For the jobseekers... Great blog post on interviewing!

[crispini]

I really enjoyed this article. Hope it will be of use to some of you.

Biz Watch: 5 Job Interview Questions That Mean You’re Not Getting Hired…And One That Means You Are

Over the years I’ve worked for a couple of great companies and a bunch of mediocre to awful ones. Of the skills I developed during this time, one of the few I feel qualified to speak on at length, is the interview process.

I have lost count of the number of interviews I’ve done, both applying to new companies and changing jobs within a company. I can say with confidence that in our capitalist system, job interviews are the most unpleasant, stressful, and awkward part of working, at best a necessary evil.

Many job consultants and guides to the “hidden job market” agree that the best way to find a job is to bypass the interview process altogether by finding someone at a company who can hire you directly. Most people, though, will have to do the interview in order to get in the door.

more....

http://glipress.blogspot.com/2008/12/5-interview-questions-that-mean-youre.html

[Donnachaidh]

1. nowadays you should consider yourself EXTREMELY lucky if you even GET

an interview.

Many are not so lucky. :shrug:

[YOY]

2. Interviewing for a job is like trying to get a date.

The more desperate you are the more likely you will be seen as someone who needs to be rejected.

There are a lot of desperate folks out there...

[Lisa0825]

3. I agree on some points and disagree on others...

First of all, I have been hired by people asking those very questions. Second, some of those questions are very valuable for getting an understanding of the applicant.

Behavioral interview questions are a great way to find out how people react in different situations, solve problems, lead, act in a team, etc. It all depends on what the core of the behavioral question is, and how relevant it is to the job. One of the comments to that blog mentioned "Situation, Task, Action and Response (STAR)" as the best way to answer, and I agree strongly. I often coach people to prep for an interview by thinking about challenges, problems, projects, etc and putting them into words using the STAR method: What was the situation? What was your role? What did you do? What were the results? Having several of those in my memory bank has come in very handy for me several times.

I have had 11 interviews in the last 3 months, and will be starting my new job Monday (YAY!). Every company used behavioral questions. Some were well-done and others not so much. The brilliant one was a job I didn't get, and at the end of the interview, I no longer wanted the job, because it became clear that it was not a good match.

What people tend to forget is that it's not about passing a test or winning or losing to someone else. In the end, it is in the best interest of both the applicant AND the company to have the best match. If you take a job and you're not right for it, you'll be less happy, less productive, and more likely to leave sooner to look for the RIGHT job for you.

I really, really wanted some of the jobs I did not get. For one of them, I think someone else was just more qualified than me. For two others, I don't think I was qualified enough in some key areas, and may not have excelled like I probably will in the job I accepted.

It may be more of a symptom of the bad economy/job market, but it seems to me that there is a rising tide of anti-human resources rep sentiment, and I have seen it here often lately too. That is my field. I'm not a bad person and don't take joy in rejecting anybody. There are skills involved in using interview questions to get the full picture of a candidate. The unfortunate part is that while HR people are usually trained in this, hiring managers in other departments often are not, and they probably don't do the best job of creating the right questions.

[JANdad]

7. As as recruiter...

It has been my experience that "HR" folks, look for ways to screen "out" applicant vs. screen "in" applicants...

I would be happy to expand on this if you care to engage...

[Lisa0825]

8. I'm in Recruitment and I do both.

I screen out folks who do not meet even the minimum requirements for the position, and then I look for folks who would be the best fit for the job.

[Political_Junkie]

4. Great,

now if I could only get an interview! Job prospects not looking good here.

[Chan790]

5. I think it's a mixed bag...

Frankly they lost me when they said to ditch the generic resume and to write a resume tailored to every position you apply for. Clearly, this person has never be unemployed in a bad economy. If you wrote a custom resume for every position you applied for, you could generally get a maximum of 20 resumes/week out if you were doing it right and researching the company and position to find what information you should be including. 20 resumes/week pretty much insures that you'll starve to death before you get a new position, possibly before you get an interview even. I don't need a customized resume for every receptionist job in America because all receptionist jobs are the same and the generalized "I can do this job" receptionist resume suffices.

[Lisa0825]

6. True.... I recommend a different resume for different TYPES of jobs though.

Many people look for different types of jobs at the same time, such as customer service, clerical, management, etc. Those resumes should look different, highlighting different skills.