Tips to crack Interview for freshers

                                                           
Are you the one who is freshly out of college, the one who is searching for his/her destination in the crowd of graduates. If you are the one who is up for his next level of the challenge then here are some of the interesting tips which would help you in earning the job immediately once you are out of college.

It is always difficult to find a job if you are freshly graduated since you are always bombarded with question like

1) Do you have any experience on the desired field? 

2) Where do you look your future down the line after few years in this field?

3) How will you rate yourself in the corresponding field?

4) What are the skills you have worked on?

To name these are the few questions especially for technical individuals as in my case I felt it very difficult to answer. As I was freshly graduated I never had any industrial experience and even anyone to guide and was very difficult to meet the level of expectations from interviewers.

Following are the few tips which you need to take care before attending your Interviews.

1. Don't be nervous

2. Knowledge & Preparation

3. Language (Soft Skills)

4. Answering the Questions

5. Confidence

6. Showcasing the skillset (Presentation)

7. The Job Offer

So, let's have deep a dive to each of the points stated above. Understanding this points will allow you to develop your soft skills as well as build your confidence.

Like other fresh graduates, even I used to hesitate in front of interview panel since I had never faced such things up till my graduation and one day suddenly, I am in a room with highly skilled professional locked up in a silent meeting room. The environment got me totally perplexed and the preparation which I had done from last one month was lost.  I was totally confused and had no idea what to speak up. Even for the introduction, I started stammering and which made my interview worse ahead. I was nervous throughout the interview as I was not confident even if I was prepared for so long.

• Don't be Nervous

“There is nothing to fear but fear itself” 
– inspirational words used in the inaugural address of Franklin D Roosevelt

Nervousness is the biggest enemy which we face during the interview. Studies reveal that even if you have practiced the stuff lot of times be it an interview, acting or presentation, with a blink of an eye you will forget everything.

Nervousness has a direct impact on the thinking process, your hands will start shivering, you will feel like sweating and you will be completely traumatized. All your efforts which you have taken to clear the interview would be wasted.

Before Interview - 

The best way to overcome nervousness is to face or create the situation you fear and practice the same. Create the whole scenario with your friends/Parents and ask them to act as an Interviewer, ask them to provide the feedback, Take the feedback seriously and act on them. 

During Interview - 

"Don't think anything". Yes, you got it right, I said don't think anything during the interview. This is one of the largest mistakes done by people instead of hearing and thinking the questions asked by the interviewer, individuals think what should have been the answer to the last question which I fumbled up, Dude !!!  No, you can't think or you will goof up the current question in this way you will loose both the questions and will get confused.

Just answer the questions you heard from the interviewer. I would be covering how to answer the question in the point 4 (Answering the questions) below.

So, the solution is you can ask the interviewer whether you can answer the question you have fumbled at the end of that round.

Lastly, take a deep breath, have a little conversation with interviewer it will help you in gaining the confidence over your nervousness. Yes, please have a sensible conversation.

• Knowledge and Preparation

The Knowledge is one of the crucial aspects to work in any field, knowledge is one of the building blocks of the best career. It's very important to know about the work or the career you are about to start. Despite being graduated from Computers, Pharmaceuticals or Chemical Engineers, the process that is carried out in the industry is a lot different as what we have studied in the School and colleges.

Following are the ways you can prepare yourself:

A) For freshers, it would be great if they get an internship with any Organisation/ Company related to their field. It would help in gaining a lot of industry-level knowledge. 

B) In case if you fail to find internship with good organization you can go for a start-up organisation, pay/salary might not be so great but working with a start-up would be much fruitful for your career, not only you will be good in knowledge with respect to your work, also you will learn to take over the roles & responsibilities related to your very quickly.

C) Finding the fried or the colleague who wants to work in the same field you would like to is also helpful, or learn from the senior who are already into the industry, they would have a better knowledge and may teach you the industrial standards.

D) Preparing for the interview itself is an art even the person with good knowledge sometimes fails to crack the interview because every interviewer expects some sort of personality they want to fit in their role. So only knowledge would not be helpful, they would look many other qualities like a problem solver, work under pressure or good presentation skills.

E) Each job has its own requirements like for e.g. Chartered Accountant you should be good in mathematics, for the technical jobs you should be good in different programming languages and technology, also depends on the type of job you are looking for prepare yourself accordingly.

F) You need to surf more and more on the internet for the field you like ahead to work on, this would help you in understanding and exploring the various path which would lead to your job.

• Language & Personality (Soft Skills)

It always matters as it is quoted "First impression is your last impression"  you should give the best impression to the recruiter so that it would catch his mind and present him that you are the ideal candidate or the competitor for the position held in their organization.

Following are the behavioral tips:

• Arrive on time for the interview it's very important you cannot be late it's not acceptable.
• Be soft spoken don't scream, talk politely and decently
• Don't overtalk answer the question that has been asked to you do not try to give the extra information
• Don't talk out of the subject matters it would create a bad impression
• Ask your questions in the end 
• Don't create a gap in between keep talking, sometimes some recruiters knowingly keep quiet they would rather like to observe you and your reaction Don't get irritated and annoyed if you feel that you have done with your answer you just politely inform the interviewer this is what you know about this question. 

Personality Tips:

• Don't wear a dark colored office shirt/tops (Black coat is an exception) or an eye catcher shirt/tops, I am talking about shirts/ tops over here, wear a light shirt/top (office formals)
• Completely avoid jeans and T-shirts, you need to be in formals if you are approaching for an interview.
• Have your shirts tucked in.
• You do not need to look beautiful/handsome you just need to be dressed formally.
• The way you sit during the interview also matters, sit straight with your hands on your lap, avoid sitting with folded legs it's not a good posture if you are getting interviewed.

• Answering the Question

This is the most important part of our article this would inform you that how can you start with your interview, what are the pieces of information that you should share to keep the conversation going on. It's really important to keep the conversation going on as well as keep the interviewer engaged and interested in your profile. It's a trick, not everyone can implement the same, it's like selling a product while selling the product you need to praise the product until it gets sold, same works with the interview.

Let's take a look at what are the information you can start with and what would be the real life scenario.

So you are sitting in an interview room surrounded by the interviewer obviously not surrounded, may be sitting in front of you. Either of you guys doesn't know each other, so the question is who would start first.

So the interviewer would ask you to brief yourself. 

Interviewer: Hey Ravi, Good morning, I have your resume so you are a fresher, can you brief me about yourself.

Most of the candidate are nervous at this time they start giving their introduction, and start stammering immediately because of which they say wrong sentences or improper introduction which would reduce their marks straight away? So the question is what is that you should do?

Please find the key points below: 

1) Personal Introduction

   a) Your name, the place you live.

   b) An introduction to your family.

   c) Your studies and the subject you were good at or something you were good at.

        (Note: Don't worry if you  were good at nothing, please make up the things and say it absolutely doesn't matter)

   d) Your hobbies and the things you do during the Past time.

   

This information would take around 5 minutes or more and you will feel little comfort while talking once this session is over, make yourself comfortable with the interviewer.

2) Professional Introduction

     a) As you are a fresher you may have limited skills, but try and prove them you have all the skills
that is a need for the empty position.

     b) Introduce them to the college projects and your solo projects/ works that you have done on the field in which you are interested in working.

     c) Demonstrate your Freelancing work/project if there is any it would add to your experience and your resume would outstand many others.

     e) If you have done any of the leading or organizing activities at your college level you can also demonstrate it as it would be a added advantage for you.

The profession introduction would be the starting point of the interview which the interviewer would hear carefully, please do not provide a false information if you have genuinely done some project them present them or it would be the reason for your rejection.

3) Different Interview Rounds

There are different types of round in Interview depends on the type of job you are looking for
Process/ methodology may differ from one type of job to other. Like for example If you are looking for a job of Software Programmer you would be bombarded with the questions related to programming or how to create a simple web page etc, or suppose if you are going for the designation of sales analyst then interviewer would ask you to sell their product, they interested in knowing how would you sell the product.

But you need to be prepared for these rounds either by practicing at home or with friends or parents as stated above it would help you in boosting up your confidence.

There are many different types of interview round such as Technical Interview, Telephonic Interview, Group discussion, Case Interview, HR Interview etc.

Each of this round would be related to the skills which you have practiced earlier or related to your studies, you should be very good in presenting the skills to the interviewer, not very good but at least interviewer should understand what you are trying to explain, be clear and precise on the points which you are trying to explain to the interviewer I have explained the Presentation in the point below.

• Confidence

Someone have rightly said that "Confidence is the Key", everyone likes to work with the confident person and the interviewer alway selects the person who is most confident and suitable for their vacant position.

The way to build the confidence is to practice the skills/skillset, Practice and hardworking is the only way you can build your confidence, If you have the knowledge you will be more confident than rest of the competitors.

All these words Confidence, Hard Work, and Talent are intermingled with each other, you cannot have one without the other. 

The confident answers help to set you aside and make a mark in the interviewer's mind so that he will easily recognize you as the ideal candidate for the job they are offering.

• Showcasing the skillset (Presentation)

Another important skill is the Presentation of your knowledge, now you have all the confidence, talent, skill and hard work on your plate, now the time comes to present in front of the interviewer.

But what if you present it wrongly and the interviewer doesn't understand anything, you will be out of the race no use of hard work and practice everything will go in vain.

It's equally important to present properly what you have learned and achieved from your hard work so that to the one whom you are presenting should understand the stuff thoroughly.

Try to give more and more examples of your work and the skills it would help the recruiter in understanding your strength.

Demonstrate your strong areas with the best results from them.

Provide your own methodology to solve the issues.

If you are not sure about the answer speak some related stuff so that it would help interviewer understand that you can improve on this area if you are given a chance to work on it.

• The Job Offer

Now finally after a lot of hard work Pappu passed in the interview and now the discussion is going on for the offer, it is very crucial don't be over excited until and unless you have an offer letter in hand you are not selected.

I have seen a lot of organizations taking advantage of freshers graduates ask them to pay money and join the organization which is a completely wrong process of hiring and its also a crime. 

"Do not ever join organizations which ask money to give you a job offer", these are fraud organizations they just collect money from you and would not give promising career, or you would give some silly work which would spoil your future. Please do hard work and try to crack the interviews genuinely it would not only make you strong performer and also you will land a good career opportunity which will help you to grow.

Back to Job offer, so friends as you are fresher you have very little scope to negotiate as you do not have any work experience, but even if you feel that the pay is too lower than the Standard  pay please explain the concern to the employer/organization and ask them for the desired pay, or if you are not happy with the pay anyways you can hold the offer for the time being and search for another one ;)

Hope this tips will help you in your job hunt for finding the first ever Job in your life and make you very much the successful person in your career. Wish you the Good Luck :)

For any more queries, you can reach out me on my email Id for any help or share your resume with me, I will notify you in case if find some good opportunities for you.

Thanks and Regards,

Gunaprasad Shetty

shettygunaprasad816@gmail.com