Interview Mistakes

After reading the article on common interview mistakes, I realized how easy it would be to make some of these mistakes in an interview if you were nervous. When you go into an interview and you're nervous, you are not in the best state of mind. I think the first interview mistake is probably the biggest, "Don't ask stupid questions!" Like I said, when you are nervous, you are not in the best state of mind, so you have to watch what you are thinking about saying to make sure it is a relevant question. I do agree that treating the secretary poorly is a big mistake, but I don't know if I would rank it #2 biggest mistake. I think I would put lying in an interview above lying to a secretary. I think the #4 biggest mistake for me would be interviewers not being ready for the interviews. It's easy to just go into an interview thinking you will be able to rattle off answers off the top of your head, but when you are nervous, there are a million thoughts running through your head. The website said, "not asking people for help" ranked as the #8 biggest mistake, which I think corresponds with my #4 biggest mistake of not being prepared.

I have never had a job interview. I have worked one job in Greenville, SC with RealtyLink, LLC. It is a real estate development company that specializes in commercial real estate. I did not have to interview for the job because I knew one of the owners pretty well. Although I have never had a job interview, I have had a different kind of interview. My freshman year at Clemson, I was considering joining a co-ed business fraternity, Delta Sigma Pi. I went through the process of getting a bid, which consisted of an interview. For the interview, there was a panel of four fraternity members at a table. I sat down at the table with the four members. The four members took turns asking me questions in which I would answer. It was not a difficult interview, but there were several questions that I stumbled on. Being a quick thinker, I was able to recover, but the interview could have been better if I would have prepared. Just from going through this interview, I see the importance of preparing for a job interview. Needless to say, I received a bid from Delta Sigma Pi, but I turned it down a few days later due to personal reasons.

I think an easy way for a person to get prepared for an interview is to go online and read through popular interview questions. You can go to google and search "popular interview questions" and it will return thousands of websites. Yes, most of these websites contain similar type questions. But, you can easily take two or three websites and just read through all the questions and make sure you have answers for them. Take these questions and try to tailor them to the job position you are interviewing for. Maybe print these questions off and sit down with a friend. Have your friend ask you different questions in a random for you to answer. In your interview, there will probably be questions that you did not practice on the internet, but at least you had a good bit of preparation. It is impossible to determine every question that an interviewer will ask you, but you do need to be as prepared as possible.