Interview preparation is a continuous effort and you have to start preparing from the date that you decide to look for a new job. The interviewer’s objective is to understand the candidate’s experience and temperament relevant to the job in hand. The job can be to execute the work or manage/ plan the work or take strategic decisions to implement work. End of the days those efforts will either add value to the top line or save the bottom line.

Focus for interview preparations

Depending upon the job that you are applying, your job interview preparation should focus on your past achievement on two important underline factors, how you have contributed to the increase in revenue and/ or how you have improved the efficiency of the organization.

If you will revisit your past employment then you will be surprised to observe that you and your colleagues have contributed in various ways to improve the efficiency and increase the revenue of the organizations. I can suggest you go through your memory lane and note down as much information as possible on your efforts to help past organizations. Once you have that information in front of you then you can add those significant achievements as talking points.

frequently asked questions at job interview

You can follow few steps for universal job interview preparation to be ready for any interview.

1. Go through your resume number of times till you are comfortable with all the responsibilities and achievement mentions on your resume.
2. Most of the interviews will start with a very simple universal question to break the ice. Tell us something about yourself? Or, Can you give us your career background and more specific to the job with us?
3. Sometime the interviewer may initiate the interview by asking you the reason for looking for a change. This is to understand your personality trait.
4. What were your responsibilities and achievement at the current or most recent organization?
5. What are the value additions you can bring to our organization? The other version of the same question is why should we hire you? You can do Linkedin research on the organization and highlight your experience relevant to their products or services.
6. Please expect a few situational based or scenario-based interview questions. They can give you a scenario and will ask you to provide your input on the solutions. A problem can be solved in different approaches based upon the given problem scenario. The question will try to evaluate your practical experience in your profession and creativity to solve a problem without the help of your colleagues and supervisor. The interviewer’s objective is to hire a resource who can execute most of the regular responsibilities without adding additional burden to colleagues and supervisors.
7. You can expect questions based on your resume. They can ask you to explain your work at the past organization, what have you done, and your achievements. They can also ask probing questions on the basis of your responsibilities at those questions. You can convincingly answer them only by having all the relevant information on your past work and how that work adds value to your experience which in turn can benefit your future employer/organization.
8. Be prepared to answer a few questions on touch-free or remote working practice and how you are well equipped to handle the current working practice.
9. What would your past employer or colleague will say about you?

What are your strength and weakness relevant to the profession or job? Be realistic that no one is perfect and we all have our own strength and weakness to address.

You can keep practicing your interview skills regularly to improve your performance. This is like any sports, practice will help you to perform better at the real game.