Challenges and Solutions
How many people do you suppose go into an interview with solutions to the challenges that your prospective company is facing? Or the challenges that the person conducting the interview is facing? Now having solutions would presuppose that one also knows what those challenges are. Yet imagine, how powerful the interview presentation would be if one knew the challenges and had the solutions going into an interview. What kind of leg up would that give you?
Knowing what the challenges are.
Well, we have talked before about the virtues of applying for a job through the help wanted or online postings versus jobs identified through networking and research. Well, that discussion is not relevant here. Because regardless of which avenue you took to get the interview, you have gotten the interview. Congratulations. Now a whole new phase of work begins. Once an interview is set, you need to go into research overdrive, but you knew that, right?
During this research, you need to do a business analysis. As best as you can, you are going look at the organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. For the interview preparation, you are going to really focus on the last two. The opportunities and threats that the organization, or department, is facing.
As for the strengths and weaknesses, that knowledge will be helpful but during an interview, it seems to me that hitting on strengths would be gratuitous and spending time going over an organization’s weaknesses self-defeating.
Understanding the opportunities and the threats, though, can demonstrate that you are forward thinking and a solutions-based individual. And that is what you want.
So, what is your solution?
Here is what the interviewer is going to love hearing. Your solutions. But not some pie in the sky imaginings. You must have a solid and reasonable 30 - 60 - 90 day plan to address the opportunities and threats that your potential employer is facing or will face. A 90 day plan that you preface by stating the obvious, which is that the 90 day plan is based on what you know as an outsider.
The key is not that you have an implementable plan, but that you want to demonstrate your skills at analyzing and synthesizing data; thought process in looking ahead; and ability to bring it together and create an actionable plan. Your interviewer will love it. You immediately bring value with you.
It is not you looking for a job with hat in hand. The interviewer does not hold the keys to your wildest dreams. You are both on equal footing looking, examining, imagining how mutually beneficial it would be to bring you on board. But you must bring value. Your past is your past. And as they say in investments, past performance is no guarantee of future success.
Unless, you walk in with a solid 30 - 60 - 90 day plan that speaks to the potential employer’s opportunities and threats. Backed with a past record of success, you start to look like a winner and sure bet to the interviewer.
That’s the ticket!
H. Kim has been up and down the corporate ladder so much, he’s on first name basis with each rung. Which is a good thing, because it lets him use all the successes, and more importantly, the mistakes, he’s made in his blog, “Landing On Your Feet: A Help You Find a Job Blog.” Strategies, Tips and Advice, a few laughs and a couple of words of wisdom are all it is. Visit him today at http://www.LandingOnYourFeet.com
Useful Links:
Fully understanding your personal finances can be achieved by using professional finance software or creating complex budgeting sheets to track your expenditure.