Top 10 interview mistakes! (and how to avoid them!)
Maybe you have been applying for several jobs and you’re wondering why you’re not getting call backs or why the recruiters are not getting back to you or you might not even be aware that you’re making some of these mistakes, you want to read this article to the end as I walk you through some 10 common mistakes which you can make while taking some of your DeVops or your IT or Cloud related interviews.
Mistake One: No Research about the Company
The very first mistake a lot of people make is they do not research the company before interviewing. Now if you do not have an idea about the company, you’re applying for is all about, there’s no way you can have a good conversation during that interview. Sometimes the recruiters begin by “so have you done a little bit of research about our company or do you have an idea about our company or what we are looking now to achieve in this particular role”. You must be able to do good research about the company you’re currently interviewing for. A lot of people put out so many applications out there and sometimes you’re being called you do not have enough time to maybe go through the company website or their blogs to check out what they doing what they are doing.
Mistake Two: Lack of preparation for technical questions
There’s no way you can avoid technical questions in any it related interview, besides these interviews are because the companies need someone who has particular experience in in a given set of Technologies so you cannot be expecting to get a job without having an interview around this technical question. So, preparing for technical questions rightly positions you for the job which you’re applying for, and I always recommend this platform www.wanderprep.com a platform that has a lot of interview preparation resources. They have technical interview questions, phone call interview questions and a lot more other interview preparation resources so you want to check out that platform to effectively prepare for real interview questions prior to your interview.
Mistake Three: Poor Communication Skills
The third mistake people commonly make is they have poor communication skills; you go into the interview you’re answering questions as if maybe you’re having a lecture or you’re answering questions as if you’re having a friendly chat or you’re answering questions as if you’re having some casual conversation with someone. Interviews are like sales speech, meaning that if you’re trying to sell a product you want to convince a customer why they should buy your product. It’s the same thing with a recruiter that has 40 or 50 clients that are interviewing for a particular role why should you be the one picked for that role? So, you must be able to communicate your skills rightly to be able to be selected for some of those roles. So, Master communication skills before you take your next interview
Mistake four: Not showing Relevant Experience
Not showing relevant experience when going for an interview, you’re maybe applying for a DEVOPS engineer role or a cloud engineer role, or a Solutions architect role and you’re not giving the relevant experience with respect to the job you’re actually interviewing for if you take a detailed look at the job description, companies will always outline what they are looking out as experience. So, when interviewing you must align your experience or your relevant experience with the requirements which the companies have. If they say they looking for someone has an experience with a cloud platform, you must give detail explanation about a cloud platform you understand, if they say experience some has continuous integration and continuous deployment skills you must give experience with A continuous integration tool, if they say someone has experience with containerized applications or containers or with containers you must be able to dish out that experience. So, you should be able to share some relevant experience during some of your technical or during some of your interviews because if you do not do that you find that in the end, you’re are not successful in such interviews.
Mistake Five: Overlooking Soft Skills or Behavioral Skills
You go into the interview and you do not show any aspects of team building, you do not show any aspects of problem solving, you not show any aspect of being able to adapt or being able to research Solutions and so on those are some subtle skills which recruiters are always equally looking out for when interviewing you. Do not focus only on the technical skills, lay some basic emphasis on some of the soft skills which are required during your technical interview.
Mistake Six: Not Preparing Questions to Ask the Recruiters
One very common mistake people make is that, they do not prepare questions to ask the recruiters. So, you go into an interview and maybe after your technical interview, they may ask “do you have any question for us or for our team?” and you’re asking very irrelevant questions. Before going for an interview, you look at the job description, you look at the requirements, you must be able you must be able to prepare some question for the job that match the requirement of the company. That way, after the interview they might have that decision to say “oh this guy actually understood what we looking out for, he was asking some technical questions. That means he’s actually enthusiastic about this role.” So ask the right questions during your interview.
Mistake Seven: Overlooking cultural lifts
What’s cultural Lift? Every company has a company culture some have leadership culture and it is based on this culture that they might want to get new recruits for their company. Amazon might have his leadership culture, Google might have JP, Morgan Bank of America whatever company, some companies have their leadership culture or they have their company culture so you must have an understanding of some of these cultural lifts or some of these cultural components which some companies have and if you can come to them with the understanding or with the presentation as someone who has an understanding of the their cultural practices in their environment, you can easily get yourself positioned for that role.
Mistake Eight: Not Sending Follow-Up Emails
After performing so well at an interview you must be able to follow up after every interview no matter the stage. After every interview you take, you should be able to leave a follow up email or follow-up text to understand how you perform or what the recruiter thinks about your performance in the interview.
Mistake Ten: Going Late for Interviews
Some people come so late they end up keeping the recruiters waiting. So maybe you come into the interview 5 minutes late or 10 minutes late or 20 minutes late the recruiters or the technical team are already present for the interview and are waiting for you and You’re not there you come you start giving one or two excuses they just see you like someone who is not serious. if you want to be ready for your interviews you must allocate a time and that’s why they even always call to find out what time or what schedule works best for you so pick a time slot when you sure that you’ll be available to take that interview rather than coming late for that interview. I always recommend if you are to log into an interview or you have an interview coming up make sure to log in 15 minutes before the actual interview time that way you get yourself ready you stay calm and you be ready for the next or you’ll be ready for the interview steps and lastly the most unlikely mistake people make is they do not dress appropriately so they dress inappropriately that’s another common mistake they dress inappropriately they always say dress to impress it also applies in your devops and your it related interviews try to impress make the recruiters understand that this an enthusiastic guy this a passionate guy your background should be inspiring and everything about your call setup or your call environment should be inspiring do not come to an interview having people disturbing or moving around your background and all of that so dress appropriately and have the right environment when taking your interviews.