{"id":11702,"date":"2016-08-26T09:54:05","date_gmt":"2016-08-26T09:54:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/?p=11702"},"modified":"2016-08-26T10:20:15","modified_gmt":"2016-08-26T10:20:15","slug":"top-ten-interview-tips","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/blog\/top-ten-interview-tips\/","title":{"rendered":"Top Ten Interview Tips"},"content":{"rendered":"

Interviews can always be a scary prospect. They\u2019re full of doubt, egotistical nonsense about yourself and of course the inevitable anxiety afterwards, just like your university interview<\/a>. Well no need to worry, we\u2019ve compiled a list of ten top tips to help you in your next interview:<\/p>\n

Dress Well
\n<\/u><\/strong>We start with a fairly obvious one, dress code. It\u2019s a well-known unwritten rule of interviews that turning up in a t-shirt isn\u2019t going to cut it. The best thing to do when going to an interview is to wear a suit (for men) and a shirt\/blouse with trousers\/smart skirt for girls. If you are told to wear a t-shirt to your interview, adhere to their wishes. There is a common consensuses that you can\u2019t really overdress for an interview, but you can underdress, so if you\u2019ve been asked to wear something specific, it\u2019s best to do so.<\/p>\n

Research
\n<\/u><\/strong>It\u2019s always best to research the company that you\u2019re visiting, you probably would have done this when you were writing your application (As you had to do with that dreaded UCAS application<\/a>). Check out the company website, see if they\u2019ve got an application in the app store and read their about us page. Check out their company directors and check out their recent activities. The longer that you spend researching the more you\u2019ll learn, this will definitely set you apart from the competition, employers have more interest in people who know a lot about their company and what they\u2019re doing. The more you know the better!<\/p>\n

Have Your Questions Ready
\n<\/u><\/strong>Employers like people that ask questions. Maybe you\u2019ve got a question on the company\u2019s recent activities and if there is something that you\u2019re not sure of, then ask them, employers are more than happy to answer any questions that you have. Don\u2019t be afraid to ask questions about pay too, after all – it\u2019s the reason you\u2019re there. Questions that go unanswered means you\u2019re not going to get the answer when you need it. There\u2019s no good turning up for the interview, getting the job and then finding out that it\u2019s not what you wanted. Clarify certain points too and don’t be afraid to ask them to explain something if you\u2019re unsure. Employers prefer honesty (See below).<\/p>\n

USP
\n<\/u><\/strong>USP stands for U<\/strong>nique S<\/strong>elling P<\/strong>oint. This is something about yourself that makes you stand out from the competition. Something about you that no one else could possibly replicate, there is something about all of us that people are unable to recreate and during an interview you\u2019ll want to highlight this as much as possible, but sadly, only you can know what your USP is\u2026<\/p>\n

Positives
\n<\/u><\/strong>Be positive, don\u2019t ever talk about a negative subject. If what you\u2019re talking about is negative then say what you need to say but add a positive conclusion to it, something like \u201c I learned a lot from this experience and this made me a better person because \u2018x\u2019\u201d. This will really help you out in the long run because employers really don\u2019t want to add a negative attitude to their business. The more positive you are the more likely people are to hire you.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t Bad Mouth Ex Employers
\n<\/u><\/strong>No we\u2019re not talking about swearing (Although you definitely shouldn\u2019t do that either), no, we\u2019re talking about the same point as before; don\u2019t be negative about previous employment. The last place you worked could be Hell on Earth itself, the very personification of Hell itself, but that doesn\u2019t matter. Don\u2019t at any point discredit your former workplace, you have to remain positive, if in doubt, see the previous point of making a negative point that is outweighed by a positive.<\/p>\n

CV – Bringing Your Resume
\n<\/u><\/strong>You\u2019d be surprised just how many people don\u2019t bring their CV to their interview. Most people believe that if they\u2019ve sent it out to companies already then there is no need to bring it along again. Wrong! You should always have it with you, it shows that you’re prepared for the worst if they do forget it, you have a spare copy for them. Also, as strange as it may sound, keep reading it, you might want to familiarise yourself, with previous achievements and quickly highlight what it is that you feel you may need to mention in your interview.<\/p>\n

Body Language
\n<\/u><\/strong>Body language is always difficult to get right. What a lot of people do is matchback. Matchback is where you mimic the things your interviewer does, if your interviewer talks slowly then you do the same, or if they cross their legs then you do the same. All of which is fine – but within reason. If your interviewer crosses their arms, it\u2019s best not do that, it shows you\u2019re uninterested. If you aren\u2019t interested in matchback, then we recommend that you sit with your arms open and ready to listen. We also recommend that any points that you may have, make sure to emphasise with your hands. This shows that you\u2019re passionate about what you\u2019re talking about.<\/p>\n

Be Honest
\n<\/u><\/strong>Employers really do appreciate it if you are honest about the things that you can and can\u2019t do. Don\u2019t pretend that you know how to use an accounting software if you\u2019ve never even heard of it. Don\u2019t pretend that you have experience in something if you don\u2019t either. It really is just best to be honest, even in the interview too. If you don\u2019t understand something, you won\u2019t lose points for getting them to explain it in more detail; if anything you\u2019ll lose points for lying, because you won\u2019t know exactly what you\u2019re doing when you get to the job. Lying really is something not to do in an interview.<\/p>\n

Your Weaknesses
\n<\/u><\/strong>Often interviewers will ask you to list something that is bad about yourself. A common mistake that people make when they\u2019re asked to list their faults is to list a good thing disguised as a weakness. Confused? By this we mean things like \u201cI\u2019m a terrible perfectionist\u201d. It\u2019s a stupid weakness because it not only is you trying and failing quite miserably at being modest, it also shows that you haven\u2019t understood the interviewer\u2019s question, it is actually a fault because it shows that you don\u2019t really hit deadlines on time because you\u2019re spending time faffing about on something that doesn\u2019t need it. The best thing to say is something along the lines of \u201cI tend to get bogged down in detail, but I\u2019m making a real effort with that<\/strong>\u201d, it shows that you have actually understood the question, it\u2019s an issue that you feel needs addressing and you have a solution too.<\/p>\n

Just remember that the interviewer wants to see you and they\u2019re there to learn about you and see what you have to say. Just be yourself and you\u2019ll be just fine.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re looking for more student related articles that can help you, then check out University Compare<\/a><\/span>, a university comparison website that compares over 36,000 courses across 425 institutes.<\/p>\n

Thanks for reading and good luck!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Interviews can always be a scary prospect. They\u2019re full of doubt, egotistical nonsense about yourself and of course the inevitable anxiety afterwards, just like your university interview. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11704,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42,45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview-tips","category-students-and-graduate-tips"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11702"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11702\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11710,"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11702\/revisions\/11710"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.studentemploymentservices.co.uk\/staging\/3440\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}