Phone interviews are not easier or less important than live interviews. In fact, phone skills in general, not just for interviews, are a key part of the job search process. Ignoring the importance of phone skills is a common job search mistake.
Phone interviews are not easier or less important than live interviews. In fact, phone skills in general, not just for interviews, are a key part of the job search process. Ignoring the importance of phone skills is a common job search mistake. As a former recruiter, most of my general interviews were via phone. Some recruiters use a phone screen for every search and reserve live meetings for finalists only. Furthermore, a lot of recruiting process work is via telephone: either you or your potential employer is leaving a message to schedule an interview or to check status. Although the term “telephone tag” recalls a childhood game, phone interactions are not play. Here are some tips to maximize your telephone interactions:
Have a professional message on your voicemail. This is especially true for millenials who might still have college fraternizing on the brain. Loud music, slang, and funny voices do not make a good first impression.
Leave professional messages on employers’ voicemails. Make it short but complete. Leave your full name. Leave your phone number. Reference why you are calling, especially if you are returning their call. Don’t make a potential employer have to remember who you are, think why you are calling or track down your number.
Treat cell phones as professionally as your primary phone. If you put your cell phone number on your resume, you need a professional cell phone message. Don’t answer your cell phone if you can’t answer in a professional way. Just let it ring to voicemail, and call right back when you have your schedule book, pen and paper at the ready.
Return calls promptly. Don’t make a potential employer call more than once to schedule an interview. Some recruiters will call more than once, but some won’t. In addition, jobs fill up quickly in a tight labor market like this one. If another candidate schedules an earlier interview and nails it, you have a smaller chance or none at all.
Help your housemates help you. Tell the people who live with you about your job search, and let them know if you are expecting calls. Keep a pen and paper handy by the phone for messages. Keep children or younger siblings from answering the phone, if they can’t take proper messages.
Phone interviews require different strategies than live interviews. You lose up to 80% of expressiveness without the physical, non-verbal cues so you have to ramp up the energy level to get your enthusiasm across via phone. Stand up to keep your energy high. Dress up for the interview to remind yourself to stay professional. Have water, resume, paper and pen readily available so the interviewer doesn’t hear the clinking of glasses or you rummaging for your stuff.
Is Your Job Search Flexible or Just Unfocused?
As a recruiter, I’ve seen lack of flexibility on the recruiting side with employers clinging to every last detail in their ideal spec while perfectly good candidates get overlooked. As a career coach, I see jobseekers prematurely dismissing possible targets waiting for that perfect job. It’s true that you want to be focused in your job search (otherwise you dilute your efforts and come across as scattered and possibly desperate).
5 Questions to Test If Your Resume Is Recruiter-Proof
After recruiting in search and in-house for over ten years, I have read thousands of resumes. Due to sheer volume of resumes received and all the other things that vie for the recruiter’s attention in the hiring process – scheduling, interviewing, networking, reference checks, client debriefs, and more – the resume review process is ruthlessly quick.
Why Conventional Wisdom On Work Flexibility Is Always Wrong
In a previous post, I wrote about why employment statistics are always wrong. In a similar way, conventional wisdom on work flexibility is always wrong. It is impossible to generalize something that is inherently case-by-individual case. Therefore, any boilerplate advice or conventional wisdom is bound to omit a key consideration, underweight or overemphasize other considerations, or take too long-term or short-term of a view.
