EP 47: The Stopwatch Mistake (And the AI Question to Prep For)

Every candidate preps for the tell me about yourself question, but far fewer candidates prep for a question that's coming up all the time, which is about how AI is used in your specialty. Before we get into today's episode, our Ace Your Consultant Interview Academy waitlist is open. So if you want to get structured support for your interview prep, then just click on the link in the description and join the waitlist.

In this episode, we are going to answer the question, is it okay to take a stopwatch into your interview? We're going to look at handling a presentation on your vision for the service, and we're going to talk about handling the AI question that's coming up more and more.

All right, let's get into it. So our first question today is a question from one of our Academy students, and the question is, is it okay to take a stopwatch into my interview? What do you reckon about this, Becky?

Okay, I can see where this temptation comes from because so many people are really worried about either talking for too long or not saying enough. And, you know, in the heat of the moment, they kind of talk for 30 seconds and then dry up. So I, I totally understand where this question comes from. I'm gonna say no though. I think it's actually— it's just not the look you're going for. And I think there's a number of reasons for this. One, I think it just kind of looks like you haven't fully prepared and you're not kind of in that zone of knowing how long to talk for, knowing how long, you know, to make Knowing how long to discuss each point for. And also, in a moment when you're already completely overloaded with stress and information, do you honestly need one more thing to think about? So I would say prepare well so that you know what talking for 3 to 4 minutes feels like, and then you won't need the stopwatch.

Yeah, I think it comes from— because we really push, encourage our students and push them to use a stopwatch when they're practising. Because otherwise you don't know, and you don't know what your timing is, and you would just know after the fact. And one of the things we really don't want people to do is to get into the habit of doing questions that are 7 minutes long or whatever, or 90 seconds long. And so if you practiced 100 questions and they were all 7 minutes long, you're going to naturally, your muscle memory is going to naturally know the feel of doing a 7-minute question. It's more likely that that's what you're going to do in the interview. So I think it's really important that you get your brain used to doing 3 to 4 minute answers. And then it's more likely that that's what will happen in the interview because you'll get a feel for how much you can say, when you need to move on to your next point. And particularly when students are struggling with keeping an answer short, that's when you need to like really watch the stopwatch during your practice. So you can say, right, well, I'm at 2 minutes now, I need to move on to my next point. Or I'm at 4 minutes now, that is the end of the question and you don't allow yourself to keep talking. So I think the use of it in practice is essential because no one intrinsically knows what a normal or an optimal interview answer length is without looking at a watch. So definitely use it. But yeah, going into the interview is a bit weird looking. I think it would come across as a bit odd. And like you say, it's stressful. Another bit of tech to worry about while you're already really nervous and stressed doesn't seem like a good idea. I suppose the exception could be Online interviews, um, so they wouldn't see it, so it wouldn't be the problem of them seeing it and looking weird. You would still have the problem of kind of faffing around with tech, so if you didn't think that was gonna, uh, be helpful for you, then don't do it. But I suppose you could in online interviews. What, what do you reckon?

Yeah, yes, I still— I think having a general idea of the clock on in the online interview is probably okay.

Yeah.

I would still advise against it because I just think you're going to be thinking, oh God, you know what, I'm at 45 seconds, I'm going to have to wrap up this point. Then you're talking, and then all of a sudden you haven't landed that point. Where if you just naturally finished that point because that's the way you've practised it, you come to a conclusion, maybe you're 5 seconds over on that one, and then it It naturally sorts itself out in the next point.

Yeah, I think that's fair. And also, the actual panel don't have a stopwatch. So it's not— although we say like your answer should be 3 to 4 minutes, that's based on an approximate average of the length of the interview and the number of questions. On the day, there will be not that exact number of questions. It will be variable. You need to go with the flow. They might move you on, they might whatever. They'll be keeping an eye on the overall time They will not be timing your individual questions, so it's just, yeah, to have an approximate so you get a rough idea of what a decent answer should be like. That allows you to develop the points enough that's not too short but doesn't go on too long. So yeah, I wouldn't take a stopwatch in.

I suppose that the only time when I think a stopwatch is okay is during your presentation, because A lot of panels, and I definitely do this when I'm on an interview panel, I say, this is a 10-minute presentation, I'm going to stop you bang on 10. Would you like a 1-minute warning? Or whatever it is.

Okay, yeah.

Because I can't be listening to, you know, 4 18-minute presentations when it just can't happen.

Yeah.

So, I think practice it so that you know that you can deliver. If you're asked for a 10-minute presentation, be able to deliver it in 8 and a half minutes. I think it's probably okay to look at the stopwatch then, just for the presentation, but I would say not for the other questions.

Cool. Okay. We are agreed. Let's go on to the golden example of the week. This is a golden example that one of our Academy students has put forward. What have we got this week?

Okay. So this is an example of a mistake. So, following a free flap reconstruction for oral cancer, I'd handed the patient over to ITU, and I'd instructed the team that the patient was nil by mouth. And this is standard practice. So, it literally means nil by mouth, but feeding via, you know, other enteral means, NG or PEG, is fine. But I failed to make that explicit in my handover. And for many colleagues, you know, particularly those who are non-surgical, nil by mouth means nothing enterally. And that's how it was interpreted. And so the patient actually went a full day after surgery without any nutrition. What do we think? This is a mistake.

Well, it's a potentially good example. I feel like there's quite a lot of detail, so it's definitely more than We say 2 sentences or less to get to the problem, to get to the story, the end of the story, and this has got quite a lot of detail. Part of the reason it's got a lot of detail is because they're explaining the context of why it happened, and usually the context is better to go after the story. So you have the story, you say you made a mistake, and then you explain all the context. Otherwise, the answer can tend to all merge into one big long story, and no one's sure what point you're trying to make. So I would really cut it down. I suppose the thing about this is I'm not really sure it's their mistake, because what they're saying is this is standard practice. And they said nil by mouth like they do with all of their patients who are having this procedure, this surgery, and going to ITU. So they really think that the team should have known, is the vibe I'm getting from this, in which case they don't really think it's their mistake. So I'm not sure how much they're using the chance to be vulnerable and own the mistake, because at the back of their mind they're like, well, these guys should have known. Um, so that's the part that I'm not sure about it being a mistake. What do you think?

Yeah, that's actually an interesting take on it because, because I think I had an alternative take on it, which also made me think it's probably not the right example. And that is, this is a patient who had no nutrition For a day.

It's quite bad.

I personally think that's a duty of candour example.

Yeah.

Not, you know, not a mistake. And remember, with our mistake examples, we want, as you're saying, them to be, you know, taking ownership of the mistake. It needs to be your mistake. And, you know, there needs to have been, you know, minimal harm, you know, maybe some inconvenience, whatever it might be. I think a patient, a post-op patient with 24 hours potentially of no nutrition, That's quite serious harm. So I think that actually, if you didn't make the mistake, this would be a good example for duty of candour if you were the one who delivered the duty of candour conversation. But I think, as you say, it's not really your mistake, and it's probably too big, um, to be a mistake.

So you could, you could maybe say, um, due to an error, miscommunication, one of our patients following whatever the surgery was, was withheld nutrition by 24 hours when they should have been getting it via an NG. It was my job to do duty of candour. And then you focus on the duty of candour. So something like that could work for duty of candour.

Yeah, no, it's a good example.

Yeah.

But I don't think it works as a mistake for a couple of reasons.

That's true. So there's 2, there's 2 angles. It's not your mistake, and if it was, it would be too big. That's probably—

I think that's the summary, isn't it? Um, it just sounds bad to me, patient not having any, you know, nutrition for 24 hours.

Okay, so we're not using it for mistake, but we think you could use it for duty of candour if you can just flex it a bit and tighten it up so it's much— so it's shorter and you get to the point quicker.

Yeah, absolutely.

Let's go on to our interview question of the week. This is a question that student— one of our students has been asked in an interview. The question is, what do you think the impact of AI will be on your specialty, and how are you preparing for it? So AI, very on trend. I wouldn't even say it's a trend. AI is very embedded in life and is slowly coming to medicine in different ways. So what are your thoughts about this?

Yeah, I think, I think you've got to have something to say about this these days. It's coming up so often. You know, there's a lot of stuff in the NHS 10-year plan about analog to digital. Um, and, you know, and, and as you say, we're just using it day to day, right? So we've got, we've got to get with the program on this, and it is coming up with interviews. There are probably specialties that are using it more You know, for example, I know that, like, we're using it, aren't we, for our digital note-taking. We love it.

We do.

And, you know, radiology are using it for reporting certain lower-risk investigations, for example. And I think there will be some specialties that think, oh no, we're not really using AI. There's you know, there's not really a role, but, but there probably is. So I think just, just think a bit more broadly about all of the different things that, that AI can do for you in your specialty, um, and, and how you might talk about those. What do you think?

Yeah, I mean, as you need— it's a common topic that's coming up, so you don't want to be surprised by it. You should be prepped for it. Yeah, you need to think about ways that it is being used already in your specialty. And it might not be in the department you're in just now, but I would have a search on the internet about what ways that your specialty could be using AI. So you've got some ideas. At a baseline anyway, every specialty could be using the AI notes taker that we're using. So that's not specialty specific. And that's like a very simple way to start using AI. There may be more complex uses depending on your specialty, but I would definitely have a think. And then part of your pre-interview due diligence work should be sussing this out as well. And you'll get a feel from talking to people on the team how they feel about it, how they're using it in different ways. And yeah, just have something prepared because I think it'd be It'd be really challenging to come up with this in the moment, um, if you've not thought about it at all. And we know that it's a pretty big topic, so I'd definitely get it ready.

Just thinking that through, you know, think broadly. Could you be using it for streamlining stuff? Um, could AI help with your appointments? Could, you know, can it help with your letter writing? Um, you know, actually take it out a bit further. you know, you could use AI for helping with your teaching.

Yeah.

You know, generating some topics, generating some simulations based on real cases, whatever you want to do. But I think just— I think the answer is not appropriate in my specialty.

Yeah.

You should have thought about this because it could come up. And equally, if you get asked a question that is in any way related to the NHS 10-year plan, being able to drop in something around AI when we're thinking about that analogue-to-digital focus is actually a helpful thing for you.

Yeah, so always, I think, in a question like this, referring— and actually, whenever you can, just refer that you know what the NHS 10-year plan is, and this is one of the kind of 3 areas. So, um, yeah, it's good to mention it, good to prep for this. Okay, and then last up, we've got our tip and trick of the week. This week we're going to talk about presentations, and in particular, how to structure a 5-minute presentation. So this is a very short timeframe, and I think most presentations people get 10 minutes, but occasionally people get 5 minutes, sometimes 8 minutes. I don't know why. And we've had the very occasional 15 minutes, which seems quite long, but has been, has been given to people. But 5 minutes, pretty short, hey?

Really short. So, I think that the answer to this is not 10 PowerPoint slides.

Yeah, no.

That's the first thing to say about this. I personally think that a 5-minute presentation is a question that you've been given ahead of the interview. So, you can almost treat it like one of your interview questions and structure it in the same way. So, you know, I would think about it, and it's probably most of these kind of questions are something related to your vision for the X service that you are working in. In which case, I would break that down into 3 sections. I'd give a little bit of an intro about, you know, what the baseline is, give them some kind of stats or a teensy bit of background that To demonstrate that you understand the context. Don't spend 2 minutes of this presentation telling them the context. They know, they already know that, and you haven't got time to do it.

Yeah, I think the intro needs to be really tight because, yeah, you could easily spend 2 minutes going, this is what I'm going to do. In fact, I had one I was looking at with a student this week where that's what, like, the 2 minutes was, I'm going to be doing X, Y, and Z in this presentation. And in a 5-minute presentation, I don't think you've got time to tell them what you're going to do. You just need to get on and do it, because all of that takes away from your time with the points that you're going to make. So yeah, definitely quick context setting, maybe a quick plan if you can do it in a very short space of time, and then just get stuck in, I think.

Yeah, and then it's the same as, you know, in many ways any, any other answer. It's aligning, you know, whatever it is that you've got in terms of your USPs, your experience, to the vision that you're describing that you can deliver for them, or, you know, answering the question, but being really clear that you are the person to deliver whatever it is that you're talking about. So, there's a skill in, you know, giving them the answer to the question, but also showing them that you are part of the answer.

Yeah.

And then it's just a very quick wrap-up.

Yeah. I think sometimes people forget that it's about them trying to get a job, and so get kind of immersed in the topic, and often use it as a knowledge share, like, this is what I know about this topic, rather than— and there's 2 key elements. One is that it needs to be specific to the team you're applying to. So, it should not be a presentation that you can take and give in another Cardiology service or another radiology service. It needs to be specific to that team. And so if you're getting too general, a future vision of your specialty, it needs to be specific to them because you're trying to get a job in that place. So it should not be a presentation you can give to another team. And also it should not be a presentation that I could give instead of you. It needs to be specific to you, which is what you're mentioning about, like, you're the one getting the job, so you need to be sharing your strengths in there as well. And so it should be a presentation that only you can give, only to this place. And once you do that, once you even see that that's what you need to do, it makes a massive difference to your content. Now, it is really hard to do all of that in 5 minutes, definitely. So because you've got 3 points, 1 minute, maybe slightly over 1 minute for each, or 1.5 minutes of each with a bit of an introduction. So it's a lot to do in that time, but you can definitely Do it. And that is the goal of what you're trying to do. And just recognise they've given you a hard task of talk about the future vision, ideal service, or whatever in 5 minutes. It is a hard task, and you're just trying to keep it as tight as possible, and importantly, not run over time.

Should we talk about slides for a second?

Yeah.

What do you think about slides in the 5-minute presentation?

So, I would do Write your talk, forget about your slides, just write your talk first. And once you've got your 5 minutes, then see where the slides will help. And it should not be slides that you have to read, especially with a 5-minute presentation, but even with a longer one, it shouldn't be slides that people have to read what you're saying and you're reading off the slides. It should be slides that are aids to getting your message across. If you've got 3 points, you could just have the actual few words of each point on a slide and have 3 slides. It really doesn't need to be more than that. If it's more than 5 slides, you're really going to struggle to get through them in the time frame. And I think the other thing about slides is that they often— there's a tech problem and they fail. And we saw this happen this week as well, but luckily we'd prepped with the student beforehand, which is, can you imagine what's going to happen if you get in there and the computer doesn't work, or it won't connect, or your thing won't load, or... Crashes in the middle. You need to have a plan because otherwise this will cause you great stress and it's the first thing in your interview and it could knock your confidence for the whole interview. So you need to be prepared. So in this case with the student this week, they had prepared, they had, it was a longer presentation, they had some slides and they had printed out copies of the slides, one for each panel member. And so in the event, I think it loaded and then they pressed the first button and the whole screen went black, which is massively stressful in your interview. They had a plan B, which is, that's fine, I've got you all a printout, you can all have one, and then went through the presentation that way. So just have a backup plan. NHS tech is not known for its great reliability, so just be prepared for the unexpected.

I love that. How professional must that candidate have looked? I just love that for them. I'm going to just share a couple of other slide things that I think people often interview that I just, I think, just, I can't bear, and I think I'm just gonna have to get it out there. So, one, I think it's particularly in a 5-minute presentation, but probably in any interview, if you feel the need to share complex data on a slide, just move away from that.

Okay.

Um, if you, you know, nobody on the panel has got time to decipher a slide of complex data. You're going to be under great stress, and so your ability to translate that for the panel is going to be reduced from what it ever normally is. And anytime that you feel you need to present a slide that requires you to say, I'm sorry, this slide is a bit busy, take it out.

I can see we've got the full— we've got the full rant coming. This is it, all the years of slides.

I'm coming to my final point. Divided it into 3. Finally, Don't leave them on a slide that says any questions. With a little, uh, yeah, with a little— we don't, we just don't need it. Um, so there's a couple of reasons for this. One, I think it looks a bit naff. Two, um, what we want them to be reading as the last thing, if they're left staring at anything Related to your presentation at the end, it should be, you know, 3 points related to your vision or whatever it is. What I'm going to deliver for you is, so that that is the thing that's stuck in their mind as they ask you a question, end the presentation, or whatever it is they're going to do. I just think it looks so much stronger than a big question mark on a slide.

Can I add to that the thank you slide? Because that—

We're really going for it now.

I think we may as well just let it all out. The thank you slide is not necessary, for the same reasons you mentioned. Much better to have them staring at your bullet points of your vision for the future. Thank you slide with any sort of cartoon-type thing on it is a no from me.

Yeah.

So, yeah, definitely not that. The other thing that I think is that you don't need to introduce yourself in a 5-minute presentation. They know who you are. This is your interview. And yes, that's not the same as going through your tell me about yourself answer. This is like, hi, I'm Tessa, I'm blah, blah, blah. It doesn't need to happen. And in a 5-minute presentation, it's a waste of time that you could be using to answer their question. If you think about any type of way they would be scoring you, there is no situation where they're going to score you for telling them your name or your role or anything like that. So I would definitely skip an introduction part.

Well, that was quite cathartic.

Okay, we got it all out. I'm sure we could go on a rant about slides for probably a whole episode.

We could do a whole— We have a whole episode on slides.

Tessa and Becky rant about slides for 20 minutes. Be very popular. Okay, I think we got the key points across there, and we'll probably wrap up there. So, thank you, Becky. Another great episode. I look forward to seeing you next time.

See you next time.

Bye.