How is it that some people seem to breeze through job interviews and are routinely successful, while others, who are just as capable, struggle to do themselves justice?
What lessons can be learnt from those who are more successful in job interviews? Can you increase the likelihood of securing an offer, and if so, how?
I came across some useful insights in Julia Yates’s ‘The Career Coaching Handbook’. Yates says ‘Successful candidates can be characterised in terms of their personalities and the specific behaviour they demonstrate within the interview.‘
Let’s take a look at Personality and Behaviour in more detail.
Personality
Yates draws on research undertaken by Kyl-Heku and Buss 1996, who identified within the Big 5 Personality Traits that candidates with the traits of extraversion and conscientiousness, do better at interview. It’s probably no surprise that extroverts perform well in these situations. They’re comfortable with social interactions and are more likely to present as enthusiastic and relaxed. They talk more and are better at coping with stressful situations. Those who also have conscientiousness as a trait take time to prepare and research before the interview. The investment in preparation in turn feeds confidence, so can be a winning trait combination.
Of course you may now be interested to learn what your Big 5 personality traits are. You can complete a FREE questionnaire here.
But what if you don’t share the traits of extroversion or conscientiousness? Is it game over in the job interview?
I’m not suggesting as a natural introvert that you act as if you were an extrovert in an interview situation – that would feel uncomfortable for you and strange for the panel. However, undertaking thorough planning and preparation for an interview, whether conscientiousness is a natural trait or not, can help to build your confidence ahead of the interview.
Behaviour
Yates also explores specific interview behaviour. Whilst you may be familiar with different kinds of interview questions (see my post on this topic), you may not be aware that recruiters may be looking for evidence of ‘organizational citizenship’, something Podsakoff et al 2011 explored in their research: ‘Effects of organisational citizenship behaviours on selection decisions in employment interviews‘.
Three of the key elements of organizational citizenship are helping, voice and loyalty.
What do these behaviours mean?
Helping is your willingness to go above and beyond to help your colleagues or clients with work or solving problems.
Voice is how you contribute ideas which would benefit your organisation, even when others may not agree with you.
Loyalty describes how you demonstrate the ways in which you put the needs and reputation of your organisation above the needs of the individual.
By understanding that employers value these behaviours, consider how you might weave these into competency-based questions in your interview preparation. Behaviours are not the same as skills. But they do capture how you used a behaviour skilfully to achieve a positive impact or outcome. Your response to skills-based questions will be richer as a result.
STAR
Write out your response to a competency-based question taking a skill highlighted in the Person Specification. Use the STAR framework- see my previous post for how to use STAR. See whether you can weave in one of the behaviours above into your example.
These three behaviours are certainly not the exclusive preserve of extroverts. If you are an introvert, however, you’ll need to become comfortable in owning your achievements. Simply describe the impact of what you did (quantify or qualify with an example). There is no need to exaggerate or embellish your accomplishments with unnecessary superlatives; your achievements will speak for themselves.
One important key to success is self-confidence. An important key to self-confidence is preparation.
Arthur Ashe
