When we think about developing ourselves and our careers, we often focus purely on our technical skills – the practical knowhow we apply to our profession on a day-to-day basis. But it’s useful to step back and think about the effects of our behavioural and business skills, too, and whether they may need some fine-tuning. For example, how often do we think about enhancing our communication or presentational skills? These are vital to ensuring that we can progress in our careers in the way we want to. Yet we often overlook them. This is particularly true in the context of changing jobs – especially when it comes to taking the hot seat in the interview room.
Before you get there, you must make the necessary impact at application stage. The value and importance of tailoring a CV, rather than relying upon an off-the-peg, one-size-fits-all version, cannot be understated. It is vital to adapt your CV to match what the recruiter is looking for. As such, when you look through the job description, ensure that you can provide examples of experience in your CV that will chime specifically with what the firm is looking for. Let’s say you’ve got through the CV stage – now comes your opportunity not just to show your prospective employer what you can do and why you want the job, but to find out more about the advertised role and the company itself. Preparing for an interview can be daunting – but there are several approaches you can take to help you feel mentally and physically equipped for the process, so it will unfold as a natural conversation rather than a gruelling obstacle course.
Treat how you communicate with others as a project, and set goals for what you want to achieve. Try out new techniques in a safe environment – for example, with friends you can rely on for constructive criticism – to see if they work. Practise role playing and get feedback from others to understand how they see you and what you are good (and not so good) at. A useful exercise here is to practise doing interviews as if you are playing yourself as a role. When you act, you step outside yourself and remove emotion from the picture, enabling you to see the discussion – and how you perform in it – in a more clinical, objective way.
When going for an interview, you should research the organisation and interviewers in detail. There is so much information available online – from the company’s annual report to profiles on LinkedIn – and it’s essential to understand the firm as much as possible before you go to the interview. This helps you to get a sense of the company’s culture and business strategy, and to perceive the individual who will be interviewing you as a person, rather than simply an abstract concept. Fear often stems from the unknown – so factual data is your armour.
How do you look – and what is your impact – when you walk in through the door? Are you busy dealing with your bag and coat, or are you shaking the interviewer’s hand with confidence and meeting their eye? When you take your seat, it’s best to keep your back straight and place both feet on the floor. Then you will automatically sit up straight and look poised. Do you turn your body during the conversation and show a particular side more often than the other? Ask a friend to tell you how you come across, as we all have one side that makes us look more empathetic and one side that make us look more serious.
As the interview gets under way, actively listen to what your interviewer is saying and respond. They will be providing you with cues about what sort of information they’re looking for. Are you hearing them and responding in the most useful way? Also, go deeper than simply listening, and understand why the person asking the questions is approaching you in the way they are. What can be influencing them? One tool you can use to determine that is the Ladder of Inference, developed by management thinkers Chris Argyris and Peter Senge. The Ladder explains how past experience influences how we react to everyday situations: instead of looking at things in a purely factual way, we often select what we want to hear and jump to conclusions. If you are aware that this is what your interviewer is doing, then you can adapt your responding style to reflect the cues that the person on the other side of the desk is giving you. Are they interpreting what you are saying in the correct way? If not, how can you adjust your behaviour or language to ensure you’ll come across in the way you want to?
Think about which key points you want to get across that will make big statements about who you are and what you can do. Focus on three, core messages that you will make sure you bring out in the interview. Go in feeling positive: that will shape your body language and how you react. And remember that an interview is about whether you will like the company, too. Think about what job you actually want and what your criteria are as a prospective employee in terms of culture. Does the job on offer match them?
Following the interview, it’s really important to get proper feedback – whether you are successful or not! Absorb the learnings from the comments you receive, and use them to inform either future interviews you take, or how to approach the early days of life in the new role. If appropriate, contact the interviewer to thank them for their time and to emphasise that you are interested in the position. But don’t be too pushy: you don’t need to reiterate your achievements – just your interest in the role.
When we go for an interview, we are only exploring – and the process is just as much about whether we will like the firm as it is about whether they will like us. Sometimes fear can take over. But if we recognise that and adjust our mindset to think about the interview as an opportunity for research or self-development, then that can help us to calm our nerves and think positively.
Louise Tatham is head of professional development at the ACT
Thank you to Caroline Stockmann for her insightful comments on this topic during the Future Leaders in Treasury career session at the ACT Annual Conference. Find out more about the Future Leaders group here.