Becoming Who You Want To Be

You know that when you go in to that interview room, you are going to get bombarded with a load of interview questions don’t you. Most of the questions can sound like gobble-dee-gook, sometimes. You must stay with the programme and focus on responding to their questions as best you can. I remember that some of my answers in an interview of mine, initially seemed crazy, but ended up getting me one of my most enthralling posts…

A few years ago, I applied for a teacher’s assistant post at our local junior school. After the preliminary greetings, I found myself sat across from the headmistress. She wanted me to answer the “What’s your greatest weakness?” question. I don’t know if it was the whole – sitting in front of the head teacher thing – but I just blurted out the truth. I told her that when I first meet a new person, I am usually painfully shy and quiet. The challenge is that people can think that I am a little aloof and remote. To my huge relief – she just laughed and confided in me that she had the same issues when she was at my stage of career.

So, you shouldn’t be scared by your weakness and never be frightened of going with the truth. If you tell them what the issues are, you will naturally be more believable and come up with more interesting answers. If you just go with the old faithful answers, such as “I please too many people”, then you risk being perceived as false and untrustworthy.

What clinched my interview for the teaching place was a lot more unexpected than I thought. I was asked an excruciatingly easy question that almost made me marvel, “What is this lady getting at?” The director gazed at me earnestly, cocked her head to one side, and inquired, “If I needed to send you into a room by yourself for a few minutes, and you weren’t used to the schoolroom or the children, what would your initial response be?” I chuckled and answered, “Probably try to placate them and keep them occupied by playing the Hokey Pokey, or another sort of game.”

Do you know what? A few months later, when I was in the post – the head teacher told me that the reason that she gave me the job was that mad answer!? She was intrigued by my honesty and felt that my personality would be the biggest asset that the school would use. Weird eh?

As ever, it is always sensible to ask those close to you to help you to formulate your answers to these questions. They know you well and care about you. It will be embarassing as they will start to rib you about some of your responses – but just keep persevering as it is better to be made fun of by those who are on your side than find yourself underprepared by the interview panel!