Day by Day Daily Cartoon by Chris Muir

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Monday, July 24, 2006

Interview with the Vampire... er, Employer(s)

Fresh graduate or experienced management type, interviews can be wearing on your nerves - on both sides! My brother is an interviewer himself and he's got plenty of horror stories about interviewees. Well, I can tell a horror story or two about prospective employers myself.

So far, in my search for a job, I've been to about 5 interviews. One I aborted because of horror stories on the Internet. Now, this doesn't necessarily mean it's bad, but caveat emptor and I definitely did. Another (Col Shutters) was my first, and I thought it went all right. I guess my interviewers didn't, because I never heard back frmo them. Still, it was a sales job and that wasn't my main intention, so it wasn't too bad.

Subsequently, I've had interviews from Tactics Asia, Kumon and AIG. I'll be having second interviews with the latter two, and another from Nilai International College. It's going to be hectic, but that's a good sign; the more the better, if I can give 100% to all the interviews.

Prospective job seekers; here are a few tips before you attend your interviews. Nothing hard, just common sense stuff.

1. For crying out loud, make sure you don't lie or hide anything in your resume/CV. You think employers can't check stuff out? They can!

2. Going with (1) above, ensure you can verify/prove what you claim. It's not so important if you say you've attended as an ordinary member the Chess Club while you were in Uni. But if you claim your English is superlative, both written and spoken, then be prepared to do some Shakespeare.

3. Remember details of your application. When they call you up, they might want to do a phone interview. It really helps if you can recall (or have handy) what your job description is and what the company is so that you sound like you know what you're talking about. I got burned by this one somewhat, so I speak from experience.

4. Look stuff up on the Net!!!! This is the one single HUGE advantage we have over those of even 10 years ago; we've got the mighty Google. Use it! Look up the company. Look up the industry. Look up the job. Look up whatever you can so that you'll be as prepared as possible going into the interview.

5. Commit everything to God. Most important step. Quite possibly the only one step you really need to be all-out serious about. Man proposes but God disposes. Paul plants, Apollos waters but God gives the increase. In everything go to the Lord in prayer.

Simple stuff, really. Just go in calm, collected, courteous, charming. Smile a great deal. Have a sense of humour. See the silver linings. Good luck and God Bless!
Greg

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