Hello and welcome to LetThemTalk and today we are answering a viewers
question Sajid Ali asked "how should someone with no job experience present
himself in the interview room kindly make a video on it." Good
question. Now I've already made a couple of videos
on interview technique and I've noticed that this question or this type of
question coming up time and time again in the comment section so if you are a
recent graduate or you have some qualifications but you have no, or little,
experience how do you approach the interview? This is what we're going
to look at today and if English is not your first language we'll look at how
you can tackle it from that angle too. And, by the way, before we get started let
me tell you that, although I'm happy to answer this question, bear in mind I'm
not a professional careers advisor my background is in running small
businesses and before that I worked in companies in a number of positions and
early in my career I had a lot of interviews, as a candidate I mean, and
when I started I was very bad. believe me but fortunately I've learned a lot since
then. Anyway my perspective might be a little different from a careers advisor
so with that in mind stay tuned.
Let's begin and first of all of course you need to get offered an
interview so I hope you have a good CV and a good cover letter the cover letter is
so important but I won't discuss that in this video because we've already made a
video about how to write a perfect cover letter link up here somewhere.
so do see that video before watching this one if you haven't already now
you've got the interview well done! you're feeling a bit nervous
that's normal you haven't had many interviews before so what do you do what
do you say now 90% of the rules that apply for taking an interview for
someone with experience applies to someone without experience too so you
still need to maintain good body language good posture that's the same
you've got 20 years experience or no experience maintain good eye contact the
voice that sounds friendly but serious so not hello nice to meet you but hello
nice to meet you you need to engage with people try and find a connection with
the interviewer and you can find all the information about these general tips on
the videos I've already made on interview technique link in the
description. So what do you need to do if you don't have any or limited experience
First of all do your homework. Do a lot research on the company believe me
they are going to be impressed if you know a lot about their organization
people like flattery and so do companies and it shows that you have personalized
the interview you want them to feel special. You don't want any job you want
this job working at their company this is of course always important but it's
particularly important if you're just starting out on
your career. They want to know that you've chosen to begin your journey with
THEM so make it count now I want to say something about if
English is not your first language now bear in mind what I've said before it's
not about grammar it's about communication some native speakers are
good communicators some are bad communicators some people who speak
English as a second language of good communicators or bad communicators it's
not about the grammar that plays a very small and insignificant role and your
interviewers not gonna be a grammar teacher so have confidence and
communicate as well as you can. So some important points to bear in mind if you
haven't had many interviews before it takes time to become good
So perhaps there are a few freaks out there who are great even
at their first ever interview but for most people for normal people you will
get better with experience look for example ask anybody
myself included has a YouTube channel and has more
than 100 videos compare their first videos against the recent ones and
you'll see that the improvement is astonishing I know my first video
attempts are unbelievably bad and I'm not being modest here but with
interviews or any other complex tasks you will need time to master it and
mastering an interview is a complex task so even if you fail at the interview you
could either stop crying and go back to bed for weekend and
grow a beard (if you're a guy) or you can think "oh never mind! I didn't get
this job but I've got some interview practice I have improved my skills and
next time I'll do better" and after taking lots of interviews you will
become good I promise you that
as long as after each failed interview you sit down and you go through how you
could have done better so take as many interviews as you can and you will
become good. Secondly let's face some facts if you have never had a job before
you are not going to get the position that requires five years
project management experience or senior legal adviser however many many
interesting positions, and I'm not talking about sweeping the streets or
selling burgers, many interesting positions are open to recent graduates
or those who have some qualifications but little or no experience. So what do
you talk about? You need to emphasize your intelligence your creativity, your
ambition, your clarity of mind and your versatility. Put yourself in the head of
the interviewers if they are interviewing for a job that requires a
lot of technical ability they want to know that you have that skill. However if
they're interviewing for a junior position they will care much less about
your experience they want to know that you are flexible, that you're confident
that you're friendly they've got to work with you every day then they want to
know that you can interact with people in a relaxed and positive way, that you
are creative (the level of creativity might depend on the job of course) and
and that you're ambitious but that you're going to stick around. Meaning
that you're not going to leave after one week to take up another job. They want to
know that you are versatile that you can adapt to new situations and, if English
is not your first language, they want to know that you can express yourself well
enough in English. now we're going to look a few example
interview questions. Of course what you precisely say depends on the job but
these are the things that you need to stress at an interview. So, can you
demonstrate firstly your interest in the job? can you? I hope so.
Tell them that. But remember your answers should
always say what YOU can do for them and not what THEY can do for you. if they ask
you "why do you want to work here" don't say "I'm interested in this job
because I can get some useful experience" do say "This is an interesting position
and I'd love the opportunity to work with you and contribute to your team"
something like that so it's about them it's not about you and your answers
should always reflect that. Can you demonstrate that you like working as
part of a team? can you show your your commitment? what can you contribute can
you show your creativity? if you don't have any work experience
can you still demonstrate that you still have the skills and you still have
talent? so let me give you an example say in the interview they asked you "what are
your strengths?" A typical interview question in your answer you could say
"...you know I have a cooking channel on YouTube and I put up vegetarian recipes
and in order to do this you really need to be a good communicator you have to be
a good planner you have to be creative constantly thinking of new ideas you
need to be able to manage a project and see it through from the beginning to the
end so I would say that these are some of my strengths". By the way if you are
not working in the moment you should be constantly looking at ways that you can
improve your skills and this will help you down the line maybe not today, maybe
not tomorrow but soon and for the rest of your life. Now remember the way you
express all this is even more important than what you say so
say for example they asked you "Why do you want to work here?"
don't say "After reading your website I liked it very much and I decided I
wanted to work here" Not so good lacks commitment lacks energy. So how
about: "After reading your website I thought wow! this is a company doing
really interesting things and I want to be part of it" So you are basically
saying, more or less, the same thing but and I can't stress this enough the tone
and the body language is the most part of it and the words you use are the
icing on the cake. Now another thing to bear in mind don't be apologetic don't
be apologetic for who you are and your lack of experience. Turn a negative into
a positive. what I see so often is people
apologizing for what they don't know so for example you are asked at the
interview "do have an experience of using Microsoft Access?" - "No sorry I
don't know that" better to say "Do you have an experience of using
Microsoft Access?" - "Microsoft Access? that's the database program isn't it it's funny
you should say that you know that's the top of my to-do list and by the time we
get to the second interview I'll be able to say yes to your question" now that
answer is also no but here I showed a commitment and a willingness to learn.
Probably they know that you're just bluffing but that's okay they won't mind
unless it's a key requirement for the job so avoid saying "no", "I don't know", "I'm
not sure" as much as possible find a positive angle to answer all the
questions and this is also true if English is not your first language. You
might think it's a disadvantage but not necessarily so. Speaking a second
language could be very useful to the company and also you can see things from
a different cultural perspective view things as an outsider and from a
different angle so think of it as a positive. Now remember one final thing,
they are interviewing you for a reason. They need someone to fill a gap in their
organization that's why there is a job vacancy if they fill it the wrong person
it's going to be a major problem for them. So, what you have to do is to put
their mind at ease and get them to think that if they offer you the position then
the job is in safe hands and you will moreover, be helping the organization to
thrive and if you can do this then, my friend, you are a great candidate worthy
of their trust. So I hope you found that useful if you have any tips on how to
pass an interview with little or no experience then do leave them in the
comments good luck it's your interview and see you in the
next video