First phone interview

Water Cooler Careers
#1

I got my first phone interview tomorrow for a Corporate Finance Analyst position and I am pretty excited.

How should I prepare and what should I do?

#2

is it an initial HR screen or will you be speaking with a hiring manager?

#3

Interesting enough, its the Managing Director from a boutique firm.

#4

Hi statusone

  1. Research the firm and your interviewer thoroughly and know your facts. Since it’s a phone interview you can have printouts in front of you but don’t rely on them - you still can tell over the phone if the interviewee relying on notes.
  2. The objective of the interview is to display your competence and make friends with your interviewer. I usually already made up my mind competence-wise about the candidate based on CV and am just looking to see if this guy has a decent head on shoulders. Don’t sound nervous and stiff.
  3. Staying on your feet helps - I normally pace when I’m on phone interviews / business calls as it keeps me on edge and sharper minded.
  4. The best way to get good at interviews is to have practical experience - there’s no other way. You can have coaches for these things but I tend to dislike the concept (don’t like people recording my face and playing it back to me etc) - much better to just sign up for loads of interviews.

Hope this helps and good luck!

#5

You should have a practice phone interview with someone. Your friend can help point out bad speech habits, if you need to speak more clearly, or other things like that. Good luck.

#6

i hate this, but thats why my resume is built one step ahead of you… it exagerates experience/ responsibilities :slight_smile:

#7

Thanks guys. It was just like usj2 said. It wasn’t really an interview persé. It was literally 5 minutes long and I think he just wanted to make sure I wasn’t some next guy/idiot/what have you.

So I got the interview, I’m so excited!

#8

Congrats!