If you guys keep coming back for this, I really don’t know what to say.
Honestly, my blog isn’t even publicized to any of my friends, so I really wonder where all these readers come from. Whoever you are, welcome to my blog, and I hope you’ve enjoyed your stay here!
Anyway, I didn’t manage to secure the job. It’s probably because I wasn’t as outstanding as any of the other candidates she might have interviewed with. How did I know? She told me that if I don’t receive a call by today (Friday), the job probably has been offered to someone else.
So the interview questions? Here they are… (in no particular order, cause I can’t really remember!)
Upon arriving, she said to me “we’re just here for an interview, but don’t worry: treat it like a casual talk”
Q: What are you currently doing?
A: Currently, I’ve just ORD-ed and has been job searching for the past 6 months. During these 6 months, I have been helping my uncle at his cafe in a “on-and-off” basis, while looking for a job.
Q: Do you have any working experience?
A: I don’t have any relevant working experience, however I do have working experience during my attachment period as an IT Analyst Assistant. Other than that, I do quite a lot of administrative duties during my National Service as a Supply Supervisor.
Q: So you are a supervisor in your NS. Tell me more about it.
A: As a Supply Supervisor, my main job is to monitor my men and managed a few stores. I have to occasionally log into the system to retrieve store information, then transfer those information into a report, and give it to the men as regular checks. Apart from that, I have to retrieve various ad-hoc reports for my boss, where he will then give other specific instructions on what I should do with those excess stores.
Q: So he asks you for comments on those reports?
A: Sometimes, he asks me what I think about those stores. I will give him some options, but normally he makes the call. I do not make any high level decisions that might affect the store or the camp status.
Q: Tell me what you don’t like.
A: I’m not sure what you’re trying to ask, but if it’s food, I don’t like seafood and durians.
Q: What are your strengths?
A: I think it’s my ability to be able to look into finer details of an instruction given so as not to miss critical instructions when given a task to do.
Q: What about your weaknesses?
A: I think it’s taking too much time on small little details. For example, I might not get satisfied over a “done” job, and might look into getting other things into it, which might make it irrelevant, thus taking longer to finish than expected.
Q: Tell me about you hobbies.
A: I have a few hobbies, but the main ones would be playing computer games, fishing and playing music.
Q: So which one (of the hobbies) are you most passionate about?
A: Most of my friends think I’m very talented with the computers, so I should say I’m most passionate at computers. I tend to look for newer gadgets and latest technologies that’s currently happening, and I like to find out more about the product. For example, the iPhone, there’s quite a few things you can do with it like messing with it’s system, and make it more useful. That’s why most of my friends consider me “different” than other regular people. Maybe because I liked to be different?
Q: It seems like you are very creative and innovative. Do you consider yourself to be one?
A: I would say so, as I liked to get things done in a better way. I liked to improve on “current methods”. Like for example, during my NS, I was assigned to do some forms on rations on a weekly basis. Since I will be working on that, I told myself “there’s something I can do about this thing”, so I made some excel formulas to my worksheet. That way, if I’m going to leave and an understudy take over me, I just told him “just change this value, and everything will be calculated for you”.
Q: Are you proficient with Excel?
A: I would say, Excel has been second-nature to me. It’s because I have been working with Excel sheets during my NS almost every day.
Q: You sounded like you can talk with an external customer. By the way you sound on the phone, I think you are that.
A: (no answer required. I just smiled)
Q: Do you consider yourself a fast learner?
A: I think I do. I have been given a few tasks to learn new things, and I have been able to grasp them perfectly.
Q: State an example.
A: During my attachment period, I was assigned to learn about PeopleSoft codings. That’s because their Enterprise System uses such codings and I should work with it. Weeks later, they gave me an mini assignment to test my codes, and they were impressed. However, they then realised that they don’t need me to code in PeopleSoft as I can use my Java programming onto their Enterprise System too. So they scraped the idea, and let me code in Java for all my other assignments.
Q: Tell me about what you do during your attachment period.
A: The company has this “Enterprise System” where every employee has access to it. It’s like a personal website with a lot of widgets. So my tasks is to develop some widgets for their Enterprise System. I was then assigned to develop a weather widget, where I have to extract information from NEA’s website, then display it. I had another assignment where I have to develop an employees search engine, where I work with the network directories, and extract information based on their search queries. These are then displayed in a format, something like a Google search, and display relevant information about those employees.
Other questions don’t really fit into this post, so they have been omitted, or have been forgotten. The answers may not be like the ones I’ve written here, but it’s close. I don’t really remember every single word I said. 
Anyway, I still think my interviewing skills suck. Maybe I should lie more. Or try to be even more convincing. Maybe with what I said is not enough to capture her heart. Well, I should just try harder next time.
Going for my first interview definitely gives me a clue on how a real interview looked and feel like. At least, the experience I gained might help me perform better on my next few interviews.
Here are some things you should avoid during an interview (in my own opinion):
- Don’t shake your legs, even if you can’t help it.
- Keep moving your hands around like you’re restless.
- Losing eye contact during the talking. I noticed that she NEVER moved her eyes away from me. If she’s in a staring competition, she would definitely win.
Here are some things you should do:
- Speak loud and clear. Do not stammer. If you’re born stammering, don’t worry, interviewers don’t hate you for that.
- Be confident of your answers. Remember this tip: State a point, state an example, then elaborate. Make sure you have your answers ready whenever it’s asked.
- Look into the eye when talking as much as possible. If you’re nervous, look into one of their ears of nose, it will looked like you’re looking at them in their eyes. This trick is tried and tested during a few of my personal tests I’ve made with a few friends. You should try it out.
- Have your documents ready, they might as for it.
- Have a few spares of your resume, they might need it.
- Keep a good posture, smile always, and be friendly. No employer wants to hire a rowdy personnel.
Well, I’m going to look out for more job offers. I hope the phone keeps on ringing in the near future.
