Are you looking to learn how to get your first cloud architect job?
Well, if so, this video is for you.
Hi, my name is Michael Gibbs and I've been working in technology for over 25 years and
during the last two decades, I've actually helped coach others to get their first or their best
technology career and today we're going to talk about mastering the cloud architect interview.
Now this video is part of a series that we're going to do cloud architect, interview questions,
techniques and tactics for your interviews, and today we're going to talk about
building rapport, which is a tip and tactic on how to have a great interview.
What is rapport? Rapport is a personal connection or an emotional connection between two people.
You may have noticed in your life that sometimes you just meet someone and inside of a 10 minute
discussion, you feel like you've known them your whole life. You're crazy about them and you have
so many things in common. That's what happens when you have instant rapport with someone,
that kind of a fantastic connection, and that's natural rapport. A natural report is wonderful.
It's the basis of friendships but but you can also create rapport. Doctors do it all the time.
Lawyers do it all the time. Sales reps do it to build relationships with their clients or patients
and it can make a big difference in the interview.
So why is building reports so important? If you can, at the
beginning of your conversation establish rapport or find common ground with the hiring manager,
it will set the tone in a very positive way for the remainder of your interview. Why? Because as
soon as somebody already likes you and they've had that personal connection with you, then everything
you say is going to sound better. So every answer to every question is going to sound better
and everything that you don't know will be less problematic when the interviewer likes you.
So how do you find common ground? Prior to any interview, you really should be researching the
company and researching the hiring manager, as well as everybody you're going to interview with.
Here's the reason why. When you go on an interview, it's the organization determining
if you are a solution to one of their problems and the more you know about the company prior
to going on that interview, the better of a position, you'll be able to have a discussion
with a hiring manager on why hiring you could help solve the organization's challenges.
Remember organizations don't hire you because they want people,
they have challenges and they want people to help solve them and that's why you're there. So anytime
you can show value to the hiring manager about how you can improve the business, it's going
to increase your chances of getting hired. So prior to the interview, research the company.
Now also prior to the interview and research the hiring manager, as well as anybody you're
going to interview with and here's the reasons why. The more you know about the hiring manager,
you know a few things. One is how to be a solution to their problems, which everybody wants
and also you can find areas of common ground. Maybe you went to the same university,
maybe you were part of the same fraternity, maybe you both started out in networking before
migrating towards cloud computing. Look for areas of common ground.
People tend to like people that are most like themselves, at least statistics tell us that,
so statistically speaking, people tend to like people that are like themselves, or they like
animals that look and feel like themselves. Find a way to create common ground with the employer.
So what do I mean by that? So when you researched the hiring manager, you've found
areas of common ground, things that are in their background that are similar to your background.
Now it has to be honest. If you both played football and that while you were in college, that
might be something great to talk about, but it has to be honest. You don't have anything in common,
don't even try. Don't create some fake story to be in common that will derail the relationship.
But if there is an area of common ground, early in the conversation inject that into
the conversation. So if the person's telling you how I started my career in networking and
I work in networking, and then after networking I worked in the data center, and then I moved to
the cloud, and you're in a position to tell that same hiring manager, when they say,
"Tell me about yourself," you can say, "Like you, I started out working in networking and then I
moved toward the data center and now I'm moving towards the cloud." Find that area of common
ground and if you do that, you will have a better connection, almost instantly with the
hiring manager, and then everything you say on that interview will sound better and you'll be
much more likely to get hired and the interview is much likely to go in a positive direction.
So now you know the cloud architect career tip of today is to find the ability to create rapport
with a hiring manager as soon as possible and that will improve the outcomes of your interviews.
Let me tell you about some offerings that we have. Every Monday and every Thursday, we have a How To
Get Your First Cloud Architect Job Webinar, and we spend over an hour telling you the steps that
we typically take with clients to help them get their first cloud architect job and you can do
all these steps on your own and you can even ask us questions for 60 minutes. We will help you
plan your career. We will ask any cloud architect questions you actually have and we do that live
and it's free. We do it Monday mornings at 9:00 AM Eastern time, and we do them Thursday at noon.
Now every Tuesday, we have the How To Get Real Cloud Architect Experience Webinar.
This webinar is about how you can go from being AWS certified and knowing you need experience to
getting real hands on experience, so you can show the hiring managers not only are you an
eminently capable, but you've got a background in networking and data center technologies,
which are the foundation of the cloud and we even talk about how to build your own cloud, because
once you built your own cloud, you're a true cloud architect and everything else becomes very easy.
Also wanted to let you know that we have a free AWS Certified Solution Architect Associate eBook.
It's literally everything you need to pass to AWS Certified Solution Architect Associate Exam
and it's completely free. I'll leave the link in the description below,
as long as the link to the two other webinars that I talked about.