Preparing for an interview can be a nerve wracking experience. Fortunately, there are some ways to prep for it which will let you ace the interview. While these may seem like strange pre-interview routines, they actually do work and will help you to land the job of your dreams:
Look at Facebook
This is actually two strategies in one. First of all, check your Facebook profile out and make sure that your own profile is set to private and there are no embarrassing photos of you tagged on the site. If there are, untag yourself from those photos and ask your friends if they would please refrain from tagging you. If possible, get the photos taken down. Double check as well that status updates you’ve posted aren’t embarrassing. If they are, delete them.
While this won’t completely remove the record of those photos, it does make it harder to find. That in turn means if you ace the interview, your interviewer is less likely to find embarrassing material online which will make them think twice about calling you back for a second interview.
The second half of this technique is to find out the name of the person who will be interviewing you and look up their Facebook profile. Get as much information as you can about the person since this will be helpful to you to throw into the conversation when you are meeting with them. Showing an interest in something the person is interested in is a sure way to get yourself remembered out of the hundreds of interviews the hiring manager has to conduct.
Prepare a Folder to Fiddle With
Yeah, it sounds strange, but this is a great pre-interview technique that can come in handy. Often, you will be asked to wait for a few minutes before your interview. Most times, it’s just because the person interviewing you is busy or wants to make you feel as if you aren’t the most important person for them to meet. However, on occasion, this is actually a test. They will secretly observe you to see what you do when you are waiting to be interviewed. If you have a folder with your papers in it, you can spend the time appearing to organize yourself so you ace that test.
Put Water Behind Your Ears & On Your Wrists
This is actually something to do just before the interview. Duck into the bathroom and dab a few drops of water behind the ears and on your wrists. These are areas where you have major arteries and some experts claim by putting water in those locations you can help to calm your nerves by cooling down quickly.
Write a List
This one is actually not such a strange pre-interview routine, but it does work wonders. You’ll inevitably be asked to tell the interviewer about your proudest achievements, your best qualities and your worst qualities. Most people just wing it when they walk into the interview. However, since you know these things are likely to come up, pre-empt them by making yourself a list of things you can answer. Just make sure to pause for a moment when answering so it appears natural and not rehearsed. Speaking of that…
Rehearse in Front of a Mirror
While a common pre-interview routine is to rehearse by having a friend or family member go through a mock interview with you, a strange pre-interview technique which actually does work wonders is to rehearse on your own in front of a mirror. Your face will often speak louder than your words, so you want to take the time to make sure when you answer questions, you don’t telegraph you aren’t comfortable answering those questions. By rehearsing in front of a mirror, you can avoid that problem completely.
[This article was originally posted on an earlier date.]
Ted Hekman is the CEO of ResumeBucket.com, a FREE online resume storage service that also has one of the largest collections of sample resumes on the internet.
Read more » articles by this approved career expert | Click here » if you’re a career expert
Photo credit: Shutterstock
About Ted Hekman
Nice tips. I think this will benefit a lot of people, myself included. I wanted to ask about the Facebook section: doesn’t setting your profile to private (only your friends can view) disallow any potential employers from seeing tagged pics and status updates to your wall? I’m just curious as to how they could see pics or status updates if it was properly set to private? If that’s the case, I will need to untag many pics ;) thanks!
I love these tips on interviews. Even if I do not make use of all of them, I feel better prepared and sort of “coached” through something that is difficult for most of us. Knowing I have this arsenal of tricks and tips to draw from gives me courage. From long before the interview starts to follow through, you have touched on everything, and I cannot thank you enough.
well im here trying to get my self together so that i can get off the streets going from house to house im tired so please help me i need a job and a place to live i need a roof over my head so please help me thank you very much
MIchelle,
Stay in touch with those people who can help you the most. You will land a job.Take advantage of all the resources avaliable to you and ask what is out there. There are so many most of us are not aware of. Best of luck to you.
These are good tips. I’m going to re-tweet this because I just wrote about this topic for a friend of mine who was looking for interview tips:
http://www.workmercs.com/2011/05/3-indispensable-books-that-will-prepare-you-for-your-next-interview/
I’ve also heard the “have a drink before you go into an interview” tip. Thoughts? My big concern would be having booze breath for the interview.
Well, as good as that might sound to just have a quick drink, it wouldn’t be a very smart move. If I was hiring someone and I smelled alcohol on them, I wouldn’t give the second interview. If they need alcohol for the interview then they might think its alright to get a few sips during work. Nope.
OMG! WHICH PLANET ARE YOU COMING FROM!
I’d say Alcooner comes from a calm, wise, and logical planet.
The facebook thing is PRE-judging someone and it is not right. I don’t want to go onto FACEBOOK and find out what I can about the person interviewing me What? Am I looking for dirty laundry like you suggest the interviewer is just seraching and searching for dirty laundry on the part of the applicant? Do you really think the person giving the interview has TIME to go through FACEBOOK and look at pictures? What happened to keeping Job life seperate from personal life? LIke I care if my boss has some silly pic up of him singing with a KISS band look-a-like and he has his tounge sticking out. That should not bother anyone since it is NOT RELATED TO THE JOB HE HAS. Same thing for a job applicant. Don’t judge ‘em based on their PERSONAL LIFE. Judge them on if they can do the job.
Everything else is fine.
I think Ted was suggesting that you make sure your own Facebook page is set to private so that a potential employer isn’t snooping around in your personal life and pre-judging you. I completely agree.
First, separate is spelled ‘separate.’ Second, Yes, employers DO take the time to look at facebook and your personal life. They’ll learn more about you that way than during a one-time interview.
I have checked the Facebook profiles of prospective employees.