Preparations and Rehearsals

Before you charge off to your first interview, spend a little time developing a strategy. Think carefully about the possible traps and pitfalls that you may encounter during the course of the interview process. Consider the questions that you are likely to hear. In the heat of an interview, decisions on how to respond to a question must generally be made in a matter of seconds. It is all too easy to be caught off guard and lose your composure. To the extent possible, you should make decisions about how you will respond to certain lines of questioning in advance of the interview. Ideally, you should formulate and rehearse certain responses so that they flow smoothly and eloquently during the interview. This is not to say that your responses should all be canned. Indeed, it is impossible to anticipate every question. You do, however, want to develop your thoughts and ideas as fully as possible so that you are able to pull information from your mind quickly in response to relevant questions.