Okay, so this is a Tips and Tricks post. I am now officially getting a new job, after 5 years in retail! So, with this in mind, I would like to post some interview tricks and tips that I've received from someone I work with (In retail). As well as things I've read on various websites, and even on other interviews.
Sections marked with a red asterisk *: Are purely situational, and won't always happen, they may also depend on the particular job position, as well as the field. I've been asked some questions only when applying for a retail job, and one question was asked because of the personality of the interviewers. So the ones in black, may be more important, and more used. Once again, it just depends on various different things.
Sections marked with a purple diamond ♦: Will be asked about half of the time, but not always.
The thing with interviews is, the interviewer wants to get to know you, but, you have to lie to them and say what they want to hear.. which is ironic because they want to know who you are.
Sections in black ♣: Are almost always asked.
Tips For Questions
♣ Why are you leaving your current position?
For my current position in retail, it was easy. I just had to tell them that I wanted to leave retail, and get back into the office environment. If you're changing fields, you can just say you want to get into that field.
What I started to do was... I'd tell them I wanted to get out of retail, and into the Private Sector, which sounds really fancy. I may or may not have gotten this idea from an episode of the Golden Girls.
Private Sector, just means a non Government job. A Government job is called the Public Sector.
Another scenario, is to just say, the job is not Challenging enough. This is a good way on doing things, as it's not negative, you're not talking bad about about the company, or anything. As with the previous statement, I may or may not have gotten this idea, from an episode of Queer as Folk...
• I Would like to leave "blank", to get a position in "(an Office, Graphic Design, Retail.. etc..)
• I am looking to leave "blank", to get a job in the Private Sector. Alternatively, if you're interviewing for a Government job, you can say Public Sector instead.
• I'm leaving "blank", because it's not challenging enough. I saw your company, and saw it would give me great new challenges to face.
NEVER:
• Say you're looking to get into a quieter atmosphere. The employer might say that their job is rather busy, and it will just hurt you in the end.
• Say you're not a people person, this is just a bad idea. Even if it's an office job, they may even say, that you still have to deal with customers/clients. If the topic comes up, tell them that you love working with people!
♦ I see you went to school for "blank", but you got a job in "blank", OR you're applying for this position. Why is that?
I was asked once, why I went to school for Graphic Design, but got a job in retail. This was a heavy hitter, like really, why ask that?!
Dont:
I used to tell people, that I couldn't get a job in Graphic Design, so I went into retail.
Do: But now, I'll tell people that I decided I realized I wanted to do Graphic Design as a hobby, and tried out retail, because I love working with people. (Which was a lie..). It sounds better.
Then you can state reasons why you want the current position.
For Customer service positions, I told them that I love working with people, but also wanted to get back into the office atmosphere.
♦ What do you know about the company?
• List 2-3 things about the company before hand, so that you can tell them what you know.
I like to write it down in an order of 1-3
Examples:
1. "Started in 1999"
2. "Law firm company that focuses on schools, and children."
3. "Affiliated with Donations companies, and gives to charities.. "
I'd even go out to ask the interviewer, more about the company.
Alternatively, during the interview, you can mention one of the facts you've collected, and they might make a comment saying that you did your research!
♦ What is your favorite and least favorite thing about your current position?
This is a question to be careful with! Never say anything bad about your current job such as, "They need more staff", or "The customers are rude", this will just make you look bad.
Favorite Thing: (This you can have fun with), The Managers, the People you work with, Free food in the break room.. etc..
Least Favorite: There's two ways you can do this, either list something silly that can't be controlled, or you can have a more smarter way to answer this question.
• Silly Answer - No Employee bathrooms, Not enough parking, No TV in the break room.. something that isn't a big deal.
• Smarter Answers - The job isn't challenging enough, you might also be able to get away with saying Bad Management, but I would be careful on that one.
* At your current job, who is your favorite manager, and least favorite manager. Why is that?
THIS IS A TRICK QUESTION!!! DO NOT say you have a least favorite manager! I got hit by this one myself, but I've only ever been asked this once.. I think it's because all of the reviews on Glassdoor for that company, talk about how the managers do favoritism.
Just say, I like all of the managers, but if I had to choose a particular favorite, I would choose so and so. Because "they're sunshine and rainbows", "they bring in a cake every week.. etc.. " .
♦ What are your strengths and weaknesses?
This is an interesting answer, because I've recently learned of a really cool way to answer this question.
Strengths: examples: I'm a go getter, I'm hard working, I love a good challenge, I'm creative, I come in on days off to pick up extra hours, I always stay later if needed. etc...
Weaknesses: This part is tricky, you can either answer with a real weakness, but challenge that weakness with a solution. Use a strength, and make it sound like a weakness, or use a something you love, that is a weakness.
As an example, if you're bad at math like me.. you can say, "My weakness is math, but in order to combat that, I can use a calculator! "
Alternatively, you can have some fun with this, and turn it around. You can say that your weakness is something that you're good with, but make it sounds like a weakness. "My weakness is, I never say no to coming in on my day off!".
Another type of "Weakness" you can use, is something you adore/unexpected! "My weakness is kittens!".
• My weakness is "Blank", but in order to combat that, I can do/use "blank".
• "My weakness is, I never say no to come in on my day off!", "I can't stop working, until the challenge is completed!" "My weakness is, I never say no!".
• "Kittens are my weakness!" " Pokemon is my weakness!" "Flowers! They're so pretty to look at!"
♦ Name a time when you had a challenge at work, and what did you do to overcome it?
This can be an interesting question. If you've never had a job, just come up with either a made up scenario, or use something that happened to you, where you were able to overcome something. This is a personal experience thing, so I cannot add much myself. Just make sure it was a positive experience that happened.
Example below: Feel free to use this yourself, as long as you've worked with customers before. You could even go as far to say that you were at so and so's garage sale, helping out, and helped an unruly customer out with a price.
I personally, like to use this time I had a really rude customer. Her coupon didn't work, and she was being very nasty to me for no reason. I got the supervisor, and she fixed the error, and made the coupon work, and she left the store happy, with a smile on her face! (Which wasn't true, she was an evil bitch from beginning to start, but I changed the end, and so far I've gotten positive results from this answer!)
* Name a time you used team-work.
This is pretty self explanatory, just come up with something that happened to you. These are my examples.
Before I got a job in retail, I told an interviewer, that for a college photography class, a bunch of my college friends and I car-pooled to a park, and took pictures for a class project.
My personal favorite is this one time...
In order to stop a lady, who was switching price tickets in my store... Myself, and two other co-workers, grouped together and watched her from afar, to make sure she didn't do anything fishy.
* How do you get along with ODD/Annoying/Rude people?
"I get along with everyone, I am calm, and supportive of people, even with different ideals."
"I work with everyone the same way, in a positive manner"
"I have a good rapport with everyone!"
* Describe the perfect position.
You can say something like,
•A place that provides professionalism, growth and advancement.
•A place with good people to work with, people who really care about their customers/clients.
Something fun and positive.
* How are you with stress?
Just tell them that "you work harder in stressful situations", " I am calm, collective and enthusiastic!" sometimes things aren't as bad as it seems.
♣ Do you have any questions for me?
These are questions that the person is going to ask on an interview, and I don't think there is a time where they aren't going to ask you for questions. The following are questions I've gotten from the internet, and I've had really interesting results!
My top three:
• What's an average day like? - They'll just tell you what happens through a normal day.
• Who would I report to? - Half of the time I've asked, it's usually not the interviewer, or it's them, and another person.
• What is your favorite thing about the company? - This is the part where they say they've been with the company for 100 years, and how much they like it.
Others:
• How long is the training period? Will there be mentors or orientations for the position? (This would be great if you want to know the learning curve of the job)
• What is a current challenge or goal that the company currently faces?
• How long has the company been at this location?
• What is the next step in the process?
I usually only ask three questions, but I found out about this question recently, and it's also very useful to use.
• What is the competitive scene like? Who am I up against, and what would I have to do, to show that I am the right choice?
I've only asked this twice so far, but I've gotten very interesting answers! But I can also see how this could come off narcissistic, like you just think you're better than everyone else.
If you've had a history of bad bosses and want to see if this person is just as terrible as the last, you can ask these questions I found on Workplace Stack Exchange.
Question
• Can you describe a project where someone reporting to you did particularly well on a project? How did you help them be successful?
If the interviewer says something along the lines of "We're still interviewing", it's possible that they're not going to hire you.
Don't use
• What area needs the most help?
I've asked this a few times, and usually people got defensive, and would just say "Well, this position you applied for!". Although one time, someone did actually say something else needed more help, but I decided not to ask this question anymore, since people got weird about it.
* List three Adjectives/Personality traits, that best describe yourself.
This is from a question I was asked on an interview, and ever since then, I've collected a few words to use on other interviews. At the end of an interview, I will tell them, if I described myself with three adjectives, it would be, blank, blank and blank. Any time I've said this, people usually thought it was interesting that I had said this, one person even wrote it down.
These are the ones I've used currently.
• Ambitious
• Friendly
• Optimistic
Make sure not to use a similar word, that basically means the same thing, as well as words that are the opposite too. You can't say you're energetic, and calm, it clashes too much. Always remember to use positive words.
Some other words I've used are
• Creative
• Enthusiastic
• Positive
Some others I found.
• Adaptable
• Compassionate
• Diligent
• Persistent
• Reliable
• Sincere
Tricks
• A cool trick you can do, is ask the interviewer for a cup of water.. or coffee (Or whatever). When you don't know what to say, you can take a sip, in order to think about what you're going to say! I did this on an interview, where I ended up getting the job.
-Alternatively, you can also mention that you will get back to that question, and need a moment to think, and you can discuss another topic in the mean time. If you haven't given your references/resume/ or Cover Letter, you can give that to them, while you think about the answer.
• You can ask the interviewer, if you are allowed to show off your skills. You can ask them to give you a project to complete, in order to test out your abilities!
• If you forgot anything you were going to say, you can ask for their email and say something like "I forgot to mention on the interview, that "blank".
• In some cases, the interviewer might put you up to the task, and give you an assessment. Make sure you can do the assessment, and if they listed a program, make sure to try the program out, before the interview.
-Alternatively, If you haven't used a program for a long time, just tell them you haven't used it in a while, and need to re-familiarize yourself with it again.
-If by chance you do terribly on an assessment, tell them you're going to practice with it.. It may bring a shed of hope for considering you. Some companies also don't care about how well you know a program, but care about how pleasant someone is!
• Be cautious when applying! - Some companies aren't actually hiring, they either got a good discount on a job site, and have to post an X amount of jobs, in order to get the discount.
So when a company posts a job a million times, they're either doing something fishy, or they're just bad at keeping people.
- They may also do it, to make them look better, more popular.. etc..
• NEVER Say you want to go back to school one day, this means you wouldn't stay with the company, and it would be a red flag.
• If you don't have experience in something, tell them you're always willing to learn, as well as you pick things up quickly.
• If your current job is in a different field as the one you're applying, you can always mention something that you did, that can qualify for the job. Such as, when I was in retail, I answered phones.. which is something you also do in an office, so for office jobs, I could list answering phones.
• Saying you're a jack of all trades, is a good thing.
• If they talk about not liking Drama/Complainers, or something similar, just agree with them. "I agree, there's no room for drama in the work place."
• You can always say something at the end, like..
"If hired, you won't be disappointed.. I am a hardworking, detail oriented individual that always takes the extra mile!" Something like that can add to the interview.
• At the end of the interview, tell them that it was a pleasure to meet them, and that you are excited about the opportunity.
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