The devil's in the details

I attended a first round job interview on Tuesday of this week with a management consulting company. This stage came after I had successfully passed the online testing round (consisting of an SHL numerical test and Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal). The interview was around 45 minutes long, and was competency-based. This post is to share my thoughts with you about interview techniques, following my experience at this interview.

Details, details, details. Unfortunately for me, this position is not a graduate role. They are only seeking to fill one or two positions, which already puts me at a disadvantage with my lack of experience. The HR person that I had my interview with had a list of questions to ask me that circled around the following main areas:

1. Analytical ability and problem solving/dealing with complex situations or data
2. Teamworking ability and skills/Leadership
3. Building relationships

I managed to successfully prepare to answer these questions by conjuring up all the relevant experiences I had in these areas. However, what I wasn’t prepared for was the amount of detail I would need. Let me give you an example of what I mean:

Base Question: Give an example of a time when you successfully built a relationship with a client/customer?
Detail Question: How exactly do you think you managed to build the relationship, what did you do?

This is something that MUST be thought about before going into an interview, that I had not experienced until now. I had already known about having examples of where I had demonstrated a skill but I had not prepared to explain exactly how I carried out a task or my methodologies. The answer the interviewer is looking for is whether you have built up your own methodology for building relationships. Has your experience allowed you to make observations on what is and is not successful for building relationships. Another example:

Base Question: Give an example of a time you had to work under pressure.
Detail Question: How exactly do you think you managed to handle working under pressure?

I found myself being hesitant on such questions. Not because I was lying, because I wasn’t, but it is just something that is rarely spoken of. We can all make friends and build relationships but do we ever vocalise what exactly had to be done in order to build these relationships and make these friends? Now you have to.

The conclusion of this is that you have to know the details of every example you give and you have to know how you get things done. Therefore, you have to analyse your own behaviour, and also general human behaviour. For example you can build relationships by:

1. Listening to the customer/colleague
2. Using your  (excellent) memory to remember their preferences/dislikes for next time you speak to them
3. Remembering what you say to them so you don’t repeat yourself too much

These are general things that humans do when making friends or building relationships with people. So for every experience you have like time management, team work, leadership, start thinking of how you worked well in the team and how you led the team and how you managed that time. Just another thing to think about!

The recruitment process- there to scare you?

As I start to fill out yet another ridiculously long application form, part of me thinks that the whole recruitment process of some employers is just there to scare! Seriously, just looking at the thing - all the hurdles I would have to overcome, all the hoops I have to jump through - makes me feel nervous. Some of the application forms actually ask the same question about three times, making it much harder for those applicants with less experience. “Explain a time when you lead a team to a common goal” and then “Explain a time when you convinced a team to work towards a goal?”. 

We all know why employers have such a long and hard recruitment process, it’s to make sure that they can get rid of as many numbers as they can along the way. The point I’m trying to make here is that some people are scared out of the process. It just takes too much precious time and effort during the final year of university, when frankly, there are so many more productive ways to spend time. There is just no possible way to have the time to complete all of the graduate schemes on offer as well as juggling university work, lectures and a dissertation.

Anyway, this would be a terrible blog post if it didn’t suggest some ways to overcome this issue with time management. So here we go with top tips to handle the fright of the recruitment process:

Tip 1: Save every single answer you create in a word document of “answers”. Sort them by the core competencies they are demonstrating; being either teamwork, leadership skills or communication etc. This will help you to start building a bank of useful answers that you can then use in future application forms and adapt them to the particular question.

Tip 2: You can print out a version of your “answer” bank to use during a telephone interview. It will help you demonstrate those core competencies and remember the main points about them. That is one of the main advantages of the telephone interview right?! No one can see what you’re doing!

Tip 3: Allocate time. Do not let yourself have open-ended deadlines to complete applications. Just set yourself one to two evenings or a day to complete x number of applications. Re-use your answers and work efficiently.

Tip 4: Research the company and add this to your self-constructed documents so you have something to refer to in a telephone interview or surprise phone-call.

Tip 5: Do not complete applications half-heartedly or the ‘I can’t really be bothered’ attitude. It will end up being a much bigger waste of your time at the end of the day when you are not selected to move to the second round. Take care with each question you answer, try and tailor it to the organisation, and absolutely no spelling mistakes!

One final word of advice, If you have an Internet presence make sure you remove any inappropriate or unappealing content (remove all of it completely in my opinion!) as I have heard that employers will research you. We do the same to them after all don’t we?

Numerical Tests - The New Fashion

Don’t you love the conversations you have with your grandparents, ‘No gran, I can’t get to the job interview without first completing an application form, a series of tests, a telephone interview, an assessment centre...’. How times have changed since the good old days of newspaper ad, phone call, interview, job. Well maybe not for all jobs but definitely for graduate jobs.

Numerical tests are definitely in fashion. Not just for jobs that require numerical ability, but also for those that don’t! I applied to a scheme the other day that said nothing about having to be numerate at all. I still had to complete a numerical test. I think it’s something to do with the fact that your numerical ability is some indication of your overall general intelligence.

I find the SHL numerical tests are very hard. I don’t have a degree in a numerical subject, but I do have A-Level Maths. The general format is you have 25 minutes to answer 18 questions so about a minute and a half for each question. Performance under time pressure is something you only get with practice. Here are a few of my tips when it comes to numerical tests.

Tip 1: Your percentage score is not what the employers are looking for. They are looking for your score in comparison to a pool of results. The feedback I received from one of the SHL Verify Numerical Tests I completed was that I was in the 95th percentile (meaning that I got a score higher than 95% of test takers). Although, from my guessing, I calculate that I probably got the percentage score of around 60-65%. It’s not about you, it’s about how you compare.

Tip 2: Be awake. The main reason for a bad result is if you are tired, unable to concentrate or stressed. Make sure you pick a time where there are no distractions, where you are fully awake and can focus your efforts on each question.

Tip 3: Practice, practice, practice. It is the best way to improve your accuracy, efficiency and general ability. The format of the questions will become familiar and the time it takes for you to figure out what the question wants will lessen.

Tip 4: Stop practicing. There is something called over-practicing. It’s not good. Don’t overdo it.

If you are an undergraduate/graduate and you are jobhunting you are bound to come across testing of some sort. These tips apply for any kind of test, not just the numerical ones. It’s just another hoop to jump through.


Share your experience with numerical tests, leave a comment.