A few months ago, I was pretty good at nailing job interviews and going through my experience. I interviewed yesterday with a company and I was extremely bad at introducing myself and what I’m looking for.
For those who had a similar situation, what helped you gain back that skill quickly and retain it?
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As the saying goes: Practice makes a man perfect.
All you have to do is keep practicing, do a lot of mock interviews, till you get the confidence.
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It’s easy. You just have to do three things:
- Practice
- Practice and
- Practice.
Hope you got it.
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+1 to both of the above. I also find that good interview candidates answer questions by telling compelling stories about their experience and career. I’ve taken the time before to review my career and work out which stories I want to make sure I tell and how best to tell them (and then again, practice with friends).
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Take mocks as often as possible prior to the weeks you have your interviews scheduled.
30-45 min PM interviews usually seek to learn about your communication style and the clarity in your thoughts. So it really helps to be open to critical feedback during mocks.
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- Talk to yourself. Seriously. Actually practicing saying the words out loud, even alone, is huge. Even if it feels a bit nutty. I tend to go over things like this — interviews, presentations — ad nauseum, whenever I’m alone.
- Find the structure for your intro that feels the most natural and practice it until you can deliver it without thinking about it.
What has always worked for me for the 5-10 minute “tell us about yourself” question is:
Present — Start with the present. Where do you work? What do they do? What are you accountable and responsible for? Stick to things that are relevant for the company, role, and what you want in the future.
Past — Then go right back to the beginning of your career (or decently far back if your career has spanned > 10 years). Where did you go to school? Where’d you start? Why and how did you end up in product? Strive to build a narrative around this journey. This is your origin story!
Future — Why are you interested in this company and role? What are you looking for? Why does it excite you?
Personal — Cap it off with a couple of short personal details. Hobbies, interests, etc. But keep it brief. Just enough to make you more relatable and spark some conversation.
Overall:
a) Always aim to be excited by and interested in things that are relevant to the role. You don’t just want the role — you’re excited to dive deeper in subject XYZ because of your experience at company ABC, and so on.
b) Look for opportunities to build rapport with the interviewer(s) — common locations, interests, companies — and to flip the interview to be more of a conversation rather than an interrogation. But be mindful of rambles and tangents while doing this!
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All great suggestions. I would also like to add:
- Introspecting what changed between now and a few months ago?
- Why did you think you interviewed better a few months back than now?
- How good were you towards the start of your interview process a few months ago? Is it simply a matter of practice or is it something deeper?
- Are you interviewing for similar roles that you interviewed for a few months ago to now? Are you looking for a step up role that you are not very confident of bringing out in your experiences? And thereby leading to you not being able to articulate what you want?
- Have you changed your stories from a few months ago to more newer stories in your present role? If so, all the previous suggestions of practicing will help you nail down the delivery.
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