Secrets of successful interview

Congratulations ! You have been invited for an interview! Remember that the interview is your only chance to convince the employer that the job should be yours!  Take a look at this article and see how you can improve your interview skills.

Secrets of successful Interview

You may have the skills. You may be the right person for the job. However, you have less than one hour to convince the individual across the desk that the position should be yours. There are many unwritten rules for a successful interview, and I think it's best to understand what the hiring manager wants before discussing how to prepare and deliver the performance that will get you that role.

The Buyer

Firstly, the buyer has choice. You are not going to be the only person applying for this role. Therefore, you need to understand what is going to make you stand out from your competition. Here are a few things the interviewer is weighing up when deciding if they want to hire you:

·     First impressions. I can’t reinforce this enough: be smartly dressed and, more importantly, smile at the interviewer and maintain good eye contact. People tend to make their mind up in the first five minutes if they like someone, and this is an important part of their decision making, particularly if they are going to be working with you over the next several years.

·     Enthusiasm. Show passion and genuine pride in your field. The hiring manager won’t want you if they think everything they ask you to do is a chore and that you only do it for the pay-cheque. The top firms want someone who shows a desire to innovate and be world class.

·     Flexibility. The interviewer may test your EQ to see how you adapt to difficult or ambiguous questions or situations. This is to test your real-world skills to see how you might perform in a meeting with other senior stakeholders or clients

·     Motivation to move. This is a tightrope: you don’t want to appear like a mercenary who will leave when the next higher bidder comes along; however, you don’t want to appear to be wanting to move for the sake of it. You need to have genuinely good reasons for why this opportunity attracts you.

Research

·     Review their company website and history. There will tend to be a vision statement that can be useful to ask about during an interview. If appropriate, look for any white papers on the area of the business that you are applying to join.

Framing your experience

Try to help the interviewer build a mental picture of your previous roles, the companies that you worked for and how the experience in those environments will benefit their company and department. You don’t want to get into a situation where the interviewer is going through your experience point-by-point and having to drag the information from you. Try talking about your experience in bite-size chunks (two-three minutes high-level overviews) incorporating most of the following aspects:

Review the projects/roles: (Focus on the last 5 years)

·         What was the business area and needs. What were the benefits?

·         Who were the stakeholders?

·         What were the key metrics (people, users, budgets, sales, etc)?

·         What was the process for planning the projects? What were the solutions developed?

·         What was the scale (time and people)? What was the cost?

·         What was your role/impact?

·         Were there any business changes? How were the changes risk-managed?

·         Was the project delivered successfully? Did you achieve your goals?

·         Final key metrics summary, customer numbers, group spend, profits, efficiency improvements or      margin improvements, budget for delivering change.

You may be surprised to learn that you can get this type of detail for each role into a two-three minute summary. However, doing so will allow the interviewer to focus less on your competency for the role and more on discussing what you would do should you be employed. This is where the real decisions are made.

Things to do during the interview

·     Give a high-level overview: does the interviewer know who your 

      previous employers are? If they do not, explain the size of the company, the geographical reach, the nature of the business and the sectors that it covers.

·     Give a lower-level overview: what did your business unit do? What was your role within the team?

·     Be flexible. Don’t expect them to go through each project, but maybe choose one or two projects that are applicable to their type of environment.

·     Be concise and offer to expand if they want to know more detail.

·     Allow them the opportunity to ask buying questions. Try to answer questions with specific examples of delivery (when I was at x, we delivered y).

·     Ask them what they think are the biggest challenges in the role.

·     Try to add or demonstrate synergistic examples of how your past experience can directly benefit the role for which you are being interviewed.

·     Try to build a professional rapport with the interviewer. Attempt to find common ground/viewpoints.

·     Ask selling questions about the culture of the company and why they like working there.

·     When asked why are you applying for this role you can say things like, “this is one of the most prestigious brands in the world” and “you have an excellent reputation with your people and clients” and “I’m not looking; I was headhunted. However, it seemed too interesting an opportunity to not to speak with you.”

Things to be careful of during the interview

·     Don’t use abbreviations unless you describe what the abbreviation means before commencing.

·     Watch out for the interviewer's body language. If they look confused or bored, try asking them a qualifying question.

·     Beware of your own negative body language, like folding your arms or scratching your ear/nose. Maintain eye contact most of the time, and smile now and again.

·     Don’t let them do all the talking. It is your job to sell yourself. Try to latch onto things that they are discussing and draw direct experience from your career that is relevant to that subject

·     Try to avoid abstract conversation which can be easily misinterpreted by the interviewer. Stick to the facts.

·     When asked about career and company moves, give short, objective professional statements of no more than a couple of sentences. Do not get emotional about things like redundancy, bad bosses etc. Try to use positive statements like “I took it as far as I could and it was time to move to the next stage in my career”.

In summary: research the company, understand the buying behaviours of the interviewer, summarise your experience in bite-sized chunks, use your emotional intelligence to bond with the interviewer, smile, keep good eye contact, be genuine and have realistic expectations about the role and the salary. If you do all of these, you may find that you have just landed a great new role with a fantastic company.

Article found on: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140917110637-738931-secrets-of-a-successful-interview 

Welcome to Spear Recruitment

Spear Recruitment Ltd is an established, progressive and privately owned Recruitment company solely specializing in staffing solutions for the UK Automotive industry, they place candidates into employment throughout the UK at many Car Dealerships. Spear Recruitment offer a complete recruitment service, from advertising, search and selection, even psychometric testing if requested. Spear Recruitment guarantees you quality careers in the Automotive Industry.

We are very proud to advertise Spear Recruitment jobs on our website, To view their jobs visit http://www.jobheaven.co.uk/client/spear-recruitment-ltd-6918.htm 

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Find Your Dream Job By Job Heaven

Are you looking for the job of your dreams?

Whether unemployed or looking for the next step in your career, Job Heaven is here to help!

What we offer job seekers: 

• 15,000+ of jobs at your fingertips.
• Upload multiple C.Vs or cover letters to your profile. 
• Register quickly using Linkedin.
• A hub of information to help you with the job hunt.
• A dedicated Graduate Cloud for students and graduates.
• Make your profile searchable to recruiters.
• Get updates on latest jobs emailed straight to your inbox!

Note: We put our latest jobs into social media, so follow our Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. 

To register and upload your CV just simply click here 

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Work Experience By Job Heaven

Whether you’ve gone to university or not, during or after your degree work experience is invaluable in helping you get your foot on the ladder of employment and leading you to your Job Heaven.

There are various types of work experience to consider - 

• Work Placement – This can be paid or unpaid as part of a course of study, can be arranged for a specific period of time either through your University or the Employer.
• Sandwich Placements – Often for the duration of one year for a course, it is a specific piece of assessed work.
• Voluntary work – Usually conducted in your spare time away from your course, unpaid.
• Part-time work – Taken during the term time, can be paid or unpaid
• Vocational work – Usually undertaken to enhance your CV or improve job prospects, can be part-time or temporary work for students or full time for graduates.
• Work-based project – A specific piece of assessed work for a course, conducted on an employer’s grounds.
• Work Shadowing – Where a student gains the understanding of what happens within an organisation by observing an employee in an organisation.

With so many young people applying for each vacancy, having that extra bit of work experience could be the difference between you getting that job over other contenders. Look online or speak to your careers advisor, maybe a family friend will let you help out at their company?

Undertaking work experience will help you decide if you are interested in a certain career path, let you network and exchange ideas with industry professionals and most of all improve your career prospects.

To get up to date information on the latest placements you can apply for, register with us here.

Finding The Right Position For You By Job Heaven

How To Find The Right Position For You?

When you start that all important job search things can get a little overwhelming, so don’t start without narrowing it down the who, what, when, where and why and then you’ll have a clearer idea of the Job Heaven you are looking for.

Who do you want to work for?

Things to consider when looking for a new position are who you want to work for?
Are you looking for a large firm or a small company?
If you want to work for a larger company, there may be scope for different roles and the opportunity to move in.

What kind of position are you looking for?

The first thing you need to establish is what kind of position you are looking for. Is this a Job or a Career?
Are you considering temporary, permanent, part time, full time?
If you are looking to add experience to your C.V, it is important to consider internships, graduate schemes and apprenticeships.
There are various roots that you can go down when looking for a job so make sure you know what you are looking for before you plan the best way to search and apply.

When?

When are you looking to start? Apply in advance but be aware that some roles are advertised months before employers plan for them to become available.

Where?

When you begin your Job Search, remember to set your radius to as far as you are willing to commute to. Think of feasible locations and realistic commuting times, remembering that Google Maps can be your best friend!

Why?

There are many reasons to start the job search, whether you are currently unemployed or not.  Are you after a challenge, change of scene, a new location, an increase in wages? Once you know your reasons for looking for a new job, then the search will become much easier.

And the final step... Register at Job Heaven and wait for the jobs to come to you!

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How To Market Yourself By Job Heaven

How to Market Yourself

In this day and age, getting to your Job Heaven doesn't just mean having the perfect C.V and aceing an interview. Social networks are becoming an increasingly important part of daily life, with the majority of people having a social presence on multiple forms of media.

Did you know that one in five bosses carry out a background check using social networks, meaning your interests and images may become relevant than you think to your future prospects.

You can use this to your benefit by expanding your personal branding. By this we mean edit the content on your social media to the form you think companies would deem employable, so limit the wild party shots as best you can! 

Take the time to create a LinkedIn page, not only is it free but almost all the top professionals are on there and this is a site that can help improve your networking skills to no-end. We know how important LinkedIn can be as a tool, so at Job Heaven when you register as looking for work we have built in the option to be able to take your details directly off your LinkedIn page. We like to keep things simple for you!

As a Graduate you might not have as much work experience as the next candidate, so it is important to showcase your skills as best you can which sometimes goes beyond the realms of the bog standard C.V.

One way to do this, particularly if you are applying for a role that is more creative, is to sign up for an online portfolio and give prospective employers the chance to see your work before they decide whether to call you for an interview. A quick Google search can turn up a wealth of free portfolio sites that could help you get the job of your dreams.

We understand the importance of marketing yourself to potential employers and with that in mind we encourage you to link your Job Heaven profile to your LinkedIn page, online portfolio or website. It's just a couple of clicks and you can be on your way!

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Interview Tips By Job Heaven

Are you preparing for the BIG interview? Make sure to check this before you go! 

                                           

Well done! You’ve got an interview, so now it’s time to get yourself ready for the face to face meet with your potential new boss.

Just to help you along, we’ve compiled a list of helpful hints to get you through this stage of the job hunt process.

Image matters.

Appearance is the first thing you’re interviewer will judge. Before they even ask you to take a seat if they notice a stain on your shirt you could be ruled out before you’ve even opened your mouth.  The job search is hard enough already without being ruled out for wearing a creased blouse, so make sure you are presentable and have your outfit washed and ready to wear the night before so that you don’t fall victim to what shall I wear syndrome.

Body language falls under this category as well. If you slump in your chair it looks like you aren’t interested in the position, so sit up straight and smile. Remember you want to look like you want this job!

Research, research, research!

Get to know as much as you can about your prospective employer. Check out their website and social media presence if they have one.

However don’t be tempted to spout back verbatim the contents of said website, because the chances are an interviewer will know the content of their own website and aren’t looking to test your memory.

Pick out the key themes, for example if this company has been around for 100 years, say something along the lines of ‘I am enthusiastic about working for an established company with such a long and varied history’.

What’s the plan?

As well as researching the company history, make sure you know where the actual place is! Plan your route and give yourself enough time to get there, making sure you factor in rush hour if you need to.

To be on the safe side give yourself half an hour breathing space, because it’s better to go for a walk and kill some time then end up running full pelt into the office and arriving a hot and sweaty mess!

Preparation is the key!

Make sure you take a copy of your CV and cover letter with you, in case the interviewer asks for it, you will always look better to be prepared then scrambling around in your bag for something you should have brought with you.

The same goes for bringing your portfolio if applicable, references and examples of your work are great to have on hand in a nice shiny folder then pulled out of your bag with tissues and bits of fluff attached!

As well as having all your paperwork, think about having some questions ready for the employer, have some research into the role that’s on offer. Just make sure you show an interest in the job role, not just the pay and benefits! 

The Aftermath.

When the interview is over, take some time to fire a quick email to the Recruiter, thank them for their time and reiterate your interest in the position. If you don’t get the job this time around that email could keep you in their mind for upcoming positions and will encourage them to keep the lines of communication open with you.

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