As challenging as it is for most job seekers to “score” a job interview, the actions of many job seekers in job interviews raise questions about their understanding of what job interviews are or, perhaps, their true interests in the opportunities those job interviews provide.
A recent CareerBuilder study of over 2,200 hiring managers and human resources representatives across a wide range of industries and sizes showed some amazing behavior on the part of job seekers.
My suspicion is that most (not all, of course) people are not naturally this clueless. On some level, they must understand that they are blowing away the opportunity with their actions.
Among the strange actions in the CareerBuilder study:
- Applicant crashed her car into the building.
- Applicants dressing strangely – in a Star Wars costume or in their running gear.
- Applicant kept iPod headphone on during the interview.
- Applicant checked Facebook during the job interview.
- Applicant asked for the receptionist’s name and phone number because he really liked her.
I’ve heard many other horror stories from recruiters and experienced a few myself as an interviewer. Please do NOT do any of these behaviors during a job interview:
Misusing cell phones:
- Answering the cell phone.
- Texting on the cell phone.
- Playing a game on the smart phone while interviewing.
- Asking to delay the start of the interview until composing an email was completed.
Demonstrating bad manners:
- Arriving late.
- Yawning.
- Bad breath.
- Bad body odor or too much perfume or cologne.
- Cursing during the interview.
- Arriving too early (more than 10 minutes).
- Parking in the employee parking spaces.
- Smelling like cigarette or cigar smoke.
- Being rude to the elevator operator, receptionist, secretary, or other “unimportant” staff members.
- Coughing and sneezing, obviously coming down with a cold.
Being unprepared for job interviews:
- Not knowing which job you’re being interviewed for.
- Not remembering the title and requirements of the job being interviewed for.
- Not having copies of the resume ready to give to interviewers.
- Not having a good answer to, “What do you know about us?”
- Not having good questions about the job and the organization ready to ask (questions that couldn’t be answered by a Google search or pre-interview preparation).
Acting very oddly in job interviews:
- Bringing parents and children.
- Attempting to include relatives in the interview.
- Bringing a sandwich and soft drink (or coffee and a bagel) and eating during the interview that was not intended to be a meal.
- Appearing tipsy or drugged.
- Avoiding eye contact.
- Dressing inappropriately – usually too informally, but sometimes apparently “in costume”
If you really aren’t interested in the job, don’t waste your time applying for it. The applicants in the incidents above wasted everyone’s time. Save your time and energy for the jobs you really want so you can bring your “’A’ Game” to the whole process.
Original from WorkCoachCafe
