Last week I interviewed candidates online for a number of different positions and
I can't wait to share what I learned with you so that you can ace your video
interviews too, especially as they become increasingly common whether over Zoom,
Skype or Microsoft Teams. This video is about giving you the best possible
chance of succeeding with my expert top 5 tips so let's roll the intro and get
right into it.
Tip number one is to build rapport, or a sense of connection, with your
interviewers nice and early. All too often candidates assume a really
passive role in online interviews, waiting to be asked things, but I
recommend you be proactive. I recommend opening that connection by
asking them how their day is going, how their week's going... this lubricates the
whole interview process and maybe gives the interviewer a little insight as to
how you might relate to new clients or behave in the team, so definitely show a
little bit of yourself and build that connection nice and early. As everyone
works from home a lot more, your interviewers might be subject to a lot
more distractions especially compared to a typically austere interview room like
this. Some interviewers might have childcare commitments others might have
pets running around and there's always the opportunity to be distracted by more mundane
things, all of which can distract from candidates' answers
[Sure... I can talk you through my CV, so I went to university at the...]
[so those are the main elements of my CV that I wanted to share with you]
Ok, that's great thank you. Keep your interviewers' attention by
giving a clear structure and by telegraphing that nice and early in your
answer, so perhaps for competency answers you actually say the words 'situation'
'task' 'action' 'result' e.g "the situation was X the task I found myself doing was y
and there were three actions within that, the first of those was..." or for more
general interview questions like "talk me through your CV" you might structure it
at the beginning by saying "sure, I'd love to talk you through my CV. There are
three main components I'd like to build my answer around and the first of those is..."
Telegraphing the structure of your answer means that interviewers are less
likely to get distracted if they know they're supposed to be looking out for
three things, but if they do lose focus perhaps they can re-orient themselves
within your answer a lot quicker because you've already shared that structure
with them. Tip number three is to get the physicals right... what does this mean? Well
in the first instance get the webcam to eye level so that your image is received
more like this, lighting is super easy to get right so find the right spot...
preferably with your face to a window rather than having your back to one, I
recommend wearing earphones with a built-in microphone, potentially the one that
came with your phone, the sound quality will be much better and remember to wear
what you normally would when going to a face-to-face interview so dress
professionally if you can, and keep your background nice and clear and non
distracting so that the interview can focus on the quality of your answers, and
lastly within getting the physicals right, preview your webcam. If you're
using a Mac you can launch the QuickTime App and hit 'Movie Recording' to get that
preview, while Windows users simply click the Start button and then click on
Camera. Tip number four is testing your software
and your connectivity by first testing your internet speeds. A download speed
slower than 18 megabits per second or an upload speed slower than three megabits
per second will likely result in greater pixelation or lag so definitely test
your internet speeds for free the way I'm doing here and there's a link in the
description box below for you to use. Now if you're getting slower speeds, I
recommend turning your mobile phone into a Wi-Fi hotspot. This can offer a quicker
and more reliable connection in situations where there's a lot of
pressure on localised broadband services. Now most software gives you an option to
blur your background or to change it entirely in order to reduce bandwidth
and also to promote a sense of privacy, but beware because some web-based
versions of Applications don't allow you to do this, so you might have to download
the desktop versions to get this fuller functionality, and be sure to test it out
with family and friends before your live interview. So tip number 5 is to not log
in too early but also to log out promptly. So for a normal face to face
physical interview I might recommend getting there 10 minutes before your
interview time. For online video interviews it's a different story.
I'd recommend definitely not clicking on the activation link for your video
interview any more than 2 minutes before the scheduled start time but
preferably one minute before and that's because your interviewers might already
be on that chat function discussing how they're going to arrange the interview.
Similarly, at the end of your interview, log off promptly so that your
interviewers get a chance to discuss the interview performance and to score it
and they'll definitely appreciate you giving them that space. So those are my
top 5 interview tips and I wish you all the very best with your video interviews.
Please know that you can still access practice online interviews with UCL
Careers and you can book them online via the link in the description
below. As always if you have any email questions that you wish to be featured
in future Q&A videos please email me at careers.marketing@ucl.ac.uk
That's it from me for this week, I'll see you next time!