Controlling Interview Nerves

How Not To Compete With Yourself

Whether you’re an engineer, a CEO, or a finance expert, interview nervousness can affect even the best-prepared job candidate. Here is some tips on how to deal with interview nerves.

1) Get the interviewer to talk first and give yourself time to calm yourself - for example ask...

• “How long have you worked here?”
• “I am curious - why did you join this company?”
• “Where did you work before here?”

2) Change your thinking. Think about the interview as a conversation between two professionals on a subject of mutual interest (your fit with the job that you are being interviewed for). Behave like an employee discussing your first work assignment.

3) Know your Interviewer. Use your network (or your headhunter) to find out who is going to interview you, not just the company name but the name of the person. Learn about their background. LinkedIn can help here, Google is good too. Study news articles and other facts about the company. Research the interviewer. See if you can find out their style so you know what to expect.

What do you do to control interview nerves? Post your methods and let’s comment on what works best. Join us on the blog,