Lessons

Lesson Info

Mock Interviews

What I want to do now is go into the interview stuff are we all good on? We go right to write so I want to bring one person up who's willing to get interviewed like in a real job interview we're going to get another chair in here if we can and they're gonna come up here and we're going to do just a mock interview it's going to be pretty easy nobody's going to cry in the first couple of minutes and I'm going to ask these questions like a regular hiring manager now whether or not you you're applying for a job or not it doesn't matter to me, but what we're going to do is watch what happens okay, we're going to see and I'm gonna critique it and you're gonna walk away here in just a few minutes being radically better interviewing so who wants to step up and come up to the interview hotsy sarah come on up, drew won't you come up through? You're gonna be interviewing pretty soon. All right, let's get the chair beautiful I do so it's gonna be pretty easy but we're going to set a in role play o...

kay? We're not going to escape till I say so so give us a scenario you are you said twenty two years old yes and uh you are going to be applying to what kinds of jobs probably education related media or education really jobs perfect okay so I'm going to set the snare here being you are well you're you you graduated with a degree in whatever and I for the purpose of the story we're gonna gloss over some stuff and and I am I'm hiring an advertising coordinator an entry level advertising corded does that make sense okay um can I quickly ask you doesn't matter what the what the rolls are for the position actually why don't you pick a role so I'll go with that what's a role that you know really well um that's a good question I'm applying to all sorts of things not necessarily rules that I have ever been give me a title what's a job title that year we can go with advertising okay advertising corners you're gonna do something in advertising okay? Entry great. Okay, well drew thanks for coming in. I really appreciate you taking the time. No problem. So, uh why are you interested in the advertising coordinator position at acme corp? Well, I uh I have a history of being involved in a number of different aspects of of business. Uh my last job I was I ran actually a branch of a cheering company back in los angeles I was basically given the job of running my own branch of the company hands that included marketing and include advertising um so I was forced to being a role where I needed teo get myself out there and get my name out there as a tutor um so I you know, for example I reached out to local businesses local newspaper is putting ads in those and ask them to be business partners with me um so really bringing it back I was running my own branch of the company so I had I have involvement and I really loved the advertising and so one more time why do you want to work here as an advertising coronary acne? Courtney well, I love what act colder is doing uh, the background I've done playing research into you guys and I think there's a certain aspect of advertising that can be changed and you could be pushing in your direction and I think that, uh there are plenty of people here that have great ideas and I would like to be part of it. Um tell me a little bit. I'm looking at your resume. Uh, tell me a little bit about your background. Well, I have as you can see on their resume I have a background in play different things. Um it goes to media I was a part of photography, I worked in photography company um I have like I said before I was tearing business was a big deal for me I was also a part I was the russian recruitment sharing my fraternity and I dealt a lot with again advertising business I was in charge of budgets of five to six figures I was in charge of getting all of all the data and analytics for a number of different things that was in charge of keeping people and getting information from them so I have a lot of history with people a lot of history of interest acting and I can really bring a lot of things that people great okay let's pause there first a huge round of applause it takes incredible courage to come up here in front of just this audience not even to mention them. Tony watch yeah there's no way it's just you and me and nobody's watching so what what did he do really well let's talk about that feel free to shout it out because I have a number of things you did really well, what do you do? Well, com huh? I really enjoy a lot more comfortable in your skin you weren't like, anxious or fifty what else it looks like he kept eye contact true he listened to your questions when you sort of kind of interrupted you steered him in a different direction and he did not go off to where he felt stronger maybe if if he felt stronger in a different place than answering that direct question he didn't answer those questions if anybody noticed the first time I asked him why do you want to work here? He didn't really answer my question, so I brought him back and he then answered my question he got it and that's ok it's ok you know interviewers know that you're going to nervous the first time so they're usually pretty nice they'll ask what I asked you okay? So tell me again and you picked up on my whisper and you answered it that was really good it's all it's ok to make a mistake and you could bring it back just like he did what else did you do? Well, it was great that even in answering the first question when he wasn't answering it directly, he bragged about something that he had done really well, it gives me even though it was a bit off on a tangent little bit long it did give me something to be like, so wait a minute you were this a leader of this russian friend so tell me more about that right gave me something to hook into anything from the internet that we didn't hear yet yeah, we have a few different things heather jay said that drew speaks moodley fan drew uh kim burgess burgess said that uh like that he had outlined what he had done in the past um darla sutton he said, for example indeed yeah, that was really good that that was really good now what do you think? Well what did you feel most comfortable about in that response that you gave me in that first response in the whole south and I mean I felt like I was trying to I think I gave you a pretty decent history of what I've done and how it related tio yeah what do you think he could have done better short of the first part yeah for sure I was starting to ramble but I trying to cut myself up yeah um you know it's in a situation like this it's hard when I don't know the background yeah everything but I really tried teo relate everything I could have done it better but you did a great job for being up here for the first time being mocking me like this I think my critique really it would be just to cut the the answer down and you didn't of course answer my first question but you got that on the second time I liked how you went for the for example even though it was a bit long it was like much more detail than most people who stay way up here and we never actually connect so I thought that was really good um body language was great you don't smile too much yeah you're not a spine like guys don't really smile that much it's just this is how we are but when you do smile it's actually very disarming you can get away with a lot if you smile yeah I said it yeah way little moment going on here actually you can get away with a lie a lot if you smile like I could talk about how I got a terrible grade terrible my ap math test or for example or in college for my programming class but if I kind of smile like yeah I mean it probably wasn't the best example of my academic performance but I learned a lot from it and then I boom boom boom boom boom very serious that totally changes the tenor of the conversation right? So what's one thing let me ask you a question it's going to be some random question and I want you to smile in the answer okay? And I want you to notice the words he uses in his totality and face er right um you know, one thing I notice is that you're interested in both advertising and also technology why did you choose advertising to interview with? Well, like I said before, advertising is is fairly new to me but it's also something I really wanna pursue um you know, a lot of things in the past I said, like I said before I've been really scattered and I've never really had a path so to say, but I've kind of changed that now and I know the advertising is something I wanna follow also technology I don't really understand all of it so I figure advertising is a great way to go for it okay, that was better not the biggest smile right? It wasn't to smiling it was a little bit you got a little crack of a smell I want you to be like no, I want you to go for a real smile a real smile like a true smile you gotta forces were not I know we're not used to this it's super weird I'm asking same question ok eso advertising market before we go on sorry do you sing? I can't come up with like a story I make it out head should I yeah I just say say yeah whatever you want all right what? You're going to realize that smile you're gonna realize why this is important in one second so make it up I couldn't care less about what you say okay I, um advertising technology why why this well, I've seen you know, a number of people that I know closely follow advertising they absolutely love it and I want to find something that I actually you can follow in love uh my first career ok, good, good better try this try this um uh, you know, I actually actually thought about that a lot and when I was first deciding where to work I looked at both industries actually went out and researched it with ten or twenty people from each industry but when it came down to make the decision I thought back to when I ran my russian friend and actually matters like twenty five people and one time we had to figure out a way to drink generate seventy five thousand dollars a revenue by next tuesday can you actually imagine having to do that with a bunch of college kids you don't even know what they're doing so we actually ended up using advertising to drive a ton of revenue and we were able to send sixty thousand dollars to the local charity hospital like to me that's when I realized the power of advertising and that's when I knew that I wanted to work here and after I started doing my research acne b was pretty much the only choice make it look really thank you very much but what what did I do? They're right this smile and I'm not a smiley guy actually I told the creative life staff to remind me a smile because I actually still find it a struggle to smile a lot that's true but what did I do with the smile? What did you notice when I was smiling? It made it a lot easier to have this conversation and it wasn't like an interview it was more like that just a conversation yeah and I completely disarmed or you when you smile completely disarm me in fact you almost short circuit me neurologically not actually but you almost short circuit me when you smile that's why I said it almost doesn't matter what you say because when you smile you actually connect on a toy different level and you know who knows this really well women because they smile naturally and they said they can see a reaction instantly they see things that men don't see for a variety of biological reasons and social reasons to so guys and that's the reason I want to bring you up here it's one of the things that really tests guys is body language and body language could be this because we tend to sit back our legs really spread and also just like smiling we're like masculine dudes and when I talk about smiling it's kind of like it's kind of weird this is like a little bit weird but actually it's very important so I'm not saying green like this all the time I'm saying use it strategically because what I did was I took that smile who noticed what I did with a smile I talk what did I do you a lot more in the first half than you did in the second half and interestingly I looked around the room we were all smiling back watch you can't resist it you cannot resist smiling when someone else smiles in a general way what's that doing it's instantly making you connect and iceman I watch what I did I smile I said she'll it's funny you mention that and I said I was deciding between these two I research twenty people suddenly showing that I do a lot of work and then and then it made me remember back to my russian friend which I ran and we had to raise seventy five thousand dollars now it's like a pretty emotional topic and then I made a quick little g rated joke can you imagine doing that with a bunch of college kids that don't know what they're doing and the guy's like hot but it's not it's not x rated joke it's a g rated joke we can all agree ha ha that's funny at least this guy has a sense of humor move on. So then I was like we had to re seven five thousand dollars and this is how we did it and advertising I was able to give sixty kaye to the hospital that was a nice old I made that up but it became clear that there was only one choice I mean the guy's like jesus sign here's the offer letter right now but what it's not just what I said right? And obviously I have a lot of practice doing this we can all get good really good but what I'm highlighting here is the power of the narrative you can brag about yourself without bragging I brag about my accomplishments in a story right? We're going to one more question then we're going to wrap it it didn't seem like bragging did it? I mean a little bit I probably come off a little bit more let's say cocky than the average person in the interview I know that I acknowledge it I have to consciously work with that smile you know kind of self deprecate because I know myself other people know that they come off as too self deprecating so they have to actually pump it up so no yourself and manage it all we're going to do a couple more questions you wanted to uh we'll say this is a tough one alright say uh so drew what is your greatest weakness question uh I would say my greatest weakness is why I really don't think about that um can I ask you a question sure off no I'm not okay all right cool. Uh this is tough. You can ask me a question is your interview d'oh? I would say my greatest weakness is uh having having a tendency to do too much and doing too much work uh you know there's always it there's always a deadline and there's always uh, amount of work you need to do and sometimes I need I surpassed that do too much okay, stop right there. Who here believes that answer no one you don't even believe it it's true it's not give me a second I know, I know, I know. Okay, so this is an answer every single part now this is an answer that everyone needs to be prepared to answer a question to be pretty you didn't believe it we knew you didn't believe it we didn't believe it so I want to highlight this I'm not coming down on you at all there's a tough question if you bullshit your way through an interview they will know and interviewers way more skilled than you he sees more interviews and you can imagine in a day so do not try to lie do not try to take my dream job scripts and make them your own if they're not true. All right? The point of this is to make it your own who here has a good weakness answer go ahead delta lot with being an over communicator. There are times that I think it's important to give a lot of information in there times that I think it's important to do your job and deliver the delivery bols cut the fat um I've noticed that myself and it's something that I'm working towards and I'm excited to deliver the optimal amount of communication in our relationship together what you guys think wow applies exactly pretty good I'm gonna tweak that a little bit but you actually followed the structure almost perfectly what is ok what people don't realize is when someone's asking for your greatest weakness where they really asking they want to know what your weekend says yes in fact every interview question follows the same pattern they want to know the answer to the question but they want to know the deeper answer they want to know your key message okay so when I'm asking about your weakness what I really want to know is first of all that your snobby jubal enough to acknowledge that you have a weakness everybody has weaknesses top performers the best people I know best people I know they're so candid about their weaknesses their like well, you know what I'm actually I'm good at a couple things but I'm pretty bad at a few things and then they want to know that you are self aware enough to be working on them to improve it now you just said you're working to improve it but that's generic you need to show me so let me try uh say that back to you okay um once you asked me you know the weakness question um what is your weakness? Well there's a lot but you know, one of the ones that I've really noticed in the last few in the last couple of years has been that I tend to over communicate sometimes so for example I might have a senior person like my senior manager in my last company he might say, listen, I need this thing by tomorrow and I will ask him do I understand that and can I also have this can also add that what about this? Will you need this as well? And a couple of times I noticed him being very curt with me just saying, look, just send it to me, okay? I have other things to do and that was when I kind of started paying attention to knowing when to give the right amount of information sometimes you actually need to send this much sometimes you don't need to send this much. So a couple of things I did to try to improve that one actually went to a dale carnegie institute and I attended that and that really helped me learn x y z on the other thing I've been doing is just paying attention to the senior people in my company really studying how they communicate the emails they send sometimes they're so short and sometimes there's this long they intuitively know how long to send and I'm just learning that so it's something that I'm definitely working on hopefully in the cover letter and resumes and emails we've exchanged you see that it's something that I'm certainly trying to improve on, okay so you know you have to applaud me is what I do for a living so don't interview me all right? So so I think I actually messed up in the beginning I said there are so many that was just nervousness I don't need to say that that's self deprecating why don't this is an interview this's not mr remi it's eighties therapy session so I overdid that that was not good I thought the rest of it was good but I thought it could been improved it was a little long what do you guys think? What what did you notice in that answer when you asked this question you're establishing three really clear facts in the candidate are they self aware? Do they know themselves strengths weaknesses secondly art are they um can they be proactive once they identify it? Are they do they crumble when there's a mistake or they willing to take action and fix it? Um and after about the third I'm sorry something I notice is well, just picking that up um is that I think especially younger people right drew when things happen to us at work that are negative like the terse e mails how many and how many of us just like, sit around and bitch about it and I like this person's tourists to me, you know, this sucks this company sucks, you know, um I liked what you did. Where you said. I noticed that this was happening, and I looked internally for the answer. Taking responsibility. Super high competence, trigger top performers always do that. Always they they they're like, look, I could blame a million people, but there's, one person I can blame will go to the web in one second. But, uh, on the key thing, the key thing I did there that nobody quite picked up on was I told the story. You cannot stop listening to an engaging story. Humans physically cannot stop listening to an engaging story. I took you along that path with me, and at each point, just as I did in the earlier one with the frat, you couldn't stop listening. Now, the story wasn't that interesting. Really. I too, frat seventy five k. I mean, whatever. But I had pauses. It got emotional. We talk same thing here. I took a dale carnegie institute, by the way, that brought down the house in this room. Everyone's like, jesus, this guy just how did you do that? Like I made it up. I made it up. So it's. Easy to make it up on the spot, right, easy with a lot of practice, but what could you do to address your biggest weakness? Everyone right now, you know that you're going to be asked in the interview. What is your greatest weakness? So, what are you doing proactively to fix it? You could do. You could take a dale carnegie institute class. All right, you could take this class. You could buy the recording of this class and watch it and practices again and again. Okay, so there are many things you can do or you could sit around and do nothing and be unprepared for the question. So main points there were the store. We're going to one last question. Uh, main points. There were the story. I told a story, and you came along for the ride, and I wrapped it up with a tidy, both the end. Something you will learn with practice. Okay, last question, you know, drew, I've really enjoyed talking to today, but I'm gonna be totally candid with you. I have a lot of applicants, there's. Some people have more experience than you there's some people who they may have a better g p a then you, uh, why should I choose you? Well, I'm a very quick learner, uh, you know, in college that would take me. It'll be easy for me to help out my friends because I would learn things quickly um over the other candidates you know, I think I stand out because of that fact you know I'm losing it right now so completely training um pick it up from the top why should I choose you okay um I stand out because I'm very quickly um other people may have a better g p a and other people may be more qualified, but I think that since I'm a quick learner I can I can come in and I can really get a hold of things quickly I can learn what I need to learn um I can give you what you need, okay? All right um thoughts how do you feel saying that? Not great, ok, why? I have no idea, but it just didn't feel good it didn't feel right you ended on like kind of a dot dot dot right? One thing I learned from my mental bj fog, he said at the end of a presentation you know, some experts say don't say thank you because the audience should be thanking you whatever he's like end on a strong note, I learned this with a lot of practice you'll notice every professional goes on tv, they always say data and data and that's why I did that in a da it's like a song almost so but you didn't know where you were going, so I kind of just dragged off at the very least you can restate the question you can say, you know, so that's that's why, you know, I think that I stand out among my peers or something like that anybody else noticed anything here was a tough question for this type of question, uh, because it's such I've asked you so many broad questions, these air intentionally really tough I said, like, tell me about yourself oh my god, you could go in a million different directions, right? But there are frameworks you can apply to each of these questions where it's almost like this is what happens when I started getting really good at this, they would ask the question and I would instantly see the map in my head. You guys remember that movie with nash, the mathematician movie, right? And he sees those things it wasn't like that I'm not that cool, but it wasn't actually anything at all like that, but I knew that I had I knew the type of question he was going to ask cause I'd seen it because I'd done a lot of interviews I also knew that I had a bunch of stories right here in my back pocket in my quiver, right? My story toolbox it just came together I also use certain techniques like I have a little a couple of fillers that I can use the beginning while my mind ramps up and then it all comes together again this happens with practice so can I take a crack at that absolute asked me the question why should choose washington why should I choose you well that's a that's a really tough questions I think a really fair question candidly you probably have a lot of people with more experience than me so why would you choose someone who's relatively inexperienced but the way I think about it I think about it in three different ways the first one is you know, a demonstrated interest in advertising so I didn't just choose to interview with you because I had nothing else to do if you actually look I ran the advertising club in college actually applied some of that by running the russian fret and using that teo generate sixty thousand dollars and donated this is something that I've been fascinated in both on a practical level and even on an academic level attending conferences about advertising things like that the second thing is, uh the second thing is it's actually slipping my mind excuse me? The second thing is that I want to take what I've done and apply it to a larger a stage so I've been working you know, in a small level a college level etcetera but now I want to take it to a bigger league and then that leads naturally to the third one which is I like you and like anyone want to work with the best so we all know that acne is the best I'm not just saying that to butter you up the things you've done in terms of the x y z campaign and abc campaign those are things I studied those are things I think that I could contribute to but I also know that I have a lot to learn so yes there may be people who have more experience than me but I think if you actually consider all the things on balance demonstrated track record wanted to take it to a bigger stage and also you know, knowing that I can contribute so much and also learned from you then that is the reason that I would actually like me okay so I actually did you notice how I messed up in the middle my brain just went boom that was real I actually couldn't think of it I was real I didn't mess up on purpose I'm not trying to make this flawless let's edit that out please actually I did mess up my brain went blank because I wanted to take the smaller stage to the larger stage I wanted to make that the third one the crescendo and then I couldn't think of the second one so I was like ah shit so I put that as the second and then I came up with a third one as I was doing the second one okay it seems like black magic right now because you're like how is this guy doing all this stuff whatever but this is just practice practice practice imagine you break it down you you start to interview you start to answer interview questions you start to see the same questions over and over your testing your answers you know the questions they're gonna ask you know the words they want to hear and use you get so good at this that you could answer almost anything you see why I said that my dream job students they could take my scripts and they can probably get a second round interview but the top students I actually know how to internalize it they can take and perry and genuinely answer virtually any question so does that make sense to you what would you take away from this exercise in terms of your interview? Well, I know that I need thio sit down and actually think of questions and you think of my answers uh and more importantly I need to be able to come up with a relatable things stories from my backgrounds and at least concrete examples from things I've done yeah and be able to relate them not just to you the interview about the company awesome job well done amazing so anyone else totally impressed by droop like first of all just the fact to get up on stage is incredible that is ballsy and then the answers for never really having done a mock interviews that your first time and I've done like one that's incredible really really great stuff it shows you that with just a little bit of practice you can you know you can take those answers and in fact he did that on the first one he took an answer that was a bit rambling he made it really good imagine if you do that five or ten times just five or ten times in your life how much better would you be then everyone else incredible that's how my students go on to get twenty thousand dollars raises thirty thousand dollars new jobs it's not because they're the biggest geniuses in the world they understood the systematic process and they actually put in the work and went through it anybody have any reactions questions comments on that on then we're going to ask one of my students robert to come out in just a cup in just a few minutes reactions from here and reactions from the web what we have from here anybody I'm highly impressed that if that was the only other done one other interview and you are like with him of all people with a studio audience talking about I mean it's like that is insanely impressive that you were that calm and did that well if I really hope that you feel that and take that confidence with you because I couldn't have done that I don't think a lot of people watching could have done that so big thick froth the internet as well drew folks are saying awesome drew I was sweating bullets just watching you great job drew did it great he was so calm yeah that gave me anxiety watching good job drew so yeah that was you ninja drew slip me a twenty before so he could do a little singles exercise up here all right so so I do have a question okay people were asking about how you can practice this sort of thing so great so toastmasters people were bringing other coffee chats or very simple there's there's two or three stages to it the first is you actually write down the questions that you're going to get you can predict eighty percent of the questions just on the top your head and if you don't know go to google and search for common interview questions five minutes okay this is the laziest thing people do they walk into an interview and there's surprise I'm like you're surprised they ask you the questions that everyone asks all right so you can predict those the second thing is s o you can write your answers for them literally script him out then you can start saying them actually just say them out loud and people like oh my god that's so weird to say that a lot in front of a mirror I actually think it's weird to be losing fifty one hundred three hundred thousand dollars over your lifetime because you were unwilling to do this for one weekend then what you do is you call upon your friends who's pretty good at this kind of stuff they don't have to be a master interviewer they just have a good job you say listen would you be willing to interview me and give me some feedback they'll come over on a saturday they'll ask you this the final stages to videotape yourself videotape this interaction this is really scary I'll tell you I went on tv I went on a lot of places before I went on a book tour and I told my publisher will you guys get me media training? They're like why we think you're really good we've seen you on tv I was like in my head I was like because you're going to pay for it but I told him like I want to perfect my craft so they sent me to media training and media training was really good they took my book she had read it and she said this was clarity media group by the way I'm happy to promote them they uh the lady who was there was terrific she asked me some questions that I would get on a tv show, and they videotape my answers. And I thought I was so savvy, and I watched the video tape, and I was like, oh my god, I hate this guy. I hate me. I hated myself, and we did it over and over and over again in one afternoon, and I became much crisper and able tto anticipate and wrap it up. So right now, if the cameraman tells me, like, wrap it up, I can wrap it up right now, or if I need to stretch it out twenty minutes. I could do that, too. Just a lot of practice. So that's, how we do it.