Throughout life people are often encouraged to be humble and modest. Generally speaking, those attributes are well liked. Those that are qualified do not want to flaunt their abilities because it might upset others. Unfortunately when you want any position you will have to do some flaunting.

Every step up to receiving the offer is selling. You need to sell yourself. Most companies, maybe even the one your applying for, claim to solve the problem you have and offer a better solution than the competition. You have to do the same, in a polite and agreeable manor. Although the article emphasizes arrogance, really you want to let the companies know the things you are capable of doing. Don’t confuse this with trying to offer the company everything they want.

You don’t know everything, so don’t try to sound like you do. But when they ask you a question, if you have had prior experience in that area, or even something related to it, let them know immediately. One example is my response to the often asked question: “When have you been a leader?” While I had no formal experience in the past, during a summer school program I was involved with, I was the group leader for our project. (more…)

For most of us college students out there on the job hunt, the level of nervousness prior to an interview is matched by very few events in our academic lives. It’s on par with final exams and formal presentations, but there is one key difference - you can’t study. All of your life, you have been able to directly affect your performance in important moments like these by preparing more thoroughly than the next guy, but with interviewing, the safeguard of knowing what you’re going to be asked about is gone.

You can try to look online for a list of specific interview questions the company typically asks, but I have tried this multiple times and trust me, it doesn’t work. Instead of trying to find every question you might be asked and come up with answers, I recommend devising one answer for all the questions you could be asked. It’s easier, and if done right, more reliable.

I am referring, of course, to the universal story. The majority of the questions college students are asked during a first interview are situational, i.e. they ask about a time that you’ve encountered this, or dealt with that. Naturally, your answer to a question about a situation will be a story, and the beautiful thing about stories is that you’ve spent the last 20 years of your life mastering the art of crafting and molding them to fit your needs. (more…)

When you are offered an interview, pick the best time they offer and take it. Plan to make it there. If you have a midterm, get it rescheduled. If the interview is 6 hours away, bring some homework to get done on the bus ride. There is never a good reason to turn down an interview, unless of course you already have a better offer. Again, think about what’s going to matter the most in five years…your career, or the assignment you have due in two days. Exactly - your career.

Everyone should know that careers are built over time, not instantaneously. You get a couple internships which give you the experience to get a better job out of school. That job will enable you to get another job more inline with what you want at that time. You build up from nothing into the career that you want. That’s why you want to get an internship, it’s one of the first steps out of many for the rest of your life. (more…)

Your skill set is one of the most important features to market properly before an employer is going to invest in you. It’s up there with experience and educational background, and for technical positions, maybe even higher. There are generally two schools of thought when it comes to presenting your skills. For our purposes, we’ll call them the depth approach and the breadth approach.

The depth approach is giving a company the idea that you excel in the specific task at hand and haven’t really bothered to work on less central, albeit related, skills. Tim the Finance major might use the depth approach in his interview for the finance position at Big Business Inc. by informing the interviewer of his membership in the finance club, the four electives that he took focusing on Excel Spreadsheets, and his summer job as a Financial Assistant at his local bank. He may not have spent his time learning about many other aspects of the business world, but why would he when it is a financial position he wants, right?

The breadth approach is presenting yourself as a well-rounded candidate who has focused on acquiring a broad range of skills that could be useful in your field, without having become an expert in any one area. Jane, a Finance major interviewing for the same finance position as Tim, might choose to employ the breadth approach by letting the interviewer know about her proficiency with Excel and other financial tools, but also touching upon her public speaking elective, her experience in trying to start her own business, and the leadership skills she gained as editor of the school newspaper. Jane figures she can learn exactly how to do the job at hand once she’s hired, but the more general skills are harder to come by and almost guaranteed to be necessary at some point.

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