Land Your Next Job With This Advanced Interview Technique.

I have interviewed hundreds, if not thousands of candidates during my time in HR, and it's never ceased to amaze me how incredibly talented and experienced people are...

...but not in interviews! 

If I'm honest, I'd say at least 85% of "professionals" are NOT great at interviews. 

Senior roles, junior roles, mid level roles. Even people who think they are great, it didn’t matter.  Most of them were average.

Chances are, you're likely one of them - ouch!

Why?

It's rare you get taught how to interview well.

Think about it, you invest thousands of dollars completing certificates, degrees, masters, PhD's, but how much time have you spent learning the one thing that actually gets you the job?

Very few people have invested in becoming experts in interviews. 

I'm about to share one critical aspect of interviewing that is absolutely the secret sauce. 

It’s one of many fundamental techniques I explore in the Career Accelerator Program, a program that will unlock the job market for you.

If you're interested, you can get on the waitlist here >>> Career Accelerator Program

In an upcoming newsletter I'll cover more of these techniques, including how to influence the hiring manager, but for now, let me ask you something:

Have you ever gone to a party and felt like you arrived at a place filled with strangers or was it a welcoming place of 'your kinda people'?

Interviews are similar.   You often have no idea what you're turning up to but of course you want the person hiring you to feel like you belong in their team, and that you would be a great person to be around.  That you'd be someone that would elevate the workplace.

To make this happen, we first have to cover the basics. 

This is the S.T.A.R methodology. 

It stands for:

Situation - what was the situation you were facing?

Task - what was the task, problem or challenge you were responsible for?

Action - what actions did you personally take?

Result - what was the result of your actions?

This has been ‘the way’ to answer behavioural questions, but only using this lets most people down. 

Why?

You’re actually being rated against a hidden criteria. 

If you don't know the criteria hiring managers are using to rate you, you'll simply not rate well.

You'll do your best to respond in the STAR framework, but instead of providing answers directly ticking all the right boxes (to their hidden criteria), you'll come across as either...

Waffling, off-topic or too brief.

Some hiring managers will try and help you, asking you more questions to give you opportunities to improve.  But being asked further questions usually makes you feel nervous like you've got it wrong. 

Other hiring managers won't help you at all, they will simply move on.  You'll walk away wondering if you did well at all. 

The worst outcome is when you couldn't provide an example or didn't follow the STAR framework at all. 

(If you've ever gone blank in an interview you'll know how excruciating it feels). 

You need to know their criteria...

The STAR methodology is simply a conversation structure or framework.

The criteria they’re actually rating you on is what I call the candidates 'Optimal Operating Mode'. 

In essence, it's how well you:

1. Understand and define the challenge
2. Assess the impact
3. Consider options
4. Utilise resources
5. Take action

The STAR methodology, if used in the right way, will show the hiring manager your optimal operating mode, and will give them first hand evidence of it in action.

But 95% of the time this element is missing in your answer, which is why you’re not winning the job.

Let me break it down. 

Let’s choose a common behavioural based question ‘theme’ such as ‘Delegation’. 

The interviewer might ask you this question: 

“Tell me about a time you successfully delegated a large project to your team.  What challenges did you face and what was the outcome”?

Now, before you launch into the situation, task, action and result standard way of answering, we need to get clear on...

The challenge: You can't be the one to do 'everything' in your role, you'll need to delegate to be effective. The benefit of delegating is that others have the opportunity to learn and grow. 

The options: You have several people who you could delegate to, some that won't be suited, some that won't have capacity, and some that won't want to.  You need to decide who is the best fit. 

The impact: Giving it to some people might help build their skills whilst others already have those skills, but some may take longer than required. If you have deadlines you need to meet, you need to show how you work through balancing these driving factors.

Utilise resources: You might teach the team what they need to do, or you might pair that person with someone who is already skilled.

Take actions: If you simply hand over the task to someone who isn't skilled in this area, you'll likely drive a bad outcome. However, if you coordinate resources to drive the best outcome, you monitor progress and support where necessary, you'll likely drive a much better outcome.

When you’re designing your answer, regardless of the example, you need talk through your optimal operating mode otherwise you're answer is likely to be...

…mediocre. 

This is why people with less experience are winning jobs over you. 

You have to talk through those 5 things in your answer which allows the interviewers a glimpse into your ‘optimal operating mode’ and shows them how you will actually perform in the role. 

When you nail those, that is when you ‘wow’ and your phone starts pinging! 

Sounds a lot, I know, but once you have this framework down, you can answer ANYTHING confidently, even when you don’t know what the exact questions are going to be.  

In the Career Hack section below, I’ll guide you step by step into how to find out what questions you’ll likely be asked so keep reading!