Body line...contd

Apart from the silent treatment that you can sometimes be subjected to, the ‘Bodyline’ interviewer has a few more weapons in his arsenal. Stress interviews though not very desirable are still common though I doubt you will encounter one when going for an entry level job. But if you are aware of what the interviewer is trying to do you can deal with it with ease and confidence and actually help the interviewer understand better your suitability for the job. Most prevalent stress interview is the one where a five or six interviewers interview the candidates in quick succession. The objective is to intimidate and confuse them to find out how they handle such situations. Questions about handling pressure, conflict resolution and work load are asked to find whether the candidate has faced similar situations and how did she handle them. Another arrow in the interviewer’s quiver is that the interviewer acts in a hostile and rough manner. For example, the interviewer may ‘act’ disgusted with the candidate’s answer and roll his eyes to convey disbelief and shock; he may avoid making eye contact and interrupt the candidate mid sentence and turn his back on him. Sometimes he could take a phone call while the candidate is grappling with a question he has asked. You ought to be smart enough to realize what is going on. The interviewer is playing a game or a role. Once you realize that you can play along. There is nothing personal and there is nothing wrong with you. It is an act. The moment you are aware of this fact it becomes easy to answer his questions. As he is tries to throw you off balance you remain calm, cool, relaxed and smiling as you answer his questions with aplomb. In another tactic of the stress interview all members of a panel of interviewers asks you questions in quick succession without giving you enough time to answer any. Once again be quick to recognize the game, keep your poise and deal with them like you will deal with a group of curious friends asking you questions about your recent trip or success or achievement.
A stress interview is an odd ball as in it you encounter a hostile interviewer. You are treated as if you are an enemy and not welcome. That is the reason I say a stress interview is not the norm. It is an exception and designed to check temperament of a candidate for very specific environment. Normally a job Interview should not be viewed as a tug-of-war where the interviewers and you are trying to get the better of each other or as a cat-n-mouse game where you are trying to hide something and they are trying to dig them out. It is not a catch-me-if- you-can game. An interview is a joint effort on the part of the interviewers and the interviewees to determine whether the later is suitable for the job in question or not. That is the reason good interviewers always start of with interview openers designed to relax the candidates so that they are not tense or overwhelmed by the situation. The interviewer wants you to relax and feel comfortable so that they can get to know you better. In fact they are seeking your cooperation to help them find the ‘real you’ and determine whether you are the most suitable candidate for the job or not. That is the reason they ask you to talk about yourself. After all that is one subject you know very well and psychology tells us that everyone is a thousand times more interested in himself than in any one else. Psychology also tells us that subjects people most like to talk about are ‘I’, ‘me’ and ‘my self’. Also, nine out of ten people, when they talk about themselves, talk about their achievements and strengths and special talents. Then why is it that when faced with a similar request during an interview people instead of feeling relaxed and relieved they actually become extremely nervous and crumble? The main reason could be that they are either trying to hide something or trying to make an exaggerated claim. Do they do that normally while talking to their friends? They probably do, but their job does not depend on being found out by their friends though there to their credibility takes a plunge. In an interview the moment they hide something or exaggerate a claim they are scared and nervous because if they are caught, which is very likely, they will be out of contention for the job. So if you were to recognize two facts about interviews you will not be scared or nervous.
The first thing is that an interview is actually a combined effort on the part of the interviewer and the interviewee to find out whether the interviewee fits the bill to be recruited based on the skills, knowledge, attitude and aptitude required for the job or not. More often than not it is conducted in a friendly cordial atmosphere. While the interviewers are trying to establish the candidate’s suitability the candidate also has equal right to try and find out whether the company is good enough for him. I know this seems so far away from what the common perception of the interview is, yet it is true and the sooner you recognize it the better it will be for your confidence. For this you have to acquire the ‘abundance mentality’. Abundance mentality would entail that you believe that there will be enough jobs out there for which you will have the requisite capabilities and skills. Once again this also comes as a bit of information that is hard to swallow for people who have been actually raised in a world of shortages and have a scarcity mentality. Most of you have grown up hearing that this is the age of cut throat competition and that unless you get ahead of others whether by hook or by crook you do not have a future. It may have been true for the generations that grew up in the ‘Industrial Age’ it is no longer true in the ‘Information Age’. The rules of the game in the information age have changed and you need a more modern, a more confident, a more cooperative rather than a competitive attitude to be successful. There are more opportunities for every well educated, well mannered, optimistic young citizen of the world today than there have ever been at any other time in history. As the world shrinks opportunity expands. Second thing is an interview is a selection process and not a rejection drill. The interviewers are as interested in selecting you as you are keen on being selected provided you are the right candidate. We come back to the same thing focus on being the right candidate. Will you find a job that you want to do? I am one hundred percent sure if you look for one sincerely and be the right currency, you will.

Bodyline Bowling

‘Readiness is all’, says one of Shakespeare’s characters. Dealing with prolonged silence and sustained staring by the interviewer during an interview can be very unnerving for the best of candidates. Mercifully it is not used too frequently. Normally you will not face this treatment when you appear for an interview for an entry level job. Nine times out of ten the people interviewing you will be thorough HR professionals trained to spot your strengths and suitability for the job. Yet you ought to be prepared for the situation as you might end with a goofball of an interviewer once in a while. The interviewee is sometimes put through the ‘silent treatment’ to check whether the candidate can work well under pressure. It is one of the techniques of what has come to be known as ‘stress interview’ and is used to see how you respond to stress situations. Once again at the risk of repetition it has to be said that readiness is everything. Awareness about what the interviewer is trying to do makes dealing with it so simple that you will wonder if there was nothing more to it. On the other hand if you are not ready for it you might mess up the interview. If the question’ what are your greatest weaknesses?’ is a deadly bouncer, this one is the lethal ‘bodyline bowling’ itself.
This is how it works. You have just answered one of those questions about your strengths, achievements or your weaknesses and the interviewer instead of carrying on the conversation just sits there and stares at you for what seems to be endless time. You wait feeling a bit uneasy and thinking if you made a mistake or broken some sacrosanct rule of good behaviour in an interview. You either freeze in your seat or fidget around uncomfortably and all he does is sits there smiling like Mona Lisa. Such an experience can be very disquieting and devastating to your confidence and could lead to some stupid actions like smiling foolishly and asking, “what?”
Most interviewees unprepared for the situation make the mistake of rushing in to fill the vacuum created by the silence assuming prolonged silence is an invitation to restate or clear up the previous answer. The hapless interviewee sometimes babbles on and on to get things right giving away more and more information irrelevant for the purpose of the interview. Sometimes this information could even be damaging. Why people begin to babble thus is because in most cases the candidate feels that he has committed a blunder so he just keeps rambling on to correct the ‘wrong’ without knowing what wrong he is correcting. He ends up being utterly confused and feeling miserable. That is what happens when you are unprepared.
Now let us see what can happen if you are ready for the body line bowling. The ‘stress test’ or ‘the silent treatment, as it is sometimes called is nothing more than a weak little kid wearing a vicious looking mask. The moment you unmask the interviewer it becomes innocuous. If the interviewer tries to put you through it this is what you do: You keep quiet yourself for a little while and then with a smile and all the sincerity at your command ask something like, “Is there anything else you want me to tell you about my achievements or strengths?” The point is not to be scared or confused. Keep any hint of sarcasm out of your response and be very, very polite. That is all there is to it.
That is why the strategy of being honest not just in the interview but all through life is so important. The silence scares people because they know they are either hiding some information or exaggerating an achievement. You have to be one hundred percent sure at all times to be honest. Then you have nothing to hide and no one will ever be able to intimidate you by silence and staring. In any case in general conversation too, we must remember that silences do not have to be filled up unnecessarily. In a situation where you are negotiating a deal or an agreement you have to be ready not only with your own ‘shopping list’ but also the ‘shopping list’ of the other party. In learning the art of effective negotiation one must be trained not to rush in to fill up the vacuum created by ‘silences’. In fact it is believed that he who speaks first looses. In an interview situation the rule dose not apply with the same intensity but it is certain but the person who rushes in to fill up the silence too quickly looses. So what you have to do is: wait for some time; look and feel confident; smile; and ask politely, pleasantly and sincerely if there is anything else the interviewers would want to know about the last question they asked.