things to avoid in a job interview

4 Things To Never Do In A Job Interview

If you’ve got a job interview coming up, you are going to want to watch this video because we are going to talk about the four things that you should never do in a job interview.

#1: Never complain about your previous roles, company, or management

And the first thing that you should never do in any job interview, whether it’s with a recruiter or with a hiring manager, is complain about your previous roles, the previous company or your previous line managers. So when you step into a job interview, you want to make a great impression.

Obviously, you want to leave them with the lasting feeling of confidence in you and your ability as a person to deliver on the job that they’re hiring for. And part of their assessment that they’re going to make on you during the job interview is about how you carried yourself in the interview, how you communicated, and what was the general feeling, what was the general vibe and the impression that you gave them.

And now it obviously goes without saying that you want that impression to be positive, not negative. So if you go into that job interview and they ask you, well, why you looking to interview for this role? Why are you leaving your current company?

You don’t want to use that avenue as an opportunity to just completely rant and complain about why your current role sucks, why you’re underappreciated, why your line manager is not a good person or just not a good line manager at all.

You want to keep the mood positive

Because when you do that, you’re going to bring the mood absolutely down, but it just doesn’t bode well to hear someone come into a job interview and the first thing they do is just complain and blame their current circumstances and blame the current company that they work for, for why they’re unhappy and why they’re miserable, and why they’re looking to change jobs.

Now, this might actually be a super valid reason in terms of why you’re looking to change jobs, but you just don’t need to air that dirty laundry in the job interview. Like I said, you want to keep things positive and you want to spend more time in the job interview talking about the role you’re hiring for, why it is such an incredible opportunity and why you’re really excited about it and focus less on the past and the terrible job that you’re maybe trying to get away from.

So that’s my first tip. Never do this in a job interview. Never go in there and start complaining about your current company, your current role, or your previous management. You want to keep things positive and focus on the future.

#2: Don’t be late for the job interview

Now, tip number two of things you never want to do in a job interview is be late. You never, ever, ever want to be late for a job interview. And on the flip side, you obviously always want to be super, super early.

So that literally means the night before your job interview, spending some time to map out your route to the job interview, how you’re going to get there, where you’re going to park, are you using public transport, and allowing yourself a buffer of at least 20 minutes to get there on time, settle yourself, have a drink of water, mentally prepare some of your questions before you go into the job interview.

So you’re not rushed, you’re not exasperated as you go in, but you’re calm, you’re cool, you’re collected, you’re relaxed, and you can go in with a steady mind. So there’s obviously two parts there in terms of why you want to be early. If your job interview one is just to show the interviewer that you’re punctual, that you’re professional, that you’re on time, that you take their time very seriously, but also just for yourself so that you can get there early and prepare yourself so that you’re

Collected and calm. Your breathing is all calm and ready once you go into that job interview. If you’re hiring for a role in a particular team and you’re a hiring manager, for example, you’re not part of hr, but you are a line manager and a particular team that’s hiring a role, then you are hiring for this role over and above your existing duties in your job. So you are very time poor. You want to get this person in roles as fast as possible, and you’re not going to look too favorably on people who are wasting your time. So never be late, always be early for every job interview that you go for.

#3: Failing to research the company that you’re interviewing with

Tip number three in terms of things you should never do in a job interview is all about failing to research the company that you’re interviewing with. So no doubt when you go into a job interview, the company is going to ask you or the hiring manager or the recruiter, what do you know about our company?

And they’re not expecting you to understand every single nook and cranny of their particular business or industry, but they do expect you to have at least gone to their website, maybe gone to their social media and got a general feel for what this company is, what they do, what they sell, and who they sell it to. This shows that you’re interested, you’re proactive, you’re engaged, and you’re excited about getting this role and that you take it seriously because if you don’t take it seriously, they’re not going to take you seriously.

So it’s super important in the week leading up to the job interview that you’ve spent some time to learn about their company and come prepared with questions when you step into the job interview.

#4: Failing to mentally prepare answers to common behavioural based questions

Which brings us at tip number four in terms of things that you should never do in a job interview, which is all about failing to mentally prepare answers to very common behavioral based questions.

So it’s fair to say in almost every job interview that you step inside, you are going to be asked very similar set of questions. Tell me about yourself. What do you know about our company and what do you understand this role to be? Tell me about a challenge you faced in your previous role and how you overcame it, how your coworkers might describe you. Tell me about achievement that you’re proud of.

There’s a lot of behavioral-based questions that you could be asked, but those ones I just listed, they’re the most common. They’re going to come up in pretty much every single job interview that you step in. So it’s super important that you’ve spent the time to really mentally prepare answers to that question and tailor the content in a way that’s going to be most relevant for the role that you’re interviewing for and this particular company.

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