Common Interview Question: What Do You Expect from a Supervisor?

“Candy. Lots and lots of candy.”

After working for some of your life, you probably expect nothing from your supervisor. Nothing good anyway. Most people in a management position get there by either sucking up or receiving an education that makes them no more qualified to lead than a high school dropout. The ability to work with people is not a skill that can be taught in the classroom.

Still, interviewers like to ask what you expect from your bosses and supervisors. They do so for the following reasons:

• They want to see if you have reasonable expectations for company leadership.
• They want to see if you use this as an opportunity to complain about previous supervisors.

The last part is tricky. When applicant start to talk about what you expect from supervisors, they often say the things they hadn’t received from their last supervisor, like praise or fairness. Don’t fall into that trap.

How to Answer

The best way to answer is to focus on the good qualities of the last supervisor you had (no matter how much you disliked them) and stay away from anything that could imply you didn’t like a previous supervisor.

Bad Answer

“I expect supervisors to be fair and level headed. I expect them to make competent decisions and not blame me for things I didn’t do. I also expect them to reward employees based on production, and not based on who sucks up the most.”

Notice how this makes it look like you experienced these examples of mistreatment in the past. You do not want to give that impression.

Good Answer

“My last supervisor had a lot of qualities I appreciated. She would often ask for my opinion and thoughts on the best course of action before I started on a project. She would also schedule regular check ins with me to ensure we were on the same page, and every once in a while we would enjoy a conversation over coffee over my future projects and responsibilities. I hope that any supervisor I have shares those qualities.”

By keeping the focus on what you liked about your previous supervisor, you ensure that it doesn’t sound like you are complaining, and you reinforce the idea that these qualities are realistic, since you are pointing to a specific person in your recent past and saying “she did it, so I expect it from others.”

Take Away Interview Tips

• Keep the focus on your last supervisor.
• Only discuss the positive qualities they had.

Marketing Interview Question: How Effectively Do You Think You Can Work Within Current Budgetary Constraints?

Your ability to do your job is always a part of any job interview. Within marketing – although really within a lot of fields – your job will be affected by the amount of money the company has available to invest in the work that you do. When budgets play a role in what strategies you can use, the company may wonder or worry that you might struggle with the amount of funding they have available.

How to Answer

There are two ways to answer questions about working within budgetary constraints. The first is to discuss possible strategies you can enact. The second is to tell a story about a time when you worked within extremely difficult budgetary restraints. Only tell a story if you have a good story to tell, and make sure the budget you are describing is even less than the budget you will be offered by the new employer.

Bad Answer

“Depends. How much is available? I have a few ideas but I don’t know how effective they’ll be yet.”

Good Answer

“Most of the marketing strategies I plan on implementing are either free or involve negligible financial commitment. Thanks to various SEO marketing and social media marketing techniques, I foresee no problems improving brand awareness on a limited budget, and I have a few cost effective direct mail marketing ideas as well, based on some successful in depth targeting philosophies I have acquired at my previous organization.”

This is the type of answer that breeds more confidence. You should supply the employer with enough information that they have no trouble believing you can achieve what you claim you can achieve.

Take Away Interview Tips

• Answer in a way that gives the employer confidence in your abilities.
• Share a story, if applicable.

Interview Question: What Do You Know About Our Competitors?

Where a company stands in the market is important to the company and you. The company cares because their long term outlook depends on either offering a better product or marketing their product better. You care because a company that fairs poorly may not last very long if the other companies manage to show consumers why their products are more effective.

Companies often ask applicants what they know about competitors for three reasons:

• It tells them how much research the applicant performed.
• It tells them how much knowledge the applicant has in that type of product.
• It tells them if they understand the product, by how they compare it to competitors.

How to Answer

You should research the major competitors of the company in order to have a solid answer to this question. Try your best to learn about the competitor’s products as well. When you answer, try to focus on the following:

• Specific feature differences and similarities.
• Projects/improvements in the pipeline.
• Market share and possibly marketing tactics of the company.
• Performance of the product and reviews.

Your answer should avoid the following:

• Simply listing facts and names that show no deeper knowledge.
• Saying anything negative about the company you are applying for.
• Hinting that another company may be better.

Bad Answer

“I know that your lead competitor, OpposiTech, offers a product called the ‘EyeSoar’ that offers similar functionality. I also know that they offer 3 other products and they have a lot of the market.”

These are just listing facts. It is not that impressive an answer.

Good Answer

“From what I have researched, OpposiTech offers the most competitive program to your own. Their software has slightly greater functionality, including the ability to gauge user trends, but their program is not considered user friendly and would take about 3 years of reprogramming to improve ease of use. On the other hand, it appears that your product has the functionality in the pipeline for later this year, so I suspect their share of the market will decrease dramatically before their Ui upgrade is out.”

Here you show much greater knowledge of the product. This is an in depth answer that shows you not only did your research, but you also compared and contrasted, and are intelligent enough to do so effectively.

Take Away Interview Tips

• I forgot to write anything here.

How College Graduates Can Improve Their Job Search Strategies

College is over. You’re done. That’s it. Maybe you go back someday, but you probably won’t. It’s time to start working, and while you are ready to take on the challenges of entering the corporate world, it’s not that easy to get there.

You know about resumes and cover letters. What you don’t know is that they account for only 33% of all jobs. 33%. For those that sucked at math, that’s 1/3^rd. The other 2/3rds of jobs are given to people that found them using other job search methods. So the one method you know (resumes) is barely even a good way to get a job.

Other Ways and Low Expectations

You’re not the only person that was planning on finding a job using a standard resume/cover letter. In fact, almost all recent graduates use nothing more than a resume to try to find work. The job market does not expect much else from college graduates, since college graduates only know this one method of applying for jobs.

You can use that to your advantage. Employers have very low expectations for college graduates. If you are one of the few/only graduates that tries to find a job using some other method, you will instantly stand out against your competition. Use that to your advantage.

Other ways to find jobs include:

• Networking

Yeah, it’s annoying, but professional networking is the number one way people find employment. Attend conferences and events that relate to your field, hob nob with annoying fat men that make 3 times what you plan on making and give out business cards to anyone you meet. The more you network, the better your chances of getting a job, and if you can network successfully as a recent graduate, you will be in a far better position than your competitors.

• Ask Your Buddies

You probably have friends that are already working. Ask them if their companies have any open positions. Referrals from friends is simply using your network to your advantage, and a good way to get a job at some great companies.

• Cold Contact

The standard resume/cover letter strategy involves finding a job description and applying for the job. However, you don’t need to wait for a job to open to apply. Send in your resume and a cold contact cover letter to companies that interest you. When a job opens, you can potentially be considered before the description is posted.

You are in a unique position. Most other college graduates only use the resume/cover letter method of applying to jobs. By simply using these other methods, you immediately stand out in ways your competition doesn’t.

Take Away Interview Tips

• Network
• Cold Contact
• Ask Friends

Common Interview Question: Have You Had Any Questions Come Up Since the Last Interview?

We mention time and time again that it is important to ask questions at your job interview. As long as your questions are intelligent and make the interviewer think, they are good questions. You can ask questions in the beginning, the middle, at the end of your interview – you can even ask questions with your interview answers. There may be a difference between good and bad questions, but as long as the question is good, it will always benefit your shot at employment.

That said, there are a few ways to improve your chances a little bit more. If you are invited to a second interview, and you are asked if any questions have come up, some questions will give you even more bonus points than others.

How to Answer

Obviously you can ask any question you want here. However, the best questions are going to be as follows:

• Questions that show you researched the products further.
• Questions that show you researched the position further.
• Questions that show you researched the company culture further.

These three types of questions are best. You benefit less from questions that came up BECAUSE of the last interview, because the interviewer may wonder why you didn’t ask at your first interview or during the thank you letter. Also, questions that are unrelated to either the first interview or further research can be saved for a more opportune time. The three examples above are the best types of questions to ask.

Bad Answer

“A few. Can you tell me more about [something that they said last interview or random, unrelated question]?”

Good Answer

“A few. Can you tell me more about [something you researched between interviews, either about the company, its culture, or its products]?”

Take Away Interview Tips

• Good questions will always be good questions.
• However, if you are asked about questions that came up during the last interview, there are better questions you can ask.

Management Interview Question: Tell Me About a Time You Disagreed with a Subordinate

Once you’ve reached management level, there is a good chance you have enjoyed several years of work experience that the interviewer can ask you about. That is why management interviews often have a lot of behavioral questions.

As a manager, your leadership skills are going to be tested often, so you can expect some behavioral interview questions about your interaction with subordinates. Answer them carefully.

How to Answer

No matter how you traditionally manage, you need to make sure you sound like a fair and loving boss. You should not talk like you are wiser or more experienced. Instead, share a story about calm and measured disagreement, what you learned, and how the company benefitted. Or, if you caught an employee doing something illegal or slacking off, you can talk about that disagreement as well.

Try to call your subordinates something nicer too like “team members” or “staff.”

Bad Answer

“One time my subordinate came to me and refused to do a project. She and I had an argument in the middle of the workplace. Needless to say I fired her.”

This doesn’t really make you look like an outstanding boss. No story that ends with you getting your way just because you’re the boss is a good story.

Good Answer

“Often I would walk into my team member’s office and find that he was spending time on social networking sites instead of working. We had a discussion about the time he spent on his projects. It started as a disagreement, but I realized that he wasn’t wasting time for the purposes of wasting time. He was wasting time because he would get done extremely quickly and efficiently, and he would run out of projects and get bored. Rather than reprimand him, I started finding him more work to do, and he became one of our most productive employees.”

This is a disagreement, but only in the beginning. By the end of the story you have shared a tale that makes you look like someone that recognizes brilliance and communicates well with subordinates. These kinds of stories are much better for your employment chances.

Take Away Interview Tips

• Look for stories that make you look intelligent and fair.
• Stay away from sounding too dominant, but try not to sound weak either.
• Always remain positive.

How to Hold a Mock Interview, Part 4

These last few posts, we have discussed why to hold a mock interview and how to do so in order to benefit you the most before your actual job interview. Now we’d like to offer you some closing thoughts on why these mock interviews are so effective.

Psychological Theory of Habituation

Mock interviews build one of the most well-known theories in psychology: Habituation

Habituation is when a stimulus (in this case, the interview) evokes less response because you are used to its presence. Habituation happens every day with humans and animals alike. You were probably nervous the first time you drove a car after you got your license, but then you got used to driving and it became less stressful. That’s habituation. You may have been nervous on the first day of a new job, but over time that nervousness went away. That’s habituation.

By holding all of these mock interviews, especially if you take the time to simulate an actual job interview, you become more used to the interview process, and while you will always be nervous, the degree of nervousness will be less because you have habituated to what being in a job interview is like.

Mock Interviews are a Great Preparation Tool

Researching the company and planning out as many interview answers as you can are two of the most crucial ways to prepare for the job interview. Both of those vastly improve your chances of getting the job.

Yet while they do a great job preparing you for the individual components of a job interview, they do little to prepare you for the actual stress and pressure of the job interview experience. Mock interviews solve that problem, by providing you with an interview simulation that allows you to get used to the interview process so that it has less of an effect on your abilities. They are a tool that may not be vital, but will go a long way to reducing your interview mistakes.

Take Away Interview Tips

• Mock interviews are great.
• They are better the more you simulate a real interview.

How to Hold a Mock Interview, Part 3

Over the last few posts we have gone over some of the many reasons to hold mock interviews, and who to select as your mock interviewer. Today, we will start looking at the best way to conduct a great mock interview.

Any Mock Interview Is Better Than None

Once again, it is important to note that any mock interview is better than no mock interview. So if you can’t find someone that will agree to all of the tips below, it is still beneficial to do a mock interview anyway. Mock interviews of any kind will help prepare you for the experience of being in a real job interview. All of the advice below is simply designed to improve that preparation.

Prepare Lots of Questions – Both You and the Interviewer

You should prepare as many questions as possible for your job interviewer, ideally on notecards that they can look through. However, your questions are not enough. You should also have the mock interviewer prepare questions of their own, based on the job description, the company, the type of job, and common interview questions both in general and in the field. You don’t want to only use questions you have prepared for, so that you can simulate the experience of answering questions you have not prepared for.

As many questions as you can come up with the better. At least 100 questions if possible. You do not need to answer all of the questions at the mock interview. Rather, the interviewer can pick questions out at random, so that you never know which questions are coming next. You cannot prepare for every question in the actual interview, or the order of each question, and this method is the best way for preparing for the real interview experience.

Additional Mock Interview Tips

• Introduce yourself, shake hands, etc.

You should be simulating every aspect of the real interview. That includes introductions, talking about the weather, and more.

• Come dressed up

In order to best simulate the actual interview, you (and possibly your interviewer, if they are willing) should be dressed up in job interview clothes. You want to experience the same discomfort that you will experience at the actual interview to prepare for the feelings you will have throughout.

• Give your interviewer a list of things to look for

Throughout this website you will find hundreds of interview tips for a successful interview. Write a lot of them down and give them to the mock interviewer. Have them look to make sure that you are successfully doing the things you are supposed to be doing, and avoiding the things that you are supposed to be avoiding. This includes things like posture, crossing your arms, etc.

• Use a business space

See if you can find a room that looks and feels like the room you may get your interview. Again, the more your mock interview experience simulates the actual interview, the more prepared you will be.

• Hold new interviews over and over again

If possible, don’t stop after just one interview. Hold a new interview again, shaking hands, introducing yourself, sitting down and getting asked random questions.

In the next post, we’ll add some closing thoughts about these mock interview tips and why they are so effective.

Take Away Interview Tips

• Simulate the real interview experience as best you can.
• Have the interviewer come up with questions of their own.

How to Hold a Mock Interview, Part 2

Last post we discussed some of the benefits of conducting mock interviews. Mock interviews can be an important tool for:

• Reducing the stress of job interviews.
• Learning how to speak your answers clearly and confidently.
• Getting feedback from the interviewer without a job on the line.

In this post, we will discuss who you should choose to conduct your mock interview so that you receive the greatest benefits.

Does it Matter?

No, not really. You can choose anyone to give you your mock interview and you will still receive many of the benefits. However, if you can find an interviewer that has any (or all) of the following qualities, you are more likely to get the benefits you want from the interview.

• Someone Honest and Perceptive

Mock interviews allow you to benefit from feedback, so you don’t want an interviewer that is not going to pay much attention or is not going to give you criticism. You want someone that can tell you what you did well and where you need to improve. Ideally, it should be someone intelligent whose judgment you trust, and who has a good understanding of both people and business. Your dumb, clueless high school friend that you keep around for giggles is not going to be as good a mock interviewer.

• Someone Older

If you are a younger business professional, you may want to try to find a mock interviewer that is older than you, to help simulate the experience of the actual interviewer. Interviewers are rarely in their early 20’s, and part of the mock interview is to prepare you for the actual interview environment. Someone with a lot of work experience is going to simulate that feeling better.

• Someone Less Comfortable

Not everyone chooses to go this route, but it can be extremely beneficial. Interviewing with someone whom you are not that comfortable is a good way to simulate the job interview experience. A good choice would be a family friend that you barely know but are on good terms with. The less comfortable you feel in the mock interview, the more you will get used to the discomfort in the actual job interview.

• Someone Intelligent and Confident

We briefly mentioned this before, but it’s usually a good idea to interview with someone that is both intelligent and confident – someone that is going to represent the same qualities that the interviewer has. Dumb, shy people don’t usually make good interviewers. Most likely your interviewer is going to be a talkative, loud, and bright individual, and ideally your interviewer should be too.

Anyone is Better Than No One

All of the above qualities are useful, but not necessary. Simply holding mock interview for yourself provides enough benefits that it is worth doing even if the only person you can find to do the interview is an inattentive, unintelligent stoner that is 15 years younger than you and couldn’t hold a job in the fast food industry. Still, finding someone that has the above qualities can be useful, so if you can find someone that meets any or all of the above criteria, you will find it beneficial.

Next post we will look at some of the tips for how to best conduct a mock interview.

Take Away Interview Tips

• You don’t need someone that is older, intelligent, confident and perceptive.
• It helps though.

How to Hold a Mock Interview, Part 1

Interview preparation is crucial for success. The more you prepare, the more likely you are to answer questions effectively, remain confident, and show the employer that you are ready for the position. Part of preparation is simply planning answers to common interview questions and researching the company, but while that will supply you with good answers, they are not preparing you for the interview itself. All they are preparing you for are the questions.

Interviews are stressful. You sit in a room, alone with a stranger. You have to answer expected and unexpected questions knowing that each answer may affect whether or not you get the job. You not only have to share the answers you prepared, but you have to share them with confidence, in a way that interview appreciates.

That’s hard. That’s stressful. No matter how many answers you prepared, the experience of being in a job interview is much different than writing down answers for yourself. That is why to reduce that stress you should strongly consider holding some mock interviews.

Benefits of a Mock Interview

Mock interviews allow you to simulate real interviews with someone that you are comfortable with. They still require that you try to answer questions effectively, but your employment is not at risk, allowing you to answer them with less stress.

Benefits of mock interviews include:

• Learning to answer interview questions to a real person.
• Getting used to the interview environment.
• Garnering feedback from someone you trust.

Mock interviews can prepare you for the experience of a real interview in ways that few things can, making them highly beneficial for applicants preparing for a tough job interview. In the next post, we’ll take a look at who to choose to conduct the mock interview, followed by a post on the best way to conduct your mock interview effectively.

Take Away Interview Tips

• Mock interviews have a lot of benefits.
• Studies have shown that mock interviews reduce the stress of real interviews.