A technical interview can sound like a pretty scary prospect. The interviewers will test your knowledge and understanding of technical concepts, and your problem-solving abilities. You’ll also need to show them what you know and how you think. This is a pretty high-pressure situation, a difficult hoop to jump through for that job in finance or engineering or tech. But there’s no way around it, so you’d better get used to the idea. Last week, I talked about how to answer those tough questions that you face. Today I want to talk about some of the common pitfalls that you might encounter in a technical interview.
Whether you’re in finance, engineering, technology, or software design, your job search might involve a technical job interview. In a technical interview, you have to do more than just answer questions about your background and experience. You have show you understand the technical ins and outs of your field and have a sharp mind. And you’ll do that by solving technical problems and answering brainteasers.
Imagine you’re in a job interview, answering questions about your experience. Things seems to be going pretty well, but suddenly you say something you wish you hadn’t. Maybe you mentioned a big mistake you made at a former job. Or perhaps you said something bad about your former employer. You watch the interviewers face to see how she reacts, and your heart starts to race.
These are not unusual situations. We’ve all faced them. And if you stay calm, there are some good ways to recover. In today’s lesson, we’ll look at some useful techniques for these types of situations. We’ll look at admitting to a past mistake, explaining what we’ve done following a failure, and highlighting what we’ve learnt from the experience. We’ll also look at toning down a negative statement and emphasizing positive ideas after saying something negative.
We will hear two short dialogs today. In the first, we’ll rejoin Simon and Charlene. Simon is interviewing for a job as bank manager. In the second dialog, we’ll hear Sara and Nick. Sara is interviewing for a position as a buyer with a big retail chain.
Listening Questions
1. What mistake did Simon make at his previous job?
2. What did Simon do after making a mistake?
3. What does Sara think her previous employer needed to do better?
Welcome back to Business English Pod for today’s lesson on dealing with difficult job interview situations and questions.
We all know that job interviews are stressful. And we all know that one of the keys to reducing that stress is good preparation. But sometimes, no matter how well prepared we are, we find ourselves in tough situations. Maybe we are asked to talk about a weakness, or maybe we don’t know important information about the company where we’re interviewing.
Whatever interview difficulty we are facing, we need to take a deep breath, remain calm, and show confidence. Fortunately, we can learn language techniques to help us succeed in these tough interviews. In today’s lesson, we’ll look at showing how a weakness stems from a positive, how we’ve tried to change a weakness, and how we are a team player. We will also look at showing general industry knowledge and asking good questions.
We will hear two short dialogs today. In the first, we’ll hear Sara interviewing for a position as a buyer at a large retail chain. She’s being interviewed by Nick. In the second dialog, we’ll hear Simon interviewing for a position as a bank manager. He’s being interviewed by Charlene.
Listening Questions
1. What reason does Sara give for her stubbornness?
2. What has Sara done to change her stubbornness?
3. What does Simon say he understands about the banking industry?
The interview is a crucial step in the hiring process. You have the opportunity to sit down with a candidate and get as much useful information as possible. And to get good information, you need to set the right tone and ask good questions. You also need techniques for getting people to explain and elaborate on ideas. The more details you can get from someone, the better. And hopefully you can figure out if the person is right for the job and for your company.
Good techniques for conducting interviews can help you in many other situations. Any time you need to evaluate a person, or a person’s company, you will use the same techniques. Imagine you need to contract an Internet marketing company. You will probably sit down with someone to ask them questions. Or imagine you have a paper salesman in your office. Again, you will need to ask him some good questions to evaluate his company.
Today, we’ll learn some great interviewing techniques, including how to ask stress questions and hypothetical questions. We’ll also learn about echoing someone to encourage them to speak more and calling someone on an evasive answer. And finally we’ll learn about giving the candidate a chance to ask questions of their own.
In today’s dialog, we’ll rejoin Sandy and Lee, who are interviewing Maria. Sandy and Lee are looking for someone to lead their company’s expansion into Asia.
Listening Questions
1. What does Maria say she does that Sandy repeats in order to encourage more detail?
2. What type of situation does Sandy ask Maria to imagine?
3. What does Sandy give Maria the chance to do at the end of the interview?
