Four Breakthrough Topics And Questions For A Job Interview – Pollyanna Pixton

Jul 112016
 

A stack of resumes sits in front of you. You’ve read them and sorted them into accept and reject piles. You think you’ve found candidates likely to fit in your company. You want the right people in your company and on your team. But how can you decide among these applicants which are the “right” people? What do you need to look for in your new hires? Who will help you gain the competitive edge you need? Will they step up and help move your company forward? Keep in mind, it may take several months to hire the right person but it can take years to get rid of the wrong ones.

On the other side of the table, as a job seeker your resume has resulted in the opportunity for an interview. How can you find out if this is a place you want to work? Do they have a culture and environment where you can make a major contribution?

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How To Get Your Interviewer Off The Script – Liz Ryan

Jul 052016
 

Off the ScriptGetting your interviewer off the job interview script is essential in the Pain Interviewing process I teach. If you allow the interview to be governed by the goofy script the interviewer holds in his or her hands, you won’t have the opportunity you need to get past the standard interview questions and talk about what’s really at stake.

Your goal is to get your interviewer off the script and into a human conversation with you — not asking you dumb questions like “What’s your greatest weakness?” but rather talking about the real issues in his or her department, and your success slaying similar dragons in the past.

Of course, you must be polite as you gently guide your interviewer out of Zombie Interview Script Land and into Human Conversation Land. You can’t be pushy.

Anybody who begins your interview by asking you standard interview questions is someone who is comfortable with the scripted approach. To get your interviewer off the script, you have to use a little tact and finesse.

You can’t use this approach with an HR screener or a recruiter. It doesn’t work with those guys, because they are not in pain. They have a list of things they want to know about you, and they want to use their time with you to get answers to their questions – period.

You’ll use the Pain Interviewing approach with your hiring manager — the person who will be your boss if you end up accepting his or her job offer. This person has pain. If they didn’t have any pain, the finance person who approves every job opening would not have given permission for your hiring manager to hire anyone new.

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Interning With Your Best Foot Forward – Julie Kantor

Jun 272016
 

Last week I spent some time meeting several Sidwell Friends students (my alma mater) in Washington, D.C. as they embark on their summer internships. My hats off to the students for electing in high school to seize an opportunity and work full time while their friends are in Costa Rica, Bethany Beach, Camp and many at family houses at the Jersey Shore.

I came back to the Twomentor offices and asked two of our awesome interns, Delia and Matt, to join in and share our top 15 pieces of advice to start interning with your best foot forward. Here are my top recommendations followed by Delia’s and Matt’s great insights:

JULIE’S TAKE:

1] Finding Yourself Professionally. An internship will teach you what you like and what you don’t like professionally. This is invaluable experience as it might give you insight to help inform your college major and the direction you might want to go in life. Having confidence in yourself professionally before you go to college (ideally) is equivalent to having keys for a new car. You will need it and an internship will give you merit-based self-esteem.

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Five Communication Skills That Make Good Leaders Great – Steve Olenski

Jun 202016
 

Comm Skills

Whether you’re the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, or a teenage entrepreneur just starting out, communication skills are vitally important. Great leaders motivate, encourage and inspire. They also train people, share new ideas and negotiate. These activities have one thing in common: They all require excellent communication.

Here are five communication skills that make good leaders great:

  1. Interpreting Body Language

In his book, Introducing Body Language – A Practical guide, Glenn Wilson writes: “Where body language conflicts with the words that are being said, the body language will usually be the more ‘truthful’ in the sense of revealing true feelings.” That’s why the most successful leaders are always paying attention to people’s unseen language and nonverbal cues.

When you’re able to read thoughts and sentiments that aren’t revealed by a person’s words, you have many clear advantages. Take interviewing, for example. By learning non-verbal signs, you can oftentimes determine how honest a candidate is being with you. You can also tell if someone is comfortable with what you’re saying, and whether the person feels confident in what they are saying to you. Reading body language also gives you an advantage during negotiations, selling, delivering presentations and speeches, and conducting meetings.

Also, when you know how to read body language, you’ll be able to master the art and science of projecting effective body language to those around you. Exuding honesty, confidence and leadership is just as important as being able to read these traits in others.

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  •  June 20, 2016
  •  Posted by at 10:48 am
  •   Comments Off on Five Communication Skills That Make Good Leaders Great – Steve Olenski
  •   Career Success, Social Skills

Tips For Getting A Job At Facebook, Google, Snapchat, And More – Lydia Dishman

Jun 132016
 
Tips for GettingWorld-changing companies are looking for very specific individuals as they grow their ranks. Here’s the scoop. 

We’ve reported that it’s a great time to be looking for a job. Unemployment is low, many companies anticipate adding more staff this year, and over 100 occupations have more openings than actual hires month-over-month.

For those looking to switch jobs, it’s hard to deny the lure of a big name company. This is especially true in the tech sector, where company names can be synonymous with big innovation: Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Google, and the like. But it’s also the case at other businesses where the focus on developing world-changing products and services can be just as laser-like.

With that in mind, we scoured Fast Company‘s current list of 2016‘s Most Innovative Companies to bring you the inside scoop on what it takes to snag a job at five of the top employers.

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These 3 Career Skills Will Make You Invaluable to Your Employer – Hannah Morgan

Jun 062016
 
Companies want workers with collaborating, decision-making and mentoring skills, according to one study.

3 Career Skills

Employers have raised the bar on what they expect from new employees. It may be due to the increasing number of college graduates. Or it may have something to do with the overqualified candidates who filled lower-level jobs after the recession. As long as companies can find candidates with the mix of hybrid skills they are looking for, you’ll continue to see these demanding job requirements.

The hybrid skills companies are requesting were once isolated to a specific department or role, such as social media skills as part of the responsibilities of human resources and marketing. But in fact, 71 percent of in-demand skills are required across two or more job categories, according to analysis by Bentley University and labor market analytics firm Burning Glass, which identified skills with the highest demand. This reinforces the cross-functional need and that employees “must demonstrate deeper and broader competencies to be marketable” said Susan Brennan, associate vice president of university career services at Bentley University, in an interview with Fast Company.

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10 Things New Grads Need to Know Before They Start Their First Job – Russell J. Bunio

May 312016
 
Things Grads Should KnowStart by taking a deep breath and reading these pointers.

So you managed to graduate college and land a job. The hard part’s over, right? Not quite. For recent college graduates, starting that first “adult” job can be a daunting prospect.

We get it, and we’re here to help. First, stop and take a deep breath. Next, check out the following pointers, which will help you prepare for the start of your post-graduate career.

Here are 10 things you need to know:

  1. Your boss is a valuable resource. While the very idea of having a boss may scare you, it’s important to understand that he or she is there to help. Because your success is a reflection on your manager’s performance, the smart ones will take the time to explain the job to you, provide training and monitor your progress as you gain some experience. Never hesitate to ask your boss questions if you don’t understand something. It’s okay to take up some of his or her time so your expectations are clear. You want to succeed at work, your boss wants you to succeed, and by working together you have a better chance at making that happen.

Related: The One Thing Every Manager Wants in an Employee

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  •  May 31, 2016
  •  Posted by at 8:57 am
  •   Comments Off on 10 Things New Grads Need to Know Before They Start Their First Job – Russell J. Bunio
  •   Career Success, Social Skills

No Correct Answers – Stephanie K. Eberle

May 232016
 
The best tool you bring into a job interview is comfort with yourself, not a set of practiced responses.

Experienced interviewers can tell within a few minutes of knowing you if you are delivering, verbatim, pre-prepared answers to their questions. It’s not just that memorization often results in a monotone, rushed answer. It’s that thinking about your fit ahead of time, instead of rehearsing answers, allows a more genuine, passionate answer in the moment.

The equation for getting your career of choice is simple: your interests, skills and values, plus the alignment of an employer’s desired skill set and cultural values and interests, equals fit. Communicating this fit begins early in the cover letter and CV/résumé portion of the job search process. Early on, employers want to know if you can do the job — that is, are your skills and experiences close enough to those they seek. The interview, then, may delve more deeply into your skills, but it primarily assesses whether or not they want you to use said skills at their organization. In short, do they want to work with you?

The best way to get to know your future supervisor and colleagues is to have an honest conversation with them to assess fit on both sides. Yes, you are assessing fit, too. Most people do not approach interviews with such openness. As interviewees, we are constantly trying to guess which questions will be asked, aiming to come up with the “correct” answer. But, as with any new connection, there is no correct answer, only fit.

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How To Get Your Application Noticed Every Time – Raghav Haran

May 162016
 

I love reading relationship advice on Reddit. Users on there ask some pretty interesting questions, and are very honest in their answers. They’re also mostly delusional. Check out this really interesting post I came across a little while ago:

Noticed 1

Tons of guys say things like “I’m smart, nice, I make good money, etc. but I still can’t get dates!!” Notice the subtext here.

In other words, they’re saying that all the FACTS are on their side! On paper, these guys are awesome. They did everything they were “supposed” to do. They’ve got everything going for them. How could anyone turn them down?

When we apply for jobs, most of us obsess over our resume, cover letter or online portfolio. We think that if we just use the right words, if we just emphasize the right skills in the right way, then we’ll get noticed.

We focus on the facts. We try to highlight our skills and positive qualities about ourselves. This is why so many of us end up not knowing where we went wrong if we get rejected. We thought we did everything we were “supposed” to do. We had all the skills.

We knew we could do a good job. Maybe we even hired a “resume writer” to format the whole thing perfectly. We had all the facts on our side.

But if that’s the game you’re playing, you’ve already lost.

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Why What You Learned in Preschool Is Crucial at Work – Claire Cain Miller

May 092016
 

Robot Boxing.jpbFor all the jobs that machines can now do — whether performing surgery, driving cars or serving food — they still lack one distinctly human trait. They have no social skills.

Yet skills like cooperation, empathy and flexibility have become increasingly vital in modern-day work. Occupations that require strong social skills have grown much more than others since 1980, according to new research. And the only occupations that have shown consistent wage growth since 2000 require both cognitive and social skills.

The findings help explain a mystery that has been puzzling economists: the slowdown in the growth even of high-skill jobs. The jobs hit hardest seem to be those that don’t require social skills, throughout the wage spectrum.

“As I’m speaking with you, I need to think about what’s going on in your head — ‘Is she bored? Am I giving her too much information?’ — and I have to adjust my behavior all the time,” said David Deming, associate professor of education and economics at Harvard University and author of a new study. “That’s a really hard thing to program, so it’s growing as a share of jobs.”

Some economists and technologists see this trend as cause for optimism: Even as technology eliminates some jobs, it generally creates others. Yet to prepare students for the change in the way we work, the skills that schools teach may need to change. Social skills are rarely emphasized in traditional education.

“Machines are automating a whole bunch of these things, so having the softer skills, knowing the human touch and how to complement technology, is critical, and our education system is not set up for that,” said Michael Horn, co-founder of the Clayton Christensen Institute, where he studies education.

Preschool classrooms, Mr. Deming said, look a lot like the modern work world. Children move from art projects to science experiments to the playground in small groups, and their most important skills are sharing and negotiating with others. But that soon ends, replaced by lecture-style teaching of hard skills, with less peer interaction.

Work, meanwhile, has become more like preschool.

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