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Being interviewed is the first step on your professional way. When you are planning your path you must acknowledge that this step is inevitable and you should get though it multiple times. This is something that depends on you. While being a student you had a chance to google “write my paper” and use a service for writing essays online. This won’t do in professional life. Successful people knows that the number of failures always exceeds the number of successful efforts.

It is better to learn tips for passing an interview yourself from the very beginning of your career.

1. No stress

The first initial rule is dealing with stress. No matter how important this job position is, it is crucial to deal with emotions in order to put one’s best foot forward and show gained knowledge and skills. Try not to think that future life depends on this conversation. Concentrate on preparation process. The following list helps to encourage interviewer that you are self-confident and strongly skilled person if dealing with stress takes a lot of efforts:

• Take one or a few deep breaths before the very start. This helps to relax.
• Take your hands away from your face. This is a non-verbal sign of neediness and your interviewer knows that.
• Sit straight. This gives better concentration and a better look in front of your interlocutor.
• Do not play with a pen, a list of paper or any other things. This faces your worrisome to your interlocutor.
• Don’t forget about gestures while talking. This helps not to feel uptight.
• Ask for a glass of water. It helps to refresh.

When you managed to encourage interviewer you are a self-assured person, it will be much easier to concentrate on questions and its answers. Remember, you never know if this interview is the last or not so don’t misuse your time and energy thinking of things you can’t change.

2. Commonly used questions

Each interview has the same list of commonly used questions. The best decision for each applicant is to find them and prepare full and complete answers. In order not to be stressed and feel prepared it is better to write a template answers to each of the questions and memorize it. Most well-known questions are:

• Why did you choose our company?
• How can you be useful to our company?
• Why did you quit your previous job? (not applicable for freshers)
• Who do you want to be in five years?

Preparing complete answers to those questions will prevent you from undesirable stress and will make you feel confident because there will be no need to find the answers right on the way. Please note that this list represents the most commonly used questions. It means they are asked in each company by HR representatives. The list is not completed and it is better to be prepared for the most well known questions.

3. Learn every available piece of information concerning the company

One of the most common questions are those asking what do you know about the corporation. By the moment you enter the meeting room you have to know as much information as possible concerning the corporation and realize how to implement it in your future possible job. In other words, you have to predict your daily duties. Every interviewer will appreciate your awareness.

4. Acknowledge strengths

Gather all information about previous job experience trying to represent it in five minutes. Make daily notes before the interview. Emphasize achievements of previous activity but not the bare facts. The main thing is to represent your best professional features on the example or previously gained experience during the study or on the other position. Look through the notes and shorten them to five minutes.

5. Acknowledge management style

Each experienced manager is obligated to have an answer to that question. Defining your style comes with experience. Each manager with over five years of work experience is able to describe the management style he is using from the best perspective according to his skills and knowledge. The answer should take into account the corporate idea, stylistics and other peculiarities of the corporation you are interviewed in.

6. Acknowledge weakness

Every honorable professional is able to admit his weakness. It doesn’t mean that you must share your biggest fail on the previous position. The most believable answer is confessing that you have forgotten to recognize the great work made by a worker and forgot to stimulate his success directed towards the success of the whole company. You should add that you believe overall success depends on the success of each worker.

7. What if…

Conditional questions are widely used in manager interviews. You must concentrate and give the fast decision for the represented situation. Good news is that the list of those questions are also predictable and one of them is “What if one of the workers doesn’t do his job good enough?” You should show here that you are able to discuss problems personally and honestly and are ready to take responsibility for his shortcomings.

About the author

Lisa Griffin is a freelance writer and blogger whose credo is "being prepared is the first step to succeed in this life".