Using Preptel’s Interview Guide
June 26, 2012 by Jon Ciampi · Leave a Comment
Congratulations, you received a call or response back from the hiring company and now you need to begin preparing for the phone screen or interview. You successfully passed from applicant to candidate. To prepare properly, we have created Preptel’s Interview Guide. This interview guide shows how you compare to other candidates so you understand your strengths and weaknesses.
To get started, prepare for a transition in your approach. You need to transition from job searching to selling. During the interview stage, the focus shifts from “I am qualified” to “I am the best available candidate.” Therefore, knowing where you are strong or weak compared to other candidates becomes important.
SWOT CHART
The Interview Guide is setup in a SWOT format. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. Here is the information contained within each section.
Strengths & Weaknesses: Preptel analyzes the job requirements, your skills and competencies, and other candidate’s skills and competencies. If your skills and competencies are stronger than 80% of the other candidates, this is highlighted as a strength. However, if 50% candidates have stronger skills and competencies, then we list it under weaknesses. The ratings are guidelines to help you focus and not absolute evaluations. The goal is to identify areas of your background that distinguish you from other candidates.
Opportunities & Threats: Preptel analyzes the location, industry, education, and work experience of the job requirements against your résumé and the résumé of other candidates. Based on the comparison, we list these items as Opportunities or Threats. For instance, if you have 12 years of industry experience and 80% of the candidates have 5 years of industry experience, this is an opportunity to show off your deep knowledge of the market. Comparatively, if you live in Boston and the job is located in Los Angeles, this may be a threat if other candidates live in Los Angeles. The ratings are guidelines to help you focus. They are not absolute evaluations. The goal is to identify areas of your background where you may have an opportunity to showcase other areas of your background outside of core job responsibilities.
For some items, we provide a definition to help explain the item. Use this to get a better understanding to the item listed.
In addition, we provide a list of questions to help you prepare. Working through these questions, try to include your strengths and opportunities so you showcase your best talents.
Preparing for an interview with a focus on the competition will give you an advantage. While other candidates are preparing to answer interview questions related to the job requirements, you will be answering the same questions, but with an emphasis on your strengths to the job requirements and distinguish you from other candidates.
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