Career Coach Office Hours: December 13 2022 | JobSearchTV.com
Join me at 1 PM Eastern on Tuesday on LinkedIn or YouTube (JobSearchTV.com channel). You can also message me on Linkedin before the show and I will answer it, too. 00:00 Introduction
03:55
I applied for a job online. I went to check my application status, said the company didn’t move forward with my application. I then got a call from the job wanting to schedule an interview. How does that happen? Pretty easy. Ever make a mistake? Ever make a mistake? I suspect so. Now, it could be as simple as on the applicant tracking system, the rejection box is pretty close to something else, or the invitation box and the rejection box are really close to one another. And they wanted to send an invitation to you but they inadvertently clicked the wrong box. That’s certainly a possibility. It certainly is a possibility that they rejected you and then thought better of it and as such, they’re trying to rectify it by inviting you for an interview. So consider it a minor miracle so that you have this interview opportunity and go forward. I would not, I repeat, do not ask, ‘gee, I got a rejection note from you. And then I got an invitation to interview with your company and with you. How did that happen?’ There’s no point in this, you’re sitting opposite them, or you’re on screen, doing a video interview or a phone interview, and they want to talk to you. Make them fall in love. That’s the most important thing that you can do. Impress the heck out of them. Move ahead. That’s what counts.
05:43
As a hiring manager, what are you always hiding from your applicants? Now, I’ve rarely been a hiring manager. So I’m going to just tell you from my experience in recruiting, and from coaching. The thing I know that they tend to hide from people is why the last four people who sat at that desk, or worked for this group, this organization, this manager, why was that they left. That’s what they hide. No one ever tells you about that. Instead, they all talk about a great opportunity with a terrific team of people. ‘Have I mentioned we’re like family around here?’ Yeah, the ones in the holiday movies that want to kill one another. It’s that kind of a family. But your goal is to always impress because you never know when you run into the manager again. Focus on that, not on what they’re hiding. And when they say ‘So, do you have any questions for us?’ Not on the first interview, but at a later round interview, you might ask. ‘I’m just curious. Someone else was doing this job previously. What happened to them?’ ‘They took a different opportunity to leave.’ ‘Why was that?’ ‘Well, they thought it was a better opportunity.’ ‘What made it a better opportunity? I’m just curious.’ I’d say everything in a non-threatening way because remember, what you could be told 
is, ‘I chose someone else for a particular project they really wanted. And they were disappointed and left.’ I think that’s a great reason to leave. I have no fault that the hiring manager did that. But it’s when they don’t know or they’re not willing to divulge why or they make excuses about why they were particularly good. ‘So I kind of pushed them out the door.’ W,’hat what made them the failure for you?’ Just remember, they hired this person, or they hired someone that they believed was really good. And then institutional friction got in the way and they wound up creating the circumstances that caused them to want to leave. I’ll just simply say, look to use your BS detector, and figure out whether or not you’re being sold a bill of goods, or to have a manager here who’s being honest with you. In that example, I chose someone else for a project they really wanted. I love that answer because it’s honest. This person chose someone else. The other one was disappointed. They left. That’s great. But some of the other stuff, you’ll smell BS.
08:41
I just left my job. And the manager told me I need to send her a statement that I decided to resign. What does it mean? You know, there’s an old Seinfeld episode where George quits. And he’s encouraged to go back to work the next day because George made a mistake. And he goes back in and does his job and everyone’s kind of puzzled. Like, didn’t you just quit? Yeah. So what they’re looking for is his letter of resignation. That brings this to a complete circle and confirms in writing you’ve quit. And thus, from their standpoint, they have proof that you quit. That’s it, nothing more than that.
09:32
Why is it important to determine criteria and interview questions before bringing someone in for an interview? Easy. This one’s really easy. And I’ll just simply say, how do you know you’re hiring the right person if you don’t have any criteria? Seriously, how do you know you’re hiring the right person if you haven’t established minimum baseline criteria for evaluating and assessing people? You can’t. You’re going to operate by whim. Your biases are going to get in the way, positive and negative biases, and you’re going to wind up hiring the wrong person. And with regard to interview questions, how are you going to assess them, and evaluate them to see how they match those criteria unless you’ve determined minimum baseline questions that you’re going to ask everyone that you interview?You can’t. As a result, you have to determine criteria in advance, so that you don’t make mistakes that can prove damaging to you and your career. That’s why you do it. So take the time in advance even if you’re working off an old job requirement, what you want to be doing is making sure people meet the basics for this job. That simple.
11:20
After my interview, the recruiter told my agent (I hate when people say ‘my agent’ I’ll get to that moment) that I’m very smart. Does this mean I won’t get the offer? I told them I’m a systems engineer. I applied for a warehouse helper position. Why did you do that? Like, are you a student who wants to be a systems engineer? Is that what’s going on? Now, the recruiter told your agent that you’re very smart. Did the recruiter follow up and ask, did the agent follow up and ask I should say, ‘Are you rejecting him or her?’ Yes, okay. Why is that? Because they’re very smart? Well, warehouse helpers are smart. It’s one of the criteria for the position. As a result, the fact that you’re smart is not a criterion. The fact that you might be too smart for the job, or too good for the job . . . you didn’t make them trust you. Remember, when firms hire, competence is only one thing they look for. They look for self-confidence, character, chemistry, maybe a little bit of charisma, because charismatic people always do better than those without charisma, that you care, that they can connect with you because they want to trust you. Often firms don’t hire people who are too well educated, or have too much of a different experience because they don’t think you’re going to stay in a job. As a result, that may be what they were signaling to the recruiter, or to the agents I should say. And they may not be interested in hiring you. And they may be. We don’t know. The only thing I know is that they identified you as being smart.
13:29
Shall I pay recruitment agencies to find internships? No. Now, recruiters . . . well, I know in New York, where I spent a lot of my career in recruiting that recruiters were paid by companies, not by individuals. It was a legal requirement that you had a license with The Department of Consumer Affairs if you took fees from job applicants. And I’ll simply say, why would a competent recruiter work for you to find an internship because you’re paying them? The fees are
small. Like are you going to spend as much as they’re used to earning for a full-time position? They get 20, 25, 30% of gross annual salar, to fill a job with one of their clients with a company paying? Should you pay a recruitment agency to find that internship? No. They’re not going to do it except by accident. And then to push you into paying them and if if you don’t pay them, you think they’re gonna sue you? Of course not. So that’s why most recruiters don’t do it.
15:06
What’s expected in this call after the final round? What was said is, ‘once again, thank you for participating in the interviews. We had a chance to align with the participants. Would like to give you our final feedback. Would you be available for a short call at (fill in the blank)? The answer is you’re probably being rejected, and they have the courtesy to tell you. If they wanted to hire you, they would have picked up the phone and said, ‘Cheryl? Hi. Just curious. What did you think on the last interview, like were you interested in the role? And then start to pre-close you on joining. They’re not doing that. They just want to have a chance to talk with you, which signals to me that the probability is you’re being rejected. Wish it we were different. But that’s probably what’s going on.
17:05
How do you stay relaxed during interviews? You’re well prepared, you have rehearsed, you have a sense of what you’re going to be asked. And if you don’t do that, everything is a surprise and people freak out. So your goal is to practice. Hire a coach; hire someone; ask a friend to help you. Prepare a series of questions that you want to be asked and have them listen to your answer. It’s important that you speak. it’s important that you ask questions. And I’m sorry . . . that you speak your answers and don’t just simply blab your answers to questions so that this way you can make your mistakes in advance of the interview, rather than during the interview. So how do you stay relaxed, you are practiced, rehearsed and well prepared.
ABOUT JEFF ALTMAN, THE BIG GAME HUNTER
Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter is a coach who worked as a recruiter for what seems like one hundred years. He is hired to provide No BS Career Advice globally. That can involve job search, hiring staff, management, leadership, career transition and advice about resolving workplace issues. Schedule a discovery call at my website, www.TheBigGameHunter.us
He is the host of “No BS Job Search Advice Radio,” the #1 podcast in iTunes for job search with over 2500 episodes.
I do a livestream on LinkedIn, and YouTube (on the JobSearchTV.com account) Tuesdays and Fridays at 1 PM Eastern. You can send your questions about job search, hiring better, management, leadership or to get advice about a workplace issue to me via messaging on LinkedIn or in chat during the approximately 30-minute show.
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