THE CAREER DOCTOR LEARNING FROM YOUR MISTAKES

Very few of us land that dream job on our first attempt. ROWAN MANAHAN has some pointers on using each and every job interview you attend as a building block for the future.

All too often, an interview does not result in a job offer. For senior posts, the reasons why are rarely based on core competencies or qualifications. It may be that your experience isn’t as good a match as they had initially inferred from your Curriculum Vitae, or that your personality / management style would not have been a good fit with the organisation. For more junior positions, the points above also hold true, but experience has shown me that most people simply talk their way out of the job.

Interviews are necessarily stressful occasions, but if you are learning nothing from them then you are putting yourself through the hoops for no good reason. EVERY interview that you attend is an opportunity for you to learn something that can improve your chances later in your career. Many people operate to a countdown schedule on the day of a job interview. The following will give you some ideas for continuing that schedule after the final handshake.

As soon as the interview is over, and irrespective of how you feel it went, write them a thank-you letter. The interviewer(s) must receive this no more than 36 hours after your interview. This is an entirely appropriate (and rarely utilised) tactic - it won’t change their mind if they weren’t going to give you the job anyway, but they will be impressed by your professionalism and courtesy. Occasionally, this can also be used as an opportunity to follow up from a question to which just didn’t know the answer during the interview - if so, include your response in your thank-you note.

So, the interview is finally over. You have just been through a live-fire exercise and they have given you the blueprint for exactly what it is potential employers are concerned about when they meet you for the first time. But what was said in there?

	Once you are out of sight, start notating everything that was said in the interview room. Their questions. Your responses. Clangers that you dropped. Their replies to your questions. All of this is immediately pertinent.
	Take particular note of questions that you answered poorly, or that you weren’t able to answer at all. Incomplete answers. Answers that you had practised and that you just didn’t deliver well on the day. Things you wish you had said, points you should have made.
	A useful aide-memoire for this is a Dictaphone. Alternatively, just scribble your thoughts down on a notebook. Keep doing this for 72 hours after the interview – little details will occur to you for about that long.
	Transfer all of this information in a structured way onto your computer – this forms the core of your interview question-and-answer database for the future.

Didn’t get the job? In some cases, you know as soon as you walk out the door that you have let yourself down. But if you are genuinely mystified as to why you got a Dear John letter, it is time to start digging.

Write to thank them (again), express your disappointment and your continued interest in the organisation, but also mention that you will be following up to get feedback on your performance. The Freedom of Information Act and the new EU Directive require that organisations (both Public and Private) provide feedback to interview candidates.

Your tone throughout the feedback process must be totally non-threatening (employers will clam up totally if they even suspect that you are likely to pursue the legal route), but politely insistent. You are looking for their help in furthering your career - make no bones about this and don’t be remotely apologetic in looking for this kind of feedback.

In the private sector, organisations tend not to give particularly useful feedback, typically responding with some statement to the effect that there was a “more suitable,” “better qualified” or “more experienced” candidate. Fine. Ask them what you could have done better. Politely harass them. Send them a check-list by e-mail and ask them to take a few moments to HELP you! Get specific - ask them where you fell down under these headings:

(a) Experience

(b) Qualifications / Training

(c) Personal attributes

(d) Performance at the interview itself.

If psychometric or other testing was used as part of the selection process, you are entitled to see the results and receive an explanation of what those results mean.

With the roll-out of the Strategic Management Initiative in the public sector, you are entitled to much more concrete feedback on your performance at interview than in the past, specifically on areas in which you were perceived as being weak. You are also entitled to a transcript of the questions asked, the notes taken and scores assigned to each of your answers.

Use this as a discussion document with your Manager at your next review meeting and have suggestions on training / development initiatives that you can take to help redress the perceived weaknesses.

If you feel that the selection process has not been conducted fairly, you are entitled to make some pretty big waves these days; but of course, that can have a major impact on your long-term career prospects - a difficult judgement to make and one on which you should definitely seek advice first.

If you come up against a bureaucratic brick wall, don’t give up. DIG until you learn something that allows you to improve your approach. Keep asking the question, “What can I do better the next time?” and don’t stop until you get a constructive answer.

Once the dust has settled, a very useful person to talk to with regard to a disappointment at interview is the person who got the job ahead of you. Send them a congratulations card. Follow up shortly afterwards and offer to buy them lunch or a drink after work. Explain why you want to meet them and gently ingratiate yourself.

This is a lot easier than it sounds and can pay great dividends. You can get a tremendous insight into an organisation from someone newly hired and you should also try to maintain contact with that person over time - you may be competitors, but you can also feed off each other. Just make sure that you give them a reason to want to meet you. People will tolerate a symbiotic relationship, but will be quick to dismiss someone who brings nothing to the party.

Errol Flynn once said: “It’s not what they say about you. It’s what they whisper that matters”. If your current approach at interview is not working, start by assuming that the blame lies with yourself and go looking for the whisper that will make a difference the next time.

Rowan Manahan is Managing Director of Fortify Services, a Dublin-based outplacement and career management firm.

Original article here.