Most interviewers don’t do a stress-based interview. In fact, most interviewers know you are going to be nervous in the interview and are trying to put you at ease. But occasionally, you will encounter a stress-based interview. There are three versions of this: The negative interview, The in-basket exercise or case interview, and The brainteaser … Continue reading
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How Busking Made me a Better Interviewer
How Busking is Like a Job Interview In my secret other life, I am a musician. (Or, at least until I had a baby, wrote a book, and starting working a second part-time job, I was a musician.) I have two CDs out and used to perform in coffeehouses, festivals, and bars. I used to … Continue reading
The Interview Process for Tenure-Track Faculty
The Academic Job Search: Faculty If there is any career where you can be “voted off the island,” it is as a college professor. Both of my parents are college professors, and I recently had a great conversation with my dad about the hiring process for tenure-track faculty in colleges and universities. The process … Continue reading
How do I prepare for a Skype interview?
As the cost of travel rises and Skype is becoming more and more commonly used, people are increasingly having long-distance interviews via Skype. An in-person interview is still probably preferable, but if your prospective employer can’t reimburse your travel costs, you are still at least able to be seriously under consideration if you can interview … Continue reading
The employer didn’t get back to me. What should I do?
It seems that 99% of the time, employers say they will get back to you within a certain time frame, and then they don’t. There are two possible reasons for this: 1. They are short-staffed and just can’t get all the decision-makers together to make a hiring decision, so they haven’t decided who to hire yet; … Continue reading
Questions to Ask During Informational Interviews
I always harp on job seekers to do informational interviews. These meetings are essential in building up your personal network and expanding on your knowledge of organizations in your chosen field. But what are you supposed to talk about during your half hour to an hour chat with a professional in your field? It’s firstly … Continue reading
Weakness, Schmeakness
When is a weakness a strength? There are many cases where a strength might be a weakness in disguise. As a classic example, if someone is in the field of accounting, their weakness might be that they sometimes pay so much attention to details that they lose sight of the big picture. This weakness, in … Continue reading
Public Speaking: Stand & Deliver
I’ve been coaching candidates for the Presidential Management Fellowship’s in-person assessment lately, and one part of the assessment process is a 5-minute policy presentation which each candidate must deliver in front of a panel of judges. Public speaking is, for many people, scarier than watching Aliens while on PCP. Scarier than jumping out of a … Continue reading
Handling illegal interview questions
One of my job-seeking clients recently had an interview in which the employer asked her a question about her race/ethnicity. It was for a position that required a lot of cross-cultural understanding, and my guess is that the employer wanted to know whether the candidate had the cross-cultural skills needed for the job. However, employers … Continue reading
Did you get a job offer? Or just a nice conversation?
Once in a while, I hear from a job seeker who has a very nice conversation with an employer, and hears something like “When can you start?” or “I think you’ll fit in well here.” These sound like job offers, but they are not necessarily job offers. It is quite dangerous to make an assumption … Continue reading
