Help! My first job interview!!

In My Humble Opinion
1

OK, I’m a Graphic Designer graduate, and I have my first job interview on Monday. I’m also s**t scared. It’s at a company that specialises in services for hotels, designing menus, compendiums, door signs, etc.

What should I expect? I have researched the company over the net and have a fairly good idea what they’re about (see above) but I’ve never had an interview before and don’t know what questions I should prepare to ask them, and how I should answer the questions they throw at me. Can anyone please help?

2

Well,

I don’t work in the same area but here are my thoughts:

On Being Questioned:
#1. Be truthfull. Being truthfull should be obvious but I had many interviews where the interviewee blew it by lying instead of saying “I don’t know”.
#2. Qualify the difference between what you think and what you know. If you are offering an opinion say “These are my thoughts…” or something similar. If you are stating a fact say outright that it is a fact.
#3. Be quick with your answers. Taking alot of time to respond to a question may make it seem that you are either a)lying or b)kinda stupid. Last, if you do not know something say “I don’t know but I can find that out”. Then find the answer.

On Asking Questions:
#1. Ask about money. Be frank about pay and benifits.
#2. Next ask about what long term programs the company has besides the standard benifits. If they have a stock option program ask about the vesting period. If they have paid training ask what the training could do for you and where it would take you in the company.
#3. Ask about promotions. Find out if they promote from with in the company.

Hope this helps

Slee

3

Thanks a lot for the tips, Slee. I appreciate it.

4

If the interview is behavioral (god I’m tired of those), research how to answer the questions correctly (yes correctly. Apparently the geniuses in many human resource departments beleive that all answers must be in the same form). You must answer in a certain way or you won’t get credit. The best way to prepare is to try to remember as many school and work situations as you can and think of or make up positive results for how you dealt with them.

If your lucky it will be a normal interview and you can just do what the guy before me said. I wouldn’t start talking money till the second interview if there is one. Many recruiters I’ve met said this is a bit pushy, although benefits (since they are usually the same for most hires) questions are fair game

5

Always be totally honest about your skills, knowledge and experience. Don’t build yourself up larger than life, otherwise, if you were to get the job, you may come crashing down!

Smile and appear open and friendly. Look at the interviewer/s straight in the eye when you answer their questions.

Be prepared that it may be a panel of 3 or 4 people, not just one person interviewing you.

Have in your mind, your answer to the question “If you were to be the successful applicant, where do you see yourself within this company is say, 5 years time?” (A lot of places ask this question).

Another fairly common question is: “Were you to be offered this position, what skills do you think you can bring with you to improve this position?”

Also, make sure, at the conclusion of the interview, you sincerely thank the interviewer/s for their time and for the opportunity of meeting with them.

If I think of any other little hints I’ll post them.

Oh, and BTW, GOOD LUCK!!! :wink:

6

Make sure your info on your resume is correct. If you lied, then make sure you can back it up with more lies. You might think this is fucked up, but I have interviewed lots of people who could not answer basic questions about skills they had listed on their resumes.

Try to relax. They know you are nervous, but you don’t have to sweat buckets.

Make sure you eat, or carry some candy in your pocket. Long interviews are not fun if your blood sugar is low.

Wear a suit unless other wise told not to. Also, don’t just go for black and white. Make sure you have some bright color. A power red tie or kerchief will be remembered.

In the question faze, don’t bullshit. If you don’t know the answer, say so, and then ask if they mind if you theorize. It shows honesty and creativity.

Be ready to answer lame ass behavioral questions such as “tell me a time when you had to use your leadership skills.” Sadly, answers to behavioral questions will get you hired more than skill based answers. Companies can always train people in job skills, but finding someone with interpersonal skills is a real plus because they can’t be learned quickly.

Also, if they give you a question that does not have an answer such as “Your deadline is a week away, and you have three weeks of work to do. How do you handle the situation?” That is a loaded question, and tell them that it is a hypothetical question, and that you cannot have an answer until you are put into that situation, but you will give it your best.

If asked something funny like: “Why are manhole covers round?” Don’t sit there with a dumb look on your face. It is a type of question to measure creativity and reasoning skill. Answer it the best you can, and try to be creative. (BTW, they are round so they won’t fall into the manhole)

As for asking about money, I would say, don’t do it. IMO It shows lack of tact. After all, you can always bargain after the job offer is made.

If you get hammered by asses who like making people sweat in interviews, turn the tide by asking them what they do in a common day of work. It is amazing how that will throw a wrench into their machines. You will also be amazed when all they come up with is “drinking coffee” :wink:

Be polite. Always thank them for taking time to do your interview and thank them again before it ends. Also, don’t offer to shake hands unless it is offered by them first. Trust me on this one. People at work don’t shake hands on a regular basis, and having a hand trust out to them might throw them into a kilter. Also if set in a meeting room alone, stand up when the interviewer comes in.

If you have to use the bathroom, then ask before the interview begins or just at the end (better at the end). If offered, say yes and go, even if you don’t have to, it will allow you to collect your thoughts.

If taken out to lunch, eat something light and make sure it is not messy. Also, don’t order anything alcoholic, even if they do.

Don’t be afraid to joke with the interviewer. Small talk will make the day go a lot easier, but try to stay on topic. No tangents and don’t brooch subjects. Asking them how they are or how their day is going will go a long way.

After the interview, make sure that you ask how long until a return call, if any, will be given to you. Also ask them if they will contact you either way. That way, you are not left hoping. Being turned down is better than no word at all.

Oh yeah, make sure you bring your portfolio with you and a copy of your resume and cover letter will be nice too. You might be surprised with how many people forget the basics.

Have fun, and good luck. BTW, interviews never get easier. You will always be a wreck.

7

Wear dark blue. In one of my law classes we learned that lawyers have witnesses wear dark blue because it gives off the impression of competence/trustworthiness.

Avoid green, pink and black (unless you’re a man, then black is okay).

8

Classic job search book has lots of tips:
what color is my parachute?
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1580085415/qid=1071216796/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_1/103-5497704-8721428

also, although it’s maybe too late to do this now, i have heard of job hunters purposely scheduling interviews for jobs that they don’t really want ahead of interviews for jobs that they care about purely as practice. by the time they get to the “real” interview they’ve gotten used to talking about themselves.

do you have friends who hire people? maybe you could ask them to put you through a mock interview, and they could even make it tougher than any real interview you would ever encounter.

9

whoops. it’s “what color is YOUR parachute?” sorry.

10

I’ve always treated my prospective “interviewing” managers/bosses like they were friends of my parents.

Maybe that sounds weird, but it holds. I’m respectful, polite, but never too uptight; I smile a lot, try to charm them, put them at ease, and generally make myself as appealing as possible, without getting too “chummy.” Respectful + appealing.

People hire people they like. So I make myself as likeable as possible.

Somebody’s resume is always going to look better than yours, but a resume has no personality; make yours shine.

FWIW, I’ve never not gotten a job for which I’ve applied in person. I’ve sent resumes/applications and never gotten called, but I always ace the interview if I get one.

So that’s my theory.

11

A lot of good advice so far; here’s some of my thoughts as a veteran of both sides of the table.

First, try not to be so scared. Unless this is the one company in the world you’ve been dreaming of working for since you were a wee bairn, the world will not end if you don’t get the job. Moreover, an interview is (or ought to be) as much for you to learn whether you want the job as it is for the job to learn whether it wants you. So relax. Even the worst possible interview will teach you some things about what to do next time and give you additional experience and confidence.

A good way to help yourself relax is to make sure you’re well prepared. As a recent graduate, you don’t have tons of experience to draw on, but you should be ready to make a convincing case that you’re able to do the job. The best interviewers aren’t concerned about where you expect to be in five years or what you think is your greatest strength or your greatest weakness. They care (or ought to care) about whether you are better able than other applicants to do the job that exists. The interview should be about the work; about demonstrating, whether by reference to past performance or (in your case) by showing that you understand the nature of the work you’ll be expected to perform and that you have the intelligence, talent, skill, or whatever other qualities are needed to do that work. The more specific you can be, the more that you can demonstrate how you would approach that work, the better off you’ll be (assuming that you are in fact competent to do the job).

To that end, the more you know about the actual work you’ll be doing, the better. While it’s probably a bit late to do a thorough job of this, if your net research included learning who some of the firm’s clients are, you might do worse than to pay a visit to any of them that are local and looking around – you mentioned that most of them are hotels, and that they design signage and print materials. Wander around the lobby of a few; check out the menus if they’re posted in public areas, even go so far as to ask the desk staff if you might be able to look at the guide to the property that they place in rooms, etc. Be forthright about the reason for your request – people generally like to feel they’ve done something to help someone else, particularly when the cost to them is low. If you weren’t able to find out which hotels specifically are clients, you might still pick a few properties that you think would be representative and wander the public areas for a bit to study the graphics used. Anything you learn about the business you’re proposing to work in would be useful; even if it doesn’t come up directly in the interview, you’ll be that much more confident (and hence more relaxed), and have that much more of a base of knowledge and information to draw on. For example if there’s something you notice in your observations that you don’t understand, ask about it if you get a chance in the interview – generally, interviewers also like talking about the work they do, and you’ll come across as someone who’s eager to learn about the work and who’s enough of a self-starter to have gone out and started that process on their own. Just don’t make the question something that’s obviously just a canned piece you prepared for the interview – you don’t want to seem insincere – make it something that you genuinely found interesting or unusual or otherwise worthy of asking about. It probably also shouldn’t be something that you obviously already know or that you obviously should know already by virtue of your education. In other words, don’t ask a question unless you’re actually interested in the answer.

The other part of relaxing is remembering that they decided to interview you, not the other way around. Something about your resume or your portfolio or your cover letter appealed to them. The fact that you’re just out of school shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone interviewing you – they knew that when they decided to bring you in. So you don’t have feel that you should apologize for your lack of experience; they know that already, and so they’re obviously not completely opposed to hiring someone without experience (if they are, and they’re interviewing you anyway, they’re jerks).

I’ve generally found that an excellent first question to ask, if it hasn’t been addressed by the time you get a chance to ask it, is why they’re hiring someone for this position now. Did someone get promoted or retire or leave the company, or is business increasing to the point that additional help was needed, etc. This may help you better understand the hiring manager’s motivations, the nature of the position, the atmosphere and culture of the company, etc., and help you tailor the rest of your questions and answers. Another good lead-in question is to ask what a typical day for (a) your prospective manager and (b) and employee in the position you’re interviewing for is like.

I’m sure that “behavioral” questions do get people hired or not hired at a lot of companies, but I generally hate them both as an interviewer and as an interviewee. The odds of someone just out of school being hired and staying with that company for five years, much less for a whole career, are so vanishingly small in the world we live in today that anyone asking lame-ass “where do you expect to be in five years” questions should face summary execution. And I’ve almost always found that peoples’ greatest weaknesses are the ones they’re not aware of – the weaknesses we’re aware of we’re able to cover over or otherwise mitigate, but the ones we don’t realize we have shine through at full strength to others.

I’ll never make someone an offer without having at least two interviews with them, or without having other people in the organization talk with them as well. If we haven’t arrived at a good sense of someone’s interpersonal skills in that amount of interaction, a couple of bullshit questions thrown into an interview aren’t going to tell us much more. I’ve only ever hired one person who turned out to be a spectacularly bad fit in that way, and all of us who interviewed him had had some reservations that we ignored in light of his apparent qualifications (which turned out to be overstated as well). So if the whole interview is those types of things, don’t sweat your answers too much – if the manager doing the hiring can’t think of anything work-related to ask you, they probably don’t have a very clear idea of why they’re hiring you or what it would look like for you to succeed in the position, and you’re probably as well off not getting it.

I’m also always a little bit suspect of interviewees who ask more than a couple of questions related to advancement, career path, etc.; I’m hiring someone to do a job NOW, and that’s my chief concern in an interview. It’s certainly fair to want to know whether this position is regarded as having the potential to lead to greater responsibility, but nearly every job outside factory floor or menial labor does these days.

12

First, wishing you good luck. I also have experience from both sides here.

I recommend not asking any questions about what you want (money, benefits, flexible schedule, etc.) until you have an offer. Until you have an offer, this is a sales process where you are selling yourself. Once they want you, then you can ask. Negotiations are a whole different interview skill. Feel free to post a Part II thread when you get to that point.

I like behavioral questions, from both perspectives. These are the questions that start out “Tell me about a time when you …” Give a factual account of a time when you did the item they asked for, such as worked on a tight deadline, or led a team, or calmed an angry customer. As a student, if you don’t have a work-related example, use an example from school or activities. I also recommend giving behavioral examples throughout the interview, even if the question is more general. For example, if they ask “How do you get your best ideas?” you could say “From talking to customers. For example, during my internship with XYZ, I got my idea for the widgetometer from talking with a customer at the returns counter.” The specific example makes it more credible, not like you just read somewhere talking to customers is a good way to get ideas.

I’m going to differ from Mr. Tuffpaws on how to answer hypothetical questions. I recommend either a behavioral answer, like above, or if you don’t have one of them, show that you understand how those decisions are made in that business. For the example of needing to prioritize a bunch of stuff, you could say “First I would do the things that directly affected our customers, then the things my manager needed for upper management, then get caught up on day-to-day work.” Or, in another business “I’d look at what was on the critical path of the project plan and confirm with the Project Manager that those should be my priorities.” As a true beginner, if you really don’t have a good idea of the process, at least let them know you would ask for assistance the first time, and learn how the decision was made so you could work more independently in the future.

Don’t ever bad mouth previous employers, co-workers or customers in an interview. This is huge, and you’d be surprised what I’ve heard people say.

As far as what to wear, get advice from someone familiar with the company, or at least the design field in your community. In many industries you can’t go wrong with a conservative blue suit, but design is not one of them. They are looking for a creative spark, and you need to be able to convey that with also a high level of professionalism. Dress like you would if you got the job and had an important meeting that day. Driving down there one morning/ afternoon before the interview to see how people dress is not out of the question.

The fact that you did research is a good start, and so is coming here for tips. Best of luck to you!

13

Start with a joke to put the panel at ease.

Check for a drink, your cottonmouth will need it.

The panel are asking you questions because you know the answers and they don’t. Convince yourself of this.

Don’t be too interested in what the company can offer you other than opportunities. They are offering a job after all.

Carry a copy of your application and refer to it if need be. It’s not a memory test why risk forgetting to mention stuff.

Try to work out some of the questions they may ask. See if you can find something to say that most people won’t. For example people interviewing for supervisory/management positions often approach communication questions on the basis of how well they get their message across. Many fail to give adequate weight to listening skills.

Think. Don’t rush in. In a recent interview one of the applicants managed to make most of his failings seem like advantages. As an outsider he was able to say, when asked how to implement new work procedures, that first he’d check with his staff to ensure that management hadn’t come up with something unworkable. He got a laugh and a few bonus points.

Get laid Sunday night (but only if you don’t have to work for it).

Good luck.

14

Be prepared to give examples.

That is, brainstorm some ways in which your past successes can be used to illustrate how you have various qualities that bosses like.

“Are you a team player?”

“Heavens, yes - I was chosen by consensus to lead the team that created team project XYZ and present it to the larger group.”

“Are you good working by yourself?”

“Heavens, yes - I had to take individual responsibility for many of the duties that when we created team project XYZ, and I did the presentation to the larger group myself.”

The hard question will be, “Do you have any experience?” Think up every single thing from your background that could be construed as even marginally related to graphic design, hotels, or compendiums (whatever the heck compendiums are).

Good luck. It gets easier with practice.

Regards,
Shodan

15

If you’re thrown an oddball question, answer it honestly but not stupidly. I sometimes ask “If you could have any job in the world–anything–what would it be?” I’ve only asked this question of potential law firm summer associates, and the answers have been:

  1. go to the top of Mt. Everest, without having to actually climb it (lame answer, in part because that’s not a job)
  2. own a vineyard (good answer, until she continued that she got that idea from watching The Bachelor)
  3. be a judge–got this a couple of times (terrible answer)
  4. be the GM of a major league baseball team (great answer)

Try to get a conversation going, rather than have it be just a question & answer session. One question I 've asked in interviews is how the person ended up with that company. Ask what the 2 or 3 most important qualities are for the person they’re looking for. Ask what the most difficult part of the job is.

Try to relax.

Send thank you letters IMMEDIATELY.