Students at the interview. First interview: how to behave if you have no work experience? How to successfully pass the interview and what to say in order to get it? Tune in to a good outcome

REMINDER TO THE STUDENT "How to pass an interview"

There are several forms of interviewing. And each has its own questions and methods of assessing applicants. However, in their pure form, they practically do not occur - as a rule, HR managers use an integrated approach, the candidate can be asked a question, a projection, offer to solve the situation, conduct an interview with him. Knowing the features of the main types of interviews, you can prepare for the upcoming conversation, profitably demonstrate your personal and business qualities and get a good job.

One of the most widely used types of interviews, which is usually used in the initial assessment of personnel, is a structured interview. The specialist in a certain sequence asks you about the same questions that you have already answered by filling out a questionnaire or resume:

• what educational institution did you graduate from;
• is there any additional education;
• where and in what positions they worked;
• what duties they performed;
• why are you changing your place of work;
• what you are striving to achieve;
• what do you expect from your new position.

How to get through: answer the case, without going into details and details (the question "Who are you according to your zodiac sign?" You should not give a detailed description of your sign, list its features, character traits, etc.) The specialist also assesses the degree of your sincerity - not try to hide something, but at the same time try not to say too much.

Some tips on how to behave correctly during interviews.

Before the interview, consider how you will be dressed. Appearance and demeanor are very important and practically determine the first impression. If you go for an interview, choose a conservative business dress. You should look neat and tidy. Please arrive 15 minutes earlier than the appointed time. This will show that you respect the interviewer and value their time. Watch your posture, strive to make eye contact. Do not forget to take with you to the interview as many documents as possible confirming your qualifications, education and additional knowledge. Do not forget to conclude the conversation by agreeing on when and how you will find out about the results, and thank the interviewer.

A few rules:

• When greeting a company representative, do not shake hands first.
• Do not sit down until you are asked to do so.
• Listen carefully. Follow the direction of the conversation that the interviewer asks.
• Before answering the question, try to understand why it was asked, how to highlight your strengths in the answer, and what you should not talk about.
• When discussing previous jobs, do not criticize your former boss and colleagues.
• Do not start discussing your personal or financial problems unless you are specifically asked about it.
• You can name a salary that will satisfy you, but not earlier than you are asked about it.
• At the end of the interview, thank the other person for their attention.

Possible reasons for refusal to hire:

• being late for an interview;
• sluggish handshake;
• pathetic appearance, slovenliness;
• unwillingness to make eye contact;
• inability to express, weak voice, poor diction, illiterate speech;
• know-it-all manners;
• lack of interest and enthusiasm;
• lack of liveliness;
• lack of balance;
• lack of sincerity;
• uncertainty of answers to questions, evasiveness;
• insufficient ability to navigate in society;
• indecision, lack of independence;
• lack of clear goals and objectives.

An employer who abused a potential employee during an interview will have to be dealt with by law enforcement officers.

As it became known to "MK", \u200b\u200bin early May, a 17-year-old student decided to earn extra money and posted an ad on the website. The very next day, a man contacted the girl, who introduced himself as the owner of a hotel business and offered to come to a meeting on employment issues at 20.00 at one of the skyscrapers on Novy Arbat Street. The advertisements for his hotel sound very solid. “Wonderful hotel with clean, well-kept rooms and amazing views of the Kremlin. The staff is conscientious, tidy and polite. Guests are met at the airport and train station and delivered to the hotel in Mercedes. "

The student planned to get a job in a hotel as a cleaner. She went to the interview with a support group - a friend and two friends. They remained to wait at the entrance, and the girl went up to the apartment.

After a while, the student's friends decided to call her to find out when she was free. But the girl did not answer the phone. Concerned, the young people went into the entrance and began to call the apartment where the interview was to take place. No one opened the door. Then they began to call the neighboring apartments, and also turned to the watchman for help. When a real commotion arose at the entrance, the unfortunate captive was released. The girl was shocked. She stated that instead of discussing working conditions and wages, the entrepreneur closed the apartment door with a key and forced the girl to oral sex. Law enforcement agencies have already taken up the "employer".

According to the residents of the house, the man has been renting this apartment for about a year, where he lives with his wife and small child. But the man's wife, along with the baby, went to his mother, and in her absence he abused alcohol. By the way, as a businessman, the man managed to "earn" a specific reputation. Here are reviews about him on the Internet: “They advertise through Avito, ask for an advance payment, then they say that there is no apartment, they are offered for completely different money in other places. In case of refusal, the prepayment will not be refunded. " “This is a very smart and impudent young man. They say that a former employee of the security forces. It is very dangerous to contact him. He has connections in the highest echelons of power. No matter how many statements you write against him, it's all in vain. The answer is always the same - there is no evidence! "

What are the students asked about during the interview?

A common problem among students is the lack of money. The scholarship is only enough for small things like dinners and rare trips to the cinema. Therefore, you have to look for a part-time job so as not to depend on the parental wallet. In order for a student to successfully pass an interview, one should find out what recruiters usually ask about.

"What education do you have?"

A job seeker's resume for an office position raises questions about education. The fact that you have an incomplete higher education or college degree increases your chances of success. Often, personnel officers consider students for vacant positions in such a way that after the probationary period they will take a place in the company's staff. Therefore, at the interview, be sure to ask if there will be an opportunity to move to a position that matches your academic profile.

Example:

Andrey A. was educated in economics and started working in a courier delivery service. A few months later, a quick-witted and quick-witted young man was hired as a logistics assistant, and after defending his thesis, Andrey moved to the position of a logistics specialist with a salary higher than that of other novice specialists.

"Do you have any work experience?"

This question is one of the main ones, so it is worth analyzing your professional skills before meeting with an employer.

Don't worry if the existing experience does not fit the requirements of the job or it does not exist at all. For some professions, for example, promoters, handymen, distributors, call center operators, lack of experience is not a reason to refuse an applicant. Many companies provide on-the-job training, and in one or two shifts the candidate can easily master the previously unknown functionality. It will be more difficult for those who are applying for vacancies in prestigious organizations or more complex types of activities, where one cannot do without similar experience. However, the lack of skills can be compensated for by personal and business qualities, dedication and a willingness to learn.

Example:

Student Elena K. sent out a resume for the vacancy of a fitness club administrator. After several refusals, she was nevertheless invited for an interview, specifying whether she had work experience. In a telephone conversation with a representative of a network of fitness clubs, Elena honestly admitted that she had not worked anywhere yet, but had been engaged in fitness for several years and was interested in the field of beauty and health. The applicant's arguments convinced the recruiter to invite her to the office for a personal meeting.

"Desired work schedule?"

The main difficulty in finding work for students is to combine work schedule with study. Students are often offered part-time work, only on weekends, or part-time work from a few hours a week. Before agreeing to a flexible schedule, it is worth clarifying how often you have to take time off from class in order to keep up with work. Ideally, part-time work should not interfere with education, and there should be little space for rest and personal affairs.

Example:

Valeria E., a correspondence student, was offered to work in a cafe as a waitress with a 2/2 schedule. At first, she successfully coped with both her studies and work, but when the shift worker quit, the employer asked the girl to go out for several shifts in a row. Due to revisions, Valeria had to skip several lectures and a test, which negatively affected her academic performance - the dean's office warned the student about expulsion if this happens again.

The most surprising question that we are asked when scheduling interviews for candidates for trainee positions is: "What will they ask?"

To clarify, this question is most often asked by students. Those for whom the upcoming interview will be the first or one of the first in their professional career.

What is the reason for this question?

Long experience of communicating with candidates from the university bench has shown that the reason is simple. Students often perceive an interview in the same way as an exam in their university: you need to prepare (preferably in one night :)), come and pass. And the one who answers the questions best of all will receive an A, that is, will be hired.

The catch is that the interview is this is not an exam at all. Under the cut, the answer is why.

There are many differences between these processes, we will give only two basic ones:

• The interview is like a barbell exercise. No matter how much you can squeeze from the chest, you can always hang more pancakes on the barbell. So the interviewer can ask more and more new questions, no matter how much you answer. The range of questions can be very wide: from basic algorithms to complex concepts of programming languages. On the exam, the list of topics on which the conversation will take place is known in advance. “Add”, that is, the examiner has no right to ask something from another subject.
• The interview is much more of a dialogue than an exam. The exam always begins with the fact that you recite the answers to the questions of the ticket in a monologue. Then, at best, you are asked a couple of questions. During the interview, questions will be asked much more often and more unpredictable. And you (we'll talk about this further) can also ask questions.

Not so long ago, we conducted a small study within the St. Petersburg Development Center of EMC aimed at examining the approaches of various departments to interviews with students. Over the course of a month, we met with representatives of project teams and asked them what questions they ask candidates for internship positions. As a result, continuing the topic of differences between interviews and examinations, we were able to identify

7 questions, the answers to which should be prepared just before the interview.

1. What company and what position am I interviewing for?

Several years ago, after a dozen interviews for a trainee position in one of the EMC divisions, we received a written request from an interviewer with the following text: "Tell them to read at least something about us before you come."

It would be funny if it weren't so sad. Believe me, an impressive, definitely double-digit percentage of candidates do not know which company and for which position they are being interviewed. Or, at best, they only know the answer to half the question. A competent approach implies that:

A) The candidate read about the company as a whole (when it was founded, where the headquarters is located, how many people work in offices around the world, what is the company's key business, what is its market position) and about the office in which he will have an interview local representative office, whose employees will be present for the interview)

B) The candidate carefully studied the job description, read about the product to be worked on, and also carefully studied the list of requirements for applicants.

Only in a bad joke will the teacher at the university begin the exam with the phrase: "Do you know what subject you are going to take?" The interviewer will definitely ask you what you know about the location you will be working in.

Why is the answer to this question important to us? During the interview, we proceed from the following assumption: "Good candidates choose the best employer, and good employers choose the best candidate." Simply put, we believe that applicants, when they come to an interview, make an informed choice, considering us among the good employers, from among which the best is chosen. Obviously, with this approach, a person will not come for an interview at a company about which he knows nothing. This suggests that you have read about both the company and the position somewhere.

We only ask you - do not answer the question: "What do you know about our company?" something like this: "You are a large international company that is a market leader." On this question, a competent specialist conducting an interview will immediately ask: "There are many such companies, why did you come to us?"

2. What will I tell you about myself?

After the question: "What do you know about our company?" you will probably be asked to tell a little about yourself.
This is your unique chance to steer your interview in a direction that suits you. Recall that the interviewer can ask you anything - this is his key difference from the examiner. The examiner doesn't need to ask you to tell about yourself - firstly, he managed to get to know you during the semester, and secondly, he has a predetermined list of topics for conversation in his hands. The interviewer needs your answer in order to understand what he will talk to you about, and what he will definitely not talk about.

A good answer directly depends on how you prepared for the first question (“Which company and what position am I interviewing for?”). Obviously, if you come to the position of C ++ trainee in an international company, the thesis is worth telling about yourself the following:

• I am studying at% univername% university, for% year% course
• I am interested in object oriented programming using C ++
• My experience with C ++ includes the following professional and / or amateur and / or university projects: further listing with a short (one sentence) description of the projects
• In my free time I study English (watch movies / TV series and / or go to classes and / or read books and / or ...)

This answer will show us that

A) The candidate has come to the address. That is, a candidate with interests and / or some knowledge in the field of C ++ came to our position as a C ++ trainee. Not Java, not Data Science, not IT management, but C ++.

B) The candidate took part in projects that we can talk about with him. An important point - we perfectly understand that students may not have work experience in any company. But what the student has is his studies and hobbies. And it is very good if they intersect with his interests from point a).

C) The candidate will be able to adapt more easily to an international company, since at the first stages he will have fewer communication problems (he already studies).

Believe me, candidates who, when asked to tell about themselves, answer “What exactly to tell?” Usually do not show themselves in the best way in interviews.

3. What is my favorite university subject?

A university teacher doesn't want to know what your favorite subject is during an exam. For us, the answer may become one of the key ones.
In another interpretation, this question may sound like "What subjects did you study at the university?" or "What subjects have you studied recently?"

If you have formulated the answer to the second question ("Tell us about yourself") well, then it is quite possible that you will not have to talk about your favorite subject separately - you will mention it earlier. If a story about yourself does not allow you to understand what is worth building a further conversation around, then you will be offered an alternative way to search for a topic - they will ask about what you liked at the university.

In general, the answer to this question contains extremely important information:

A) What do you like and what you are interested in. It is desirable (see question # 2) that your interests and your sympathies coincide with the job description. Otherwise (see question # 1) it is difficult to understand why you came for an interview for our position.

B) What you can be asked. Usually people are good at what interests them. And if they do not understand something, they strive to find answers or come to them based on their own knowledge. Even if you do not have your own finished project in Java, then, for sure, you have done laboratory work that was devoted to various aspects of the language. Let's talk about them.

C) Which of your university mentors can vouch for you. It probably won't come as a surprise to you that almost all teachers,
preparing personnel for us, we, one way or another, know. Even if you get confused in your answers to questions about C ++ (which you recently studied and which you are interested in), we will have a chance to ask for a recommendation from someone (or better from those) who have watched you over the past years. get down to business and what success you are achieving.

The only thing is that you don't need to say that you liked the subject, the basics of which you don't know. For example, you don't need to mention that you liked the subject "Operating Systems" if you can't explain what a "process" is. Candidates who liked databases, but did not know how the RIGHT JOIN differs from the LEFT JOIN, received not very pleasant feedback from our interviewees. By the way, we recently set up a similar experiment - we estimated the percentage of "database lovers" who do not know the differences between JOIN operations. And, unfortunately, this percentage also turned out to be double-digit, comparable to the number of candidates who do not know which company and what position they are interviewing for.

4. What is my most positive project experience?

Imagine that the teacher in the exam says to you: “Please tell me what question you have learned exactly. You will answer it. " This happens very rarely, usually when you are "pulled by a three".

We almost always ask this question in an interview. Ideally, the candidate mentions the project himself when talking about himself (see question 2). If this does not happen, then the question is asked directly.

A good answer will determine an impressive part of your interview success. What are its basic criteria?

A) (Unexpectedly :)) When preparing the answer, the question "To which company and for which position am I interviewing?" Simply put, a project relevant to the vacancy has been announced.

B) You yourself are talking about the project (the interviewee does not pull information with "tongs"). Almost always, a person who is really interested in something tells about his favorite business with passion, often even forgetting that he is in the formal interview procedure. The candidate enthusiastically talks about what architecture was chosen, what kind of IDE he used, and even what mistakes he made.

C) You talk about the project in which you did something it is you ... That is, not about some abstract project that one of your friends worked on, but you were busy with conditionally renaming variables in it. It is better if you describe a much smaller work, but done by yourself.

Now back to the point about what you "learned best." Your answer about the project will determine those theoretical and practical questions about which an impressive part of the interview will talk to you. If you wrote a conditional server that processes requests, then you will probably be asked about critical sections, multithreading and its implementation, which (if the project was interesting to you and you worked on your own) you know well.

If you honestly admit that there was no project, but you spent a lot of effort on laboratory work on C ++, in which you had to perform the specified operations with data structures, you will be asked about queues, stacks, doubly linked lists, how to sort, add and removing items. And if you can answer such questions in detail, it will be much better than talking about a large project in which you were assigned a very small piece. Or, even worse, you mention a large project, but you cannot answer any simple question related to the implementation of one or another of its components.

And, most importantly, do not say that you have absolutely no experience that you can call positive. You definitely did something that interested you in this or that language. Otherwise (see question 1) it is not very clear why you come to interview for this position.

5. What is my main mistake?

A university professor is unlikely to ask you what mistakes you have made in the past - he is interested in your mistakes in answering ticket questions.

We are often interested in how you react to your own failures. It is possible that in the project from the previous question you did not succeed and not everything worked out. But understanding that

A) Failures are part of any big business.
b) Only through failure do we gain such valuable experience

It is extremely important for any professional. If, remembering your own defeats, you can soberly assess their causes, and also tell what you would have done differently in order to prevent such mistakes, then you can also derive the necessary benefit from your mistakes in work.
6. Why am I being asked this question?

Here, of course, you cannot prepare in advance. But we urge you to remember that every time you are asked, for example, about how many petrol stations are located within the Moscow Ring Road, think about why you are being asked such a question.

Such a question is not being asked to you in order to get an exact number in return. Programmers are rarely interested in the exact number of filling stations in Moscow. But the way you approach the solution of the tasks is always interesting. And despite the fact that some refuse the problems from the book "How to Move Mount Fuji", the ability to demonstrate their own line of reasoning still remains one of the important requirements for the candidate.

When answering questions, do not hesitate to ask the interlocutor yourself. “Can we admit that there are no stations in the city center?”, “Can we assume that the sleeping areas have the same number of gas stations?”, “I know for sure that there are 5 stations in my area, can I admit, that the number of gas stations in the neighboring areas is the same? " - all these questions show your ability to seek solutions to the set tasks. Obviously, you won't have to calculate the number of gas stations in your daily practice. And you will have to constantly ask your colleagues and clarify the tasks.

Feel free to think out loud, and most importantly, write your options on paper or on a whiteboard. Cross out carefully, but, if possible, do not erase (you risk erasing the right one). Perhaps we will understand that your decision is going “in the wrong direction” and will clarify the question. You may not be able to solve the problem completely, but if we see the right train of thought, that may be enough.

If a candidate, upon hearing a question about gas stations, withdraws into himself for 20 minutes, and after that says: “Forty-two,” then we can hardly draw any useful conclusion. If, after receiving a task for expanding a singly linked list, after a long silence you say that you don't know any way, the interview will definitely end in failure. If you start by drawing a list, the chances of understanding and coming up with an algorithm (even if you didn't know it) are much better.

A couple of years ago, during interviews for an internship position in the QA department, we gave students the following task:

Let's consider the Earth as an ideal ball and assume that it was “girded” with a metal ribbon exactly along the equator. Then this tape was lengthened by 1 meter and placed over the equator so that the distance from the tape to the Earth's surface was the same everywhere. Question: will the cat crawl through the gap?

It would seem that the equator is long. What's 1 meter there? The cat will definitely not get through. Half of the candidates answered this way. The trick is that the gap is 16 centimeters wide. That is, an animal known for its natural agility would definitely make its way.
Why did we ask this question? In order to understand whether a student of a technical university, even in a situation of a seemingly obvious answer to a question, is able to apply a formula from a mathematics course for the fifth grade. If a student began to draw a round Earth, a ribbon, and then remembered that the circumference was 2 * pi * r, then this greatly brought him closer to success. Half of the candidates began to draw, half of the half reached the final formula.

By the way, after the candidate said: “Yes, it will get through” we began to clarify: “Are you sure? Is the earth huge? Just one meter? Sounds weird…". And if the student after that showed his ability to convince us that his position is correct (using a very obvious and lying on the surface of the argument), then his chances of being invited to the next round exceeded 90%.

When you are taking an exam, it makes no sense to think about why the teacher included this or that question on the ticket. The teacher is not tasked with understanding how you think. Your knowledge of a particular subject is important to him. The interview (especially the interview of a student) tests not only and not so much the knowledge of a particular programming language as of "today". The purpose of the interview is to reveal that you have an understanding of the basic concepts and the ability to use them to come to certain conclusions.

7. What will I ask the employer?

Agree, it is very strange to think about what you ask the examiner before the exam. He will definitely ask. You will only be responsible.

But you can and should ask the employer. What's more, employers love job seekers who ask questions.
Why? Because (as we know from the first question) good candidates choose the best employer. An interview is not only our chance to understand whether we want to work with you or not, it is also an opportunity for you to conclude whether our company is suitable for your career.

One of our colleagues, who has been an engineer for a long time, always devotes as much time to interviews as to interviewers' questions. Essentially doubling your interview time. Perhaps this is one of the reasons that almost always allowed him to show the employer that he, too, makes a choice. And, in the end, to be hired in the very company, from work in which both parties (employee and employer) will receive the maximum benefit.

It should be clear to the employer from your questions that you are really interested in understanding how the company works. "How
is the development process built? "," At what stage is the project? "," Where are the team members located geographically ", etc. Questions like these also show you understand that software development is about more than writing code. This understanding is rare for students and, absolutely, positively characterizes the candidate.

Conclusion

As we said at the beginning, our seven questions will be especially useful for those new to the interview process. If you already have your own extensive interview experience, we will be glad to see your case studies in the comments.

For those interested, here are some helpful materials.

Generally speaking, there is no difference in interviewing students and experienced professionals. These are ordinary negotiations about work, responsibilities, tasks, salary, schedule, conditions and other things. Everything as usual.

How a student can get an interview

To make it easy for a student to pass an interview, you will need good preparation and a little practice (attend 2-3 interviews).

And be sure to look over the common mistakes in the interview. This is useful to know.

Negative opinion about students and what to do with it

However, several negative opinions and characteristics were formed about the students.

Irresponsibility

It is a sin for students to skip work just like that. This does not apply to everyone, but the entire student community suffers.

It happens that a person picks up and does not come to work, does not answer the phone and is not in VKontakte. The next day he will explain something about personal problems and an accidentally broken phone. Tales of Agrafena Diogenovna, in short. And it happens regularly.

One of my acquaintances, a director in a store, made a rule - if an employee missed work without sick leave, he was fired. The turnover in the store was crazy. Some students couldn't even stand it for a week.

In short, the problem of irresponsibility is not invented, the leaders are justifiably indignant.

Decision: learn to negotiate and take time off. The best thing to do is to discuss fundamental things during the interview - to discuss the work schedule, the opportunity to take time off, the criticality of being late. This will show your adequacy.

Inexperience

This is not the fault of the students, it is just a fact. There is nothing wrong with this, unless the students are trying to deceive the employer and impersonate an experienced specialist.

Decision: honestly say in the interview what you know and what you don't. However, even before looking for a job, you can learn some skills and increase your chances of getting a job.