JOB INTERVIEW -
SOME TECHNIQUE TO KNOW ABOUT
Answer The below Job Interview
QuestionS:
Why Should We Hire YOU?
And
30 Pathetic Answers to Job Interview Questions.
The question of, “Why
should we hire you?” can take a variety of forms such as, “Why do you
think you will be successful in this position on?”
This is a critical question
because it will show your success, self-confidence, and preparation.
Like “Why do you want to
work here?” and “Tell me about yourself,” this question is the
employer’s invitation to sell yourself as the answer to their needs.
In this answer, do double-time
by selling yourself and by demonstrating your knowledge of the company.
Thus, start by doing your
homework on the company before the interview, even if it is “only” a telephone
interview.
That will likely include
visiting their website, Googling their name, and performing an advanced search
on LinkedIn long before you ever find yourself in the interview!
Bad Answers to This Question
An answer that focuses on the
benefits to you is a bad answer. So, answers like:
·
I need
the money.
·
I need a
job.
·
This
location is very close to where I live (or go to school or want to move or
whatever).
·
I’ve
always been interested in (whatever they do).
As important as those reasons
are to you, they are not the reasons the employer will hire you. Frankly, nice
as they might be, they really don’t care about the benefits to you if they hire
you.
Your answer to this question
should focus on them, not on you! You are the seller in this situation,
not the buyer. So, you need to focus on the benefits (more than one!) to the
buyer.
Remember that the goal here is
to entice this employer to offer you this job.
Emphasize Your Knowledge and
Experience to Demonstrate Your Value
Embrace that this question as
an opportunity to emphasize your value and to demonstrate your knowledge as
they work together to show how well you could do the job.
For example, someone applying
for a position as an administrative assistant might say:
“I have been using Word,
Excel, and Outlook since 2001 to maintain both financial and administrative
records, create and distribute internal reports for management to monitor
employee activity and asset usage which was received by 4 senior managers including
the CEO and COO, and create and distribute the internal organizational
newsletter which was sent to over 200 staff members twice a month.
“The financial reports were
created and maintained using Excel, and both newsletters were written using
Microsoft Word, using templates that I developed, and distributed using
Outlook.
“I have taken several
workshops on Microsoft Office products, and have worked with the newest version
and previous versions, going back to the 1997 version. So, I am very
comfortable with the Microsoft Office suite of products.”
Or, in a more traditional
situation, here’s what you might prepare to say as a new graduate of a medical
transcription training program applying for a job with a cardiology practice:
“I believe that I will be successful
in this position because I have 900 hours of hands-on training in medical
transcription in a classroom environment at the XYZ Institute.
(Get out your portfolio, and
open it to a print out of a sample of your work). “Here you can see several
examples of medical records, dictation, and reports I have produced in MS Word.
“I have also excelled in my
terminology courses, gaining a strong base in numerous disciplines.
“However, I have always been
interested in Cardiology and made it a personal goal to focus on that area.
Because of that, I read the Journal of Cardiology to stay up-to-date with
changes in the field, names of new pharmaceuticals, and other innovations.
“I have an excellent basis in
the discipline to transcribe the records of your Cardiologists with ease. Also,
I recently joined the American Association of Medical Transcriptionists and am
already taking steps to pursue certification.”
When I share answers like
this, most people react by saying, “That’s so good; I couldn’t do that.” But,
that’s not true – crafting answers like this is just getting to know yourself
in advance.
Advanced Preparation
You need to plan to answer
questions about why you are qualified and know how to sell yourself above the
other applicants. Realize that you may have the same skillset, but much of job
interview success revolves around who does the best job at communicating it in
the interview!
So, spend some time doing the
following:
1.
Listing
your skills and strengths.
2.
Writing
CAR stories (Challenges, Actions, and Results) about
accomplishments for each of your jobs.
3.
Documenting
your accomplishments.
4.
Uncovering
what makes you special by reviewing letters of recommendation and/or other testimonials
you may have from work, school, and volunteering.
5.
Writing
down concrete answers to questions like this that give a concrete example to
prove you fit the bill!
30
Pathetic Answers to Job Interview Questions
These
answers to 5 common job interview questions demonstrated either a complete lack
of preparation on the part of the job seeker, or a complete lack of
understanding about how to be successful in a job interview. Regardless of the
cause, the result was the same: opportunities lost!
What do you know about
us?
This
question is often asked at the beginning of a job interview. It’s not a hard
question to answer, if you are prepared.
Don’t
give these answers:
1.
Nothing. (So,
you applied why???)
2.
You’ve got this job open.
3.
I hear you pay well.
Correct answer: How to answer to What do you know
about us
What is your greatest
weakness?
This
is a very common question to be asked, and it doesn’t take much time to prepare
for it. But, you do need to be prepared!
These
answers are losers:
4.
I don’t have any.
(Amazing and unbelievable!)
5.
I have so many, it’s hard to pick just
one.
6.
I’m not a good speller. (secretarial
job)
7.
I hate dealing with difficult people.
(customer service job)
8.
I’m bad with math. (analyst
job)
9.
I’m not very good with the newer
versions of Microsoft Office. I like Office 97 best.
Correct Answer:
Why Do You Want to
Work Here?
This
is your chance to demonstrate what you know about the employer and to show the
interviewer(s) what you bring to the job, emphasizing the benefits to the
employer (not to you) for hiring you. A little flattery about the
company — if you are sincere — is appropriate here, but don’t go overboard.
These
answers are shallow and completely focused on the benefit to the job seeker:
10. My
mom said I had to get a job. (Highly-motivated job seeker!)
11. Because
I’d look GREAT in your uniform!
12. This
is a short walk from where I live now.
13. I
understand you give employees great discounts.
Why should we hire
you?
This
question is an opportunity to make a personal sales pitch, focused on the
benefit to the employer, not the benefit to you for having the job (the
employer understands how you will benefit).
Most
of these answers are worrisome:
14. I
don’t know. (Neither will the employer.)
15. No
one else will hire me.
16. I’m
unemployed.
17. I’m
desperate.
18. I
need the money.
19. I
need a job
Tell me about
yourself.
This
question is not an invitation to confess your greatest hopes or your biggest
sins. But it is another opportunity to show the employer how your skills and
experience match up with the requirements of their job. Having nothing to say
may be interpreted by the employer as lack of interest and/or lack of
preparation.
These
answers did not inspire the interviewer to recommend hiring these job seekers:
20. There’s
not much to tell. (Professional spy?)
21. My
real job is rock musician. I’m the drummer. But our agent quit, so we don’t
have any gigs scheduled the rest of the year. We’re looking for a new agent,
and I hope to get back to that soon. That’s what I really do.
Do you have any
questions?
Job
seekers often shoot themselves in the foot with this question, as you’ll see in
these responses. Would you want to hire the people who gave any of these
answers? Neither would I.
Yes,
you should have questions! But not these:
22. Will
I need to pass a drug test before I get hired? How much notice will I have?
23. No.
24. Do
you do background checks?
25. Will
you be checking my references?
26. How
often do people get raises here?
27. Do
you cover sick days? How many can I have each month?
28. How
much vacation will I get?
29. How
big is the employee discount? Is there a limit on how much I can buy? Is it OK
to resell?
30. Would
you like to go out for a drink after this? (flirt after
accepting a job offer, if appropriate)
Most
of those answers were premature or downright scary. Don’t think that having no
questions to ask is a show of respect, as some people mistakenly believe.
Instead, having no questions demonstrates a lack of appropriate interest and
also a lack of understanding about what an appropriate question is.
