If you don’t believe in yourself, how can you expect the prospective employer to?

Showing confidence and self-belief is reassuring to a prospective employer. If you appear self-assured, an interviewer will feel confident in your abilities.

As part of your interview preparation, consider how you would answer the following questions, should an interviewer ask them.

• Would you describe yourself as self-motivated? If yes, why?
• Can you give an example of a time when you made a suggestion to improve something at work?
• What happened? Was it implemented?
• What was the level of supervision in your last job?
• What was your relationship with your supervisor/manager like?
• How would your last manager/ current manager rate your performance and how would you rate it yourself (self-awareness)
• If I was to ask your last supervisor or a colleague to describe you, what would they say?
• What gets you out of bed in the morning? (The answer is not an alarm clock!)

Organisational Skills

• In your last / current job, how did you go about organising your day?
• Can you describe a time when you were under pressure at work? How did you go about handling the pressure?
• Would you describe yourself as organised? What makes you describe yourself in this way?

Teamwork

• Can you tell me about a time when you helped a team you were part of achieve its goals?
• Can you tell me about a time there was conflict in a team you were in, what happened and how was it resolved?
• Do you prefer to work alone on a task or with others?
• Does anything frustrate you about working with other people on a daily basis?
• Are you a member of any teams or groups outside work?

Ambition

• Would you describe yourself as ambitious? If yes, why?
• If we were to hire you, how long would you see yourself staying with us?
• Where would you like to see yourself in 5 years’ time?
• Do you plan to study further in any particular area?

The awkward questions!

• Why should we choose you for this position?
• Could you tell me a bit about yourself?
• What do you feel are your main strengths?
• What do you know about this company?
• What do you think you would bring to this role?
• Why do you want to work for the company?