How to prepare for a job interview with four simple tips

I’ve been working in the human resources area for almost a year and a half now, and even if this is not a long time, I’ve seen things that I never thought I would see. First of all, giving the economic situation in Portugal, of course there are a lot of people searching for our services; although not all of them have real expectations about the job offers: nowadays, for some reason, many people think they are entitled to get rich really fast, without doing any effort. However, the thing that worries me the most is that I’ve come to the conclusion that most of them are not really prepared for a job interview.

Keep it simple
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Without wanting to disrespect any of the people who have worked with me, I have seen the most innocent mistakes… And the dumbest too! So, I want to give you four simple tips that, in my opinion, will make the difference in a job interview:

Information. Make sure you do some research on the employer. Probably the interviewer will try to understand what you know about them and if you don’t have any idea of what the company does or about their services/ values, it will certainly disappoint the person in front of you. Come on, it’s not like you can’t google it in 10 minutes!

Presentation. I don’t care what they say; your appearance will influence your interview. The moment you walk into a room, they will judge you, even before you open your mouth, you just have to make sure they will look at you and feel comfortable with the way you are dressed. Of course this will depend on the type of employer, but most of the times I would recommend to dress formal, simple and clean.

Study. Of course there are always tricky questions that you can’t avoid or guess, but the interviewers are not reinventing the wheel. Questions like “tell us about yourself” “what are your main skills and qualities” “how are you going to contribute to our team?” among others, are very common and you can always study your speech in advance. Practice in front of the mirror, if that works for you! 

Punctuality.  BE THERE ON TIME. I don’t care if you didn’t sleep very well, if there was too much traffic, if your car broke down or even if there was an earthquake or any other natural disaster. If this was Pompeii and you wanted the job, you would be there on time. This will show the interviewers that you are a responsible, reliable and committed professional. Since these meetings are organized in advance, you can use Google again (just get out of Facebook for a minute!) and search the best way to get there by car, public transportation or even by foot, just don’t get there sweating.

Once you are there, just breath and do your best to impress! I also want to give you some tips on what to do and how to act during an interview and even after that, but for now you can start with these ones! I will return to this subject later, we have plenty of time! 

Your TopCrusher,

Daniela