Gary Will's WORKSEARCH:
Selling Yourself To An Employer
Chapter 9:
Preparing to Answer
From the book How to Prepare for an Employment Interview.
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This book shows you how to sell yourself in an employment interview.
[continued from Chapter 8
] At this point, you've done some research on the organization, and have thought about what they do, who their customers are, why customers use their products or services, and how the organization provides value to their customers.
You've also thought about where you'd fit in and make a contribution -- the specific work you see yourself doing for the organization. You've listed the kind of tasks you'd be performing, the environment you'd be working in, and the skills, knowledge, abilities, and traits that you think are important for success in that kind of work. You have a pretty clear picture of the work you'd be doing, why you'd be good at it, and what you have to offer to the organization.
Now you're ready to begin the most important step in preparing for an interview-figuring out the points that you need to get across to the interviewer, and the most effective ways to make them. You want to take the image you have of succeeding in the job-of the employer benefiting from your work-and transfer it to the interviewer.
You should go into the interview with an agenda. You won't have an answer ready for every question, but you should know what you want to say and then do whatever you can to make sure that these key points are brought up at some point in the interview.
But let me be clear.
THIS DOESN'T MEAN GOING IN WITH A PREPARED SPEECH THAT YOU'RE GOING TO RECITE REGARDLESS OF THE QUESTIONS YOU'RE ASKED.
You must listen to the questions you're asked and to do your best to answer them.
Providing evidence to give your claims credibility
Preparing to answer questions means thinking about the value that you'd bring to the organization that's interviewing you. You want to communicate as forcefully and believably as possible how the employer will benefit from having you as an employee.
The impact your answers have on the interviewer will depend on ...[continued here]
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