Are you ready?! We are going to do a deep dive into the REAL mechanics of becoming great at interviewing. First, I am going to give you a NEW interview paradigm. Then, we move into the HOW. Wrap your head around these concepts and start upping your game, positioning yourself to win more interviews and more offers!
The February @ISACA Career Corner column was Part 1 and laid out why sharpening your interview skills is so critical now. With a couple of digital trust recruiting experts, we explored the current dynamics of the digital trust job market and how competition for roles is increasing.
So, let’s refresh. What is an interview?
A place to make a great first impression, definitely. Most importantly, it’s where you pitch yourself as the resource that has the skills and experience to do the job the prospective employer needs done, and, to the best of your ability, you demonstrate as many of your skills as you can in the interview. It’s an audition.
In this context, it’s imperative that you differentiate yourself from other candidates in the employer’s pipeline and ace the interview by:
- Showcasing your unique value proposition for this specific organization.
- Communicating concretely how you fit the role.
- Actually demonstrating important job competencies, especially communication and listening skills.
- “Doing the job” in the interview. This is easiest to do when there is a case study, or a presentation as part of the interview. Be creative about how you can demonstrate your strategic, analytical or problem-solving abilities during the interview process.
- Thinking like an employee. Show them you have their business in mind and the goal of improving it in the role you will play.
- Illustrating your emotional intelligence by being engaging, friendly, collaborative and inclusive.
Being Prepared
Strategizing and having a plan for each phase of the interview is a must-do. Shirk this prep at your own peril!
Essential bits:
- The research
- The logistics
- The audience
- The questions you’ll ask
- Readying yourself for the questions they’ll ask
- Making it fresh for each interviewer, and each round of interviews
The research: Here is where so, so many candidates fall down. The employer is making time to talk with you. You are taking time out of your day and you are playing to win. Thus, Job #1 is knowing the company inside and out. Make it a case study. Research it as if you were planning to invest a huge sum of money in this company. (Check out my article on LinkedIn called “Think Like An Investor” for more on this research task).
Candidates who really KNOW the company and thoughtfully demonstrate that in interviews are impressive. Be that candidate!
The logistics: You are clear on the time and the platform. Prep your virtual office as best you can to be clean, well-lit, and with just a bit of your personality on view. Prep your interview attire. (If you need some guidance with respect to the dress culture of the company, ask your external or internal recruiter. Many companies still like to see that you made the effort to come to the interview dressed “interview formal” and at a minimum “business professional.”)
If you are going onsite, make sure you know where you are going, the parking situation, the entry process (need for a security check-in, or badge), and who you are meeting first. Arrive early enough so as to allow for contingencies (such as no parking spots left in the visitors lot!) and to keep from being stressed about potentially being late.
Planning, being prepared, having a contingency plan – these are all competencies in digital trust. Show that you have these skills locked down. Being late to an interview is a red flag from the get-go!
Audience: Know who they are. Use LinkedIn. Look for clues about how they think about things from their work history but also from their activity, who they follow, the groups they belong to, and the tidbits of information embedded in their profiles. Go beyond that and do a thorough web check for any presentations they might have posted or interviews they have given.
Questions you’ll ask: Make a list of 3-5 unique questions that are appropriate for EACH interviewer. Do not recycle your questions for subsequent interviewers! Design your questions to help you gather information about the role, AND also to demonstrate your business knowledge and the fact that you have researched the company. (Smart questions show that you are thinking like a consultant and like their next great team member!)
Being ready for the questions they’ll ask. They are going to ask about your skills and most importantly about your experience. Memorizing answers from a how-to book on interviewing is not advisable. You want your experience to be communicated authentically in your words. Interviewers KNOW when the answers they are getting are canned.
- Stress questions. Tell me about a time when you failed? Tell us about a mistake you made and what you learned. What is your weakness? There are lots of articles on how to create personal and real answers to these sorts of questions that demonstrate your ability to learn from tough situations, to solve problems, to be resilient, to change and grow. Take the time to think through these questions and have solid answers at the ready that will let the interviewer SEE you as the thoughtful, self-aware, always learning professional that you are.
- Behavioral questions are your friend! Chirag Joshi, who is an inspiring cybersecurity leader, author of several books, and podcast host, writes in his book “7 Rules to Become Exceptional at Cyber Security,” “If you master the art of storytelling, you’ll become an unstoppable force in your leadership, communication and persuasion skills.” This is the power you can tap with behavioral questions.
Behavioral questions give you the opportunity to share your best stories with the interviewers, painting a vivid picture of your work and why it matters. You might think you don’t have the knack for telling good stories. Don’t sell yourself short on this absolutely essential interview skill. You can learn how to do this.
Making it fresh – it’s a new show each time! When meeting with several people during an interview, it is likely that you will get the same question from some of them. Never come off bored or with the attitude of “Here we go again, I already answered that twice today.” It’s an audition, remember. The cast of a Broadway show have to delight audiences night after night. Your job in the interview is to bring that same degree of commitment to being engaged and engaging in each and every meeting in the process.
Energy Cycle
When I was recruiting, candidates often told me that they were used to sitting in meetings for many hours each day, or to presenting to new audiences (clients, stakeholders), and that they felt good about their ability to manage their interviews.
And then, in debriefing after the interview, I would very often hear something to the effect of “Wow, that three-hour interview really took a lot out of me. My energy was flagging towards the end.”
Know this, interviews take a lot of energy – each interview in and of itself, as well as the entire process – with each company you are interviewing with. If you are interviewing with several companies, the energy expenditure is going to tax you. Pace yourself. Interviewing can be, and often is, a marathon!
To endure and cross that finish line, you need to keep yourself in great mental and physical shape. Work to minimize your stress while you are in the process of interviews. Preparation helps heaps!! I can’t stress that enough. Meditation and relaxation practices can be helpful.
Take care of your body. You won’t interview well if you are sleep deprived. Make sure you prepare for interviews by getting enough sleep in the days leading up to the interview. Eat properly. Keep up with your exercise program. At a minimum go for a walk. Resetting out in nature is an amazing way to refresh your brain and your body. Drink water. Take a water bottle with you to the interview. When you are dehydrated, you get tired. Also, your voice won’t sound as resonant and pleasing if you are thirsty. When you have a break in the interview, grab your water and refresh!
Balance of Power – They Have It, You Don’t (Until You Have an Offer in Hand)
I often read and hear, “I am interviewing them to see if this role is a match for me.” Absolutely. But overtly and openly acting that way in the interview won’t help you and may cost you the job. It can, and likely will, come off as arrogant and self-serving.
Think about it. Why is the company hiring in the first place? They have a need. They need a resource to take care of that need or to solve a problem. They are, of course, purely self-interested in finding the right candidate for the role, but then, they are they buyer. They are the one who will offering salary and benefits in return for your services. The prospective employer is in the driver’s seat UNTIL they make you an offer.
Once you have an offer in hand, you can ask the me-centric questions. Until that point, your mission is to show the interviewers why you are the best person for the job. You will fill their need. You will solve their problem. In a slowing job market this is the message you MUST put across in order to win an offer.
It is absolutely critical that you get information through the interview process about the real objectives for the role, how performance will be measured, the style in which they want it done, the style of the boss and team – but this information has to be sleuthed out in a more strategic way.
OK, so how do you do that? By asking great questions. Here’s another juncture where you have the opportunity to actually do the job in the interview because asking intelligent questions is a core soft skill in digital trust.
For more on this essential skill, see the two articles in the @ISACA Career Column Archive from April 2022 called the Layer Cake Paradigm, Parts 1 & 2:
Whether you are in the market for a new job this year or not, you just never know when you are going to need to whip your interview skills into shape. It could be that a fabulous internal role appears or the dream job with another company that you never expected to see posted unexpectedly materializes.
Knowing how to interview well is an essential career skill. It’s interviews that win people great opportunities and change life trajectories. Take time to assess your interviewing competencies. What have you got nailed? What needs help?
I hope the ideas and resources here spur you to do that important career work. And, consider this, mentors can be tremendously helpful when you want to improve your interviewing skills. ISACA recently launched its Mentorship Program. Sharpening your interview game is a terrific reason to check it out. Wait! One more thought, if you are a senior professional who can help people polish their interview chops, why not join the ISACA Mentorship Program as a mentor?