I'm going to be talking about is having top tips for interviews. It's a thing that I've known about to learn about over 20 plus years of interviewing and coaching candidates through their journey, treasury, career journey, if you like, and about some of the lessons we've learned, some of the do's and don'ts. Obviously the world has evolved and changed quite a lot recently. You might notice how we've moved to more of this exactly as we're doing today. A virtual world and what, what the differences are, if you like, in, in the world of interviews. So I want to give you some top tips. You're going to have lots of these slides, you'll be able to look at them later on. But the key thing you know, for me is to show you guys that the, this, you know, one to one meetings, when you're meeting in the real world is great. You know, you can judge people's body language, you can see how they're reacting to you and everything else. In a virtual world, people say, oh, it's very similar and stuff. It's not, it's totally different. You can't judge, you can't judge here, me, where I'm sitting and things like that. You don't know the other things, so you need to be even more prepared and things like that. So I went and changed my shirt earlier, had quite a more relaxed shirt. You need to think about this. I wanted to think about my audits. I want to think about what's happening to you guys when you're looking at me. I wanted to make sure my environment was right, so I had to move around. I chose a different room to do this virtual presentation to make sure that my microphone wasn't blipping and everything else. Yeah, it's been a bit of a nightmare. But the fact is that's what you guys need to do if you're going to be successful. So be prepared. Now this is one of the things you've got here. Your little judge is a little, this is a little bit, you know, what do you call it, a bit of a talent show, if you like. They've been all the rage and you know, Simon saying, no, that's it, you're out, you know, recently. That's what you got to think about if you don't get through each of these rounds. I was doing this with one of my podcast guests one time and I actually said, he said each time you just want to get to the next round because if you're judged as not being right for it, you're out the door. So, yeah, so let's keep going. It is reaching through the screen. I put this together from an E book I had many years ago and you've got that hand. And what you've got to do when you can meet someone face to face, that's brilliant. But when you're in a virtual interview situation, you don't have that luxury. You've got to make a great impression. You've got to be prepared. You want to know, you know, people say, well, what if I do go through an interview and then I decide I don't want it? Brilliant, that's fine, you decide you don't want to go further forward, but you need to be in the position of choice. You know, if you mess this up, if you fluff it up, if you make a mistake and the person says, you know, we're not going to continue with that person, that's it. It's a lot of wasted time for you and for them. So you've got to make sure you're reaching through and grabbing their attention at every stage of the interview process. So before it, what do you do? Well, this is our little pre checklist, if you like technology. I literally had this problems with the microphone earlier. There's a blipping sound and everything else, so I had to reset it. I did a rehearsal, did everything else. Make sure that you're there before, you know, if it's Microsoft Teams, if it's zoom, if it's whatever else, make sure you're there. You can see that I'm here in literally on the screen in front of you. I had to make sure the lighting was right, you know, make sure that it wasn't. You know, am I coming over here or can, you know, am I too close up? Oh, there's nothing worse. Hello. Yeah, it's great interviewing you. Yeah. Will you see my chin? No. You need to be nicely framed in the shot. So make sure you work and your Internet is connected and if need, maybe connect directly to your router. Make sure it works. Turn off your phone. I very kindly ask my family to leave us alone just for the 10, 15 minutes that this takes to go through this slide slideshow with you. Done. Some of the other bits there, you know, blank background. Everything else, just. Just get rid of it. Just for the hour that you're going to need to, if need be, you know, don't ever do it in a coffee shop. I had someone try to do an interview. Oh, what do you think? It's one of the worst ideas I've ever had. Oh, right. Really? I said noise background. You're going to be distracted. You're going. It means that you're not serious about this. And if you want to get through this interview, that's what you need to do. Okay? Body language, that's it. Nothing worse than this, is there? Yes. Great. You're really looking forward. Really? No. Make sure you're square in the front, sitting up straight. Got your shirt. You don't have to be smart. You don't have to be in a suit. It does make a good difference as well. But make sure that I'm looking as much as possible into the camera. That's what you guys need to do. You know, I've got other distractions here. I've got the microphone here. I've got other things I made sure before I'm all set up. So it's nice. Hi, nice to meet you. Great. That's what you guys need to think about. Let's keep going. Dress the part. Yeah, I've got a smart shirt on. You know, did have a T shirt on earlier. I thought, you know what, I want to do this better for you guys. So make sure, you know what I would say is potentially, you know, before you go into an interview, ask what the dress code is. What you want to do is mirror your interviewer. You know, if they're dressed smartly, you dress smartly. If they're not going to be, you know, if they're going to be in a T shirt and, you know, shorts or whatever. Would I go that far? No, I'd be in a dress down shirt, button down shirt. That's what I would do. Just, just know. Be careful. Think about how you're making an impression on them. Not them, just them making an impression on you. You. And you only get one chance to make a first impression. Always remember preparation questions. Review your CV or resume. That's the key thing. Just have a rehearsal. You could even video yourself like this. Pretend they're asking you questions and answer them. You can even record them. I know it sounds false. The reason is it is. But you want to make sure that you're in the position of choice. So look at your questions as well. What questions are they going to ask you? You know, if you looked at your resume, perhaps give it to a friend or something or a colleague. Can you ask me a couple of questions? What things would you ask? What are the things that stand out to you? Review your resume. Make sure you're going through there. And see if there are any gaps or any bits that don't quite 100%, number one, make sense. I've done the other presentation about making sure your resum. Say, you know, really flies off the shelf and really grabs someone. But the key thing to do is make sure that you are you. You know, your career history, after all, you've lived it. So make sure it makes sense and that you're able to answer any questions about it. Let's keep going with the presentation. Strengths and weaknesses. Try and put yourself in there, you know, sit in their place, you know, so short places and, you know, look at your resume there and say, oh, what questions would I ask them? And what are your strengths? Now sometimes also people say, your weaknesses. What are the key things about your weaknesses? And you can make, oh, you know, it's, you know, my weakness is, you know, never giving up on something and stuff like that. Okay, that's good. But, you know, it's pretty standard. I would actually say, look, these are areas where I'm perhaps not as strong, but this is what I've been doing to correct it. This is what I've been doing to address those. Because they can have concerns. One of the other things about that interview process, don't be afraid to ask questions back. People also have a couple of questions at the end. But if, as you're going through, you've got lingering concerns or questions, this is a chance to constructively ask questions. So say you've got a concern about, you know, the new working from home policy. So look, is this going to work? Where do you see it developing? Where do you see it changing in the future? What are the reasons for this? And if they can absolutely answer that to your, you know, as far as they can know, because it's obviously developing, then brilliant. But if they don't, you want to make sure that you are getting the answers you need. Just keep going. So as you're going throughout the interview, what do you need to think about? First impressions. We talked about that. So be strong, you know, have some, you know, have some notes as well. That's one of the key things, actually, is a good point. I did an interview preparation session with one of my previous candidates who very successfully got a role. Technically brilliant, great guy. As I went through though, I said, look, can you tell me about your team management experience? I already interviewed him before. I was putting in front of my client. He gave some of the worst answers I ever heard in my life. And I sit there and went, honestly. And I was about to say his name then. Can't say his name, obviously. I said, look, if you give these answers, all right, I said, you won't get through this next round. And it was the final round. Oh goodness. I went, look, you're a great team manager. You told me about how you dealt with a difficult person in the past, how you had someone that really had development needs. What you did. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I said, so why didn't you tell me all that stuff? Oh yeah, I forgot about that. I said, right, tell me about this. And we went through and on a post it note, he just wrote down some of those. And I said, right, take that post it note, put it on the side of your monitor. All right, okay, great. I said, talk me through another situation you've been in. You know, how did you motivate and coach the team? When you did team reviews every three to six months, what did you do? And he'd already pre told me this. I was like, oh, right. Do they want to know? This is exactly what they want to know. That's fine. So write down the top three things. Did that Bob. You put these posts in those. They're all around. If the, the person has actually been able to see a picture of it, it would have just looked like. Look like a sunflower. There were so many. But the great thing was when it came to it, client asked and said, oh, could you tell me about some of the team things you've done and stuff? Well, the top three things I've noticed in the past, I used to run team reviews and do this and I actually did make some notes about this earlier and they were like, wow, this guy's prepared. He's thought through positive mental, you know, you're confident and you don't come across in an arrogant way. Exactly as it says on the screen. Let's keep going. Are you the right person for the job? That's what you want to think about as well. We'll talk about it in my other sessions about being their paracetamol. What I want you to do is, you know, you've earned the right for them to interview you. But then think about their pain points. What part of the development journey are they in? Are they going through a period of transition? Are they. One of the my previous candidates as well was given some interview coaching. He was joining or looking to join a company and they had just entered and expanded internationally. He had some great foreign exchange and cash management and running teams remotely. Did he tell me about that? No. Was he focusing on some of the other stuff? Yeah. Oh, I'm really great with these banks and stuff. They didn't care. Their pain point was they didn't really know how to expand across Europe and Asia. They'd predominantly been in the US domestic market before. So I said, right, could you tell me a bit more? And he did. And the great thing was he absolutely nailed it. Unfortunately didn't at the end of the day get to the, you know, get the job. But he got to the final round interview and it was just a toss up between him. And later on he did get this and all those tips came back. He kept those, his set of post it notes, his sunflower if you like. And it's a great way to do it as well. Critical but loyal. Key one here. Why don't you like your current job? Now you've got to be careful you're treading a walking a tightrope because I don't like my boss, don't like this. That's personal. You need to be careful with that stuff. What you need to do is explain why you're looking to progress or move, but keep it professional because if you're seen as someone who's difficult to work with, that's what's going to come back and haunt you, if you like, at a later stage. So let's keep moving on. We're approaching the end so it's not too much longer, but I hope these tips are helping. As I say, we will supply and Ernie will supply the slides to you after the interview. What should you do? Should be on the phone to them, writing an email, contacting them. I think it's. Well, if you're going through an agency or a consultancy such as ourselves, there's no reason why you can go back to your consultant, say the pros, the cons, what the positives, negatives and how you felt about it. It might be at that stage you say, do you know what? That's not the right role for me. That's fine as long as they know why and that will help them build a picture of you. And also. But if it is a positive thing or there are areas that you think, you know what reflecting on that didn't do so well in that area. Tell them again. I had that recently with one of my candidates. He said I fluffed it, just really messed up in this area. I should have focused on this, this and this. And they came back and the climate, do you know what? I was a bit concerned about this. And they said, well actually he said exactly the same. And you said he should have done this and this and this. And they went, oh, okay, yeah. Oh, it's really good that they reflected on that. And I said they would appreciate if you, you know, you're going to go forward, could they, you know, talk about that and explore that and understand that a bit more about you guys next time. Brilliant. They said, exactly. That's what you need to do. Be reflective. It's a two way thing as well. Okay, Feedback again. I wouldn't be too. You want to. It's, again, it's a fine line. You want to be keen but you don't want to be in their faces, you don't want to be chasing them every five minutes. Thanks very much. But, you know, there's no reason why you might not write to someone, say thank you for your time at Interview, really enjoyed it and hope to speak to you in the future whether it's successful or not. Again, the next time telephoning, we've said that if it's, if you've got very strong relationship, you spoke great. I would normally just drop a courtesy email. I would just keep it there because then they can choose to engage with you, might even ignore you, but they might also then give the feedback with a positive or negative to the agency. So that's one of the things to not be too pushy as well. Let's keep going. Further advice, go onto our website. We've got this. I did a number of things. It's a bit of a tongue in cheek video, but this is some of the things you know about dressing, you know, making sure that you dressed up for the interview, get to the point, being loyal and knowing about your own background and everything else. Don't be an ass. That was one of the other things in there. I hope all of these help you go to TreasuryRecruitment.com or TreasuryTV.com either of those. Take you to our videos, give you a lot more advice and as you see on that, thanks very much.