Things Not to Do in Interview

Stop wasting the time of your and your interviewer.

Photo by Van Tay Media on Unsplash

Interview is important part to get a new job, but there are few traits found in some candidate which are no good sign in the interview. I have taken number of interviews where I have noticed behaviors explained below.

Not Appearing On Time

When any HR person calls to the candidate about scheduling the time, some candidate just agrees to it whiout even thinking about their current job work. And when time comes, they are just not available for the interview. Most of the time the candidate even won’t pick up the phone and once they do, they give excuse. This is very frequent and gives bad impression.

What You Should Do?

Check your own timetable twice before confirming interview schedule. Once confirmed, if there is any change call the recruiter to change the schedule and give the valid reason.

Wrong Information In Resume

I noticed few times that the candidate gives false information about their experience on the technology. Because of the information of resume, as an interviewer I will have the more expectations then from the candidate. All the truth reveals when we are in the interview round and the candidate is not capable to give answers.

What You Should Do?

Write only what is correct. If you have just seen or only read about the feature or behavior of the programming language, don’t add it in your resume as a experience. If the interviewer asks you any question which you don’t know then it is more better to tell NO politely instead of looking fool.

Not Checking About Company And Work

Each and every company has a different environment, technology stack and projects. There is a highly possibility that another company will not give you same experience like you are getting in current company.

I have seen my some friends sending resume to all the companies they find in the list. They just don't look at what that company does or if that company works on. The real issue happens when they are in the interview round and knowing that company works very less or not at all in that technology they wanted to work.

For Example, I have seen some candidate making mistakes regarding Salesforce Commerce Cloud with other Salesforce platforms.

What You Should Do?

Remember that there is a difference between every different platform. Even if different platforms are owned or controlled by the same company. Double read the job description you are applying to. Double confirm with the recruiter if you still have questions on the job description.

Overconfident

I have seen candidates with higher dose of confident even when they have no experience. It is also related to providing false information on the resume. They try to over sell on their knowledge. Once checking the resume and in discussion with the candidate, it was not sure what kind of experience he has. Upon asking he said that I can ask him anything about the technology. But he has no idea on the general concept of the feature. This also hurts your evaluation.

What You Should Do?

Don’t try to oversell about your experience and work. The interviewer will eventually find out about the experience level you have. Always tell the truth. If you have no idea about the feaute then denying politely would be better than looking fool after selling overconfidence.

Unrelated and Not Satisfactory Answers

I met a candidate on online interview. He was giving me short answers but not relevant to the question.

For example, I asked to candidate about How promotions are setup in SFCC? He answers, it works because he saw it worked in his computer setup by another developer. When I asked him to give more information about how it was done he said above was the answer.

Once, the question was to explain content asset in SFCC and the candidate explained all about content slots in SFCC. There is a fundamental difference between both features.

What You Should Do?

Take a pause and think about the question twice. If you have still doubt on the question ask to repeat the question.

Buying Time in Wrong Way

Occasionally I notice some candidate when they need some time before answering, they pretend of voice breaking or internet not working, but actually he has idea about that because, he repeated the same question I asked.

Once the candidate forgot to mute the microphone and start asking his companion supporting him in background. Perks of having online interview.

In another occasion, the candidate started typing on his computer to search for answer. He first mentioned about not knowing the answer at all, then mean time he started typing constantly on his computer but definitely he was not typing to me. And then he answered fully without a pause.

What You Should Do?

Take a pause and mention that you need few seconds or a minute to think or pass if you have no answer. Read concepts before you join the interview to answer quickly with less pause.

Conclusion

Above are the things which will affect your evaluation badly if continue to do so. Try to improve using “What you should do?” section.

If you are an interviewer, comment if you have seen such scenario.