P.C. wrote:
I'm terrible in an interview......unless there is an obvious connection with the interviewer.
And that's the key. It's easy to personalize an interview and make it work, but [span style="text-decoration: underline;"]you[/span] have to do it because the interviewer never will. I've interviewed a lot of times, mostly because I did contract work for several years. Here are my observations, for what they're worth:
First of all, 99% of the time the interviewer doesn't really want to know if you know how to do the job. They're already past that because you're in there interviewing- they already think you can do the job. What the inteviewer really wants to know is, "Can I work with this person without them driving me and everyone else bonkers?" They just want to know if it's possible to get along with you, and in most cases that carries way more weight than the skills you claim to have.
Here's what I do (or did, when I was Out There working for a living):
When you show up, come in and make a little joke. Not a big joke, a little joke. This ain't Comedy Central. No, just make a little joke about traffic or the weather or the size of the building. ("Traffic was moving so slow I thought I was traveling backwards in time", "It's raining so hard there were whales in the parking lot", "Wow, this campus is so large I think I crossed two time zones on the way in".
It doesn't matter what you joke about, you're just doing this let the interviewer know that
a) you have a sense of humor (always good),
b) you're not too serious about stuff (i.e. not fun to work with)
c) this interview isn't life-or-death to you (even if it is)
d) you're relaxed about what you're doing (interviewing)
e) you're a human being, not just some damn number on their list
Next, find something personal on their wall or desk like their kid's picture, something their child might have drawn, a travel photo of them, a knicknack, etc etc and ask about it or make a comment on it. "Oh, is that you in Mexico?", "Did your daughter draw that? Yeah, mine likes bright colors too", etc etc. Again, it almost doesn't matter what it is, you're just doing it to let them know that you're human, personable, friendly, etc.
After you blab a bit and break the ice they might even get around to asking you something job-related (lol) but 90% of the time they're thinking, "Yeah, okay, I can work with this person", and you're a shoo-in.
Finally, never show fear or grovel or treat them like royalty. If you treat the interviewer like God, they'll treat you like a Mortal. That's a Bad Thing[font size="1"](tm)[/font]. If you treat them like just another person (in a friendly way, of course) they'll usually respond in kind. I've done probably 100 interviews and out of all those there might have been 3 or 4 times I wasn't offered the job. Once was because the group I was applying to was disbanded the next day (at Boeing, lol).
Really- just bop in there, kid around a little, establish a personal connection, and you'll more than likely land that sucker. It's worked time and time again for me and I interviwed with some really tough-assed companies: Microsoft, Boeing (where I was eventually hired!), AT&T, GE Valecitos, etc etc.
