Even more things you shouldn’t say or do at an interview

Posted on November 14, 2011
Filed Under Employment, Finding a Job, Interview | Leave a Comment

Every now and again CareerBuilder comes out with a list of unbelievable acts perpetrated by job seekers in interviews. The acts detailed on its lists seem to touch the limit of human absurdity, with some so thoroughly unbelievable that they seem more like performance art than an excusable gaffe or a simple misstep committed by someone unfamiliar with interviewing etiquette. CareerBuilder’s career blog, TheWorkBuzz, recently supplied a new list—the contents of which were provided by staffing firm Robert Half—which goes far beyond past lists, detailing acts so absurd, they seem almost to come straight from the mind of Kurt Vonnegut. Read more

Dress to impress

Posted on October 15, 2011
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Have you ever watched the show, “What Not to Wear”? Each of the show’s hosts, Stacy London and Clinton Kelly, might be accused of perpetuating superficial conceptions of beauty and a superficial aesthetic governed by arbitrary trends in fashion. However, each adheres to the valid yet unpalatable truth that how you project yourself—the clothes you wear—helps to determine how you will be received by society and can affect how you measure your own self-worth. London and Kelly’s mantra, which is an extension of this view, is repeated in almost every show, “Dress for the job you want, not the one you have.” Read more

3 things you can do when an interview isn’t going your way

Posted on October 3, 2011
Filed Under Employment, Finding a Job, Interview | 1 Comment

Have you ever read the children’s book, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good Very Bad Day? It is the story of a downtrodden little boy, whose life is routinely interrupted by un-fortuitous events, and against whom the whole universe is seemingly conspiring. Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good Very Bad Day might be interpreted as a narrative driven by Murphy’s Law, which explores the bounds of human perseverance and humanity’s ability to copy with a universe spinning out of control. The fact is, sometimes, no matter what we do, the whole world seems to be conspiring against us. Yet, embedded within Alexander’s sad narrative lays the idea that we are ultimately capable of controlling whether a bad day seriously affects our mental state. Read more

How to get a leg up in your next interview

Posted on July 21, 2011
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Before the age of Myspace, Facebook, Google, and the Internet, job seekers had to go into interviews relatively blind. With only their resume and perhaps a vacancy announcement in hand, the 20th century job seeker had to go into interviews without much knowledge about the person interviewing them and without the convenience of being able to troll corporate websites for important information about a company’s mission or current operations. Of course, in the age of Facebook and Google, all of this has changed—most information is literally only a click away. Whether or not they know it, job seekers stand to benefit from this great proliferation of online resources and the dawn of the social network. In the Information Age, clever job seekers can get a decisive leg up in the interview process. Read more

Thanks for the job offer, but…

Posted on June 30, 2011
Filed Under Employment, Finding a Job, Interview | Leave a Comment

One of my friends recently informed me that he had fantastic news: his dad, after almost a year of sifting through vacancy announcements and shuffling to and from interviews, had been extended a job offer. As he shared the news, I could sense a “but” coming. He continued that although his dad had received a job offer from an employer of whom he was not particularly fond, he had received three more offers for positions for which he had interviewed during the preceding week. While my friend’s dad never could have known that after receiving the one job offer he would receive a flood of offers, and the proposition that he should have declined that job offer seems rather outrageous given today’s employment environment. Nonetheless, it is important that job seekers carefully consider possible job offer before and after receiving them. Read more

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