Interview Mistakes to Avoid

By: Sharmiela Shahalam

How many of you remember wishing you had done or said the right things after a job interview? You may be a bundle of nerves before the interview but let it not be an excuse for losing that job to the next candidate. There are more ways than one to impress your potential employers and avoiding interview pitfalls is one of them. It is no longer just about meeting the requirements but establishing your value and convincing your potential employers with your vibrant personality, positive attitude and work ethics.

1. Do Not Come Unprepared

This is stating the obvious, really. Apart from researching on the organisation and recalling the position you have applied for months ago, consider bringing along extra copies of your resume and references. Just whip out your work portfolio and instantly notice the smile of approval. A work portfolio containing your resume, certificates and best work samples can give your interviewers insights into your skills and professional experience. Ultimately, the more you can support your accomplishments, the more credible you are.

2. Do Not Panic!

Yes, we are talking anxiety attacks, sweaty palms and clumsy behaviours. The fear of job interviews is a common source of anxiety but do not let your nerves throw you off your game! Stop rambling and choose your words wisely. Pause and think before you answer. Avoid fidgeting in your seat, playing with hair or tapping your feet incessantly.

3. Do Not Grieve about Past Working Experience

While your frustrations with past employers and colleagues may be justifiable, it is still very unprofessional and unwarranted. Your potential employers may instead regard it an incapability of handling work challenges or building positive rapport with colleagues. So hold your horses and think before you decide to rant about your unhappy past working experience at a job interview.

4. Do Not Lie or Exaggerate

Lying in your resume or exaggerating in your job interview will most often mess up your chances of snagging that ultimate job. Do not be someone you are not. Be honest yet tactful in your responses. Besides, you are aware that your potential employers can easily call up your referees or company to clarify on your work conduct and reason for leaving right?

5. Do Not Be Unresponsive or Disinterested

The job interview is also a chance for you to ask questions about the company, expectations and career prospects. This adds on to coming prepared for the interview and having a few questions ready for the hiring manager or potential bosses. Your knowledge and keen interest in the company and position will give you an edge over the other candidates, bringing you a step closer to your ultimate job.

And now to put your best foot forward and not let these aver-table interview mistakes stop you from shining. After all, your first impression should not be your last one.

Article: http://bit.ly/TZOS5Z

Talent Showcase

Check it out! TALENT SHOWCASE will be held in Pusat Sains Negara, Bukit Kiara on the 10^th of December 2012. This event aims to strengthen the employers’ skills in handling employees, explore as well bring up talented entrepreneurs.

It also appoints new-fangled games, roles and rules to bridge the generation gap in workplace. Generation gaps occur when there are differences in thoughts, behaviour  attitude, ethics, and values. This eventually leads to miscommunication and misunderstandings. There is a total of four generations – the baby boomer  the older generations, generation X and generation Y.

Due to different cultural societies engaging from different eras, people tend to have different values and philosophies. This happens everywhere and it is crucial when it happens in workplaces. Poor communications between employers and subordinates often raise conflicts and gradually pilot to poor business managements. 

Bridging the generation gap can improve the sincerity between people in workplace, encouraging and unleashing even the individual potential through power in coaching. The workshop is organized to teach employers how to imply strategies and experiences on different group of society class structure.

Seven well known speakers are invited to this showcase. The main speaker of the night, Michael Teoh, a Generation Y certified trainer, author and coach specializing in emerging talent and youth engagement; followed by Wai K Leong, the founder of JMC Coach Mastery Sdn Bhd whom with more than 20 years of experience as a trainer, consultant and CEO. 

Thirdly, Mel Leow, one of the youngest PCC Credentialed Coaches with ICF (International Coach Federation) and also director yet head coach in APIC Learning Academy Sdn Bhd. Janine Daniels, who has a strong foundation base in leadership that spans human capital development, consulting, strategic planning and key account management. 

Tessie Lim is the President of ICF Malaysia, also known as a peak performance coach who specializes in women’s development and corporate development issue. An editor of Byline, the journal of the Malaysia-Australia Business Council also serves as Chair of Communication & Media Relations. Vincent Chew is a visionary, a passionate Progress Coach who specializes in helping individuals to breakthrough their limiting beliefs and unleashes & optimizes their potential. He focuses on delivering three end results – hope, harmony & happiness – to his clients and acquaintances.

Last but not least, Michael Tan is the Chief Executive Officer of Human Capital Connection Sdn Bhd. An enthusiastic resourceful young entrepreneur, he is currently heading Human Capital Connection corporate division for the past 5 years. Michael Tan is also currently the Vice President of Community at Junior Chamber International Kuala Lumpur, a worldwide community of people ages 18-40 who share the belief that in order to create lasting positive change. 

HURRY and capture the registration form from us now! Feel free to contact Ms Kate Leong at 03-78770066/016-5339172 for more information. Rebates for early bird registrations are up for grabs before 15^th October. Don’t miss the chance!

Hire the Best Candidate, Not the Best Interviewer

Author: Joe McKenna Anyone with responsibility for hiring or promoting employees knows how aggravating it is to select a candidate that seemed right only to discover later they weren’t as good a fit for the job as you thought they'd be. Poor job fit results in lost productivity and excessive attrition - both costly issues for today’s lean organizations. Why do we so often hire the wrong person for the job? Often, the hiring manager isn't clear about what is required to perform the job well. When there is lack of clarity concerning any aspect of the job or the person needed for the job,managers opt for candidates they like. Many times the candidate is like the manager and we almost always ‘like’ people who match our styles. We also hire candidates who seem to know people in the industry (have an extensive rolodex). This is more common for sales people or very senior positions. Another reason for hiring the wrong candidate is that they have prepared well and have effectively sold themselves during the interview. And perhaps the most intriguing reason for poor fit that I hear (too often), is that managers sometimes know the candidate isn’t an ideal fit, but place them in the job anyway. The rational I hear for this questionable logic includes ‘we just weren’t attracting any really good candidates’ or ‘interviewing takes a lot of time and I don’t have a lot of time’. How can you prevent hiring the wrong candidate in your organization?   1. Define the ‘hard’ needs of the job including experience required (and in what), knowledge of industry, training and education, consistency of work history, willingness to travel, what they need to be proficient at (like using Excel or driving a truck). A review of a candidate’s experiences, references, education, skills and training tells us WHAT they can do and whether it matches the needs of the job. At some point you must have a background check performed - the higher the job, the more extensive the check. 2. Develop a list of 3 – 6 key accountabilities or goals that this job will ‘be held accountable for. These are those things that must be done and that will impact the business. Key Accountabilities are the reason the job exists. They must be measurable. And these 3 – 6 key accountabilities should occupy about 80% of the employees time. (Note: From my work with clients, this is the most important pre-hiring activity and is the one most often neglected.)   3. Benchmark the job. We find that those companies that effectively benchmark the soft skills required for success in the job they are filling have the information they need to look for the right candidate. And the information is objective (helping to eliminate bias). Notice I did not say benchmark your top performers in the job (such as sales). The reason is that your top performers may just be top performers in your company. It is not unusual for a company to benchmark the job and then assess their top performers and find this to be the reality. All is not loss. Two opportunities present themselves: a. Using the benchmark you can upgrade the talent in the position by filling the position with a new person who is a better fit or helping the current employee develop. b. Using the benchmark and the reports generated from the assessment reports, you will have great information with which to coach you current top performers into even greater performance. Also, using a predetermined benchmark is fine for comparison sake, but use these with care. The generalized benchmark may not be accurate for the specific job you are filling or doing succession planning for. 4. Assess your top job candidates (internal and external) versus the benchmark. Using effective hiring systems, assessing candidates’ soft skills is easier today than ever before. You can have the candidate complete our assessments from anywhere there is Internet access. And you will have their reports within minutes. The candidate’s reports should align with the benchmark which makes your analysis easy and quick. In areas that are marginal, the candidate’s reports will guide you in asking interviewing questions that target the soft skills that are most important to success in the job. Are soft skills really important in jobs?                          The answer is YES! We hire for skills and fire for attitudes (soft skills). There was a time when it wasn’t very fashionable in business to focus on soft skills. The trend was to focus on hard skills (Can they DO the task required?). Today, though, we have matured and understand that soft skills (sometimes called personal skills) usually have more to do with success and failure in a job than hard skills. For example, I have heard more than one client say “We can train them to do X, but if they aren’t good team players, concrete thinkers or problem solvers (soft skill), they can’t be effective in this job.” Conversely, I have heard most of my clients say “The reality of how (name) is doing is not what I had hoped for when I hired them! I don’t know why I didn’t see this when I was interviewing them.” Soft skills comprise a person’s job attributes, their motivators and their behaviors. Attributes are a cognitive measure of how strongly a person values certain competencies like customer service, leading others, quality orientation, flexibility, internal self control or self management. The more important the competency is to success in the job, the more important it needs to be to the person hired for the job. Attributes and Competencies often are the most important consideration when evaluating a candidate's people skills. Motivators tell us WHY a person does what they do. There are six primary Motivators: Theoretical, Individualistic, Social, Utilitarian, Traditional and Aesthetic. Here’s an example: Someone who is highly Utilitarian is motivated by results. They are profit-driven and bottom line oriented. They are driven by competition, challenges and economic incentives. The want to see results from anything they do, spend or give (including time)If the job provides and rewards these characteristics, the individual will be motivated. Behaviors were once thought to be the key to success performance in a job. While still seen as important, Attributes and Motivators are often more important because it is easier to adapt behaviors to the situation. That said, Behaviors can cause a person to fail in a job or feel a great deal of stress because their style is not a good fit for the job. For example, if someone is extremely outgoing and positive, putting them in a job that has little people contact and high levels of skepticism will be very frustrating for them. Someone in a position of authority who has difficulty making decisions will have trouble leading. In addition, an understanding of one’s behavioral style and that of others is key to effective interpersonal communication. The right assessments are the key to successful hiring The right assessments can help you objectively understand a candidate’s attributes, competencies, motivators and behaviours.  Comparing a candidate’s assessment reports to the needs of the job (benchmark) will help you understand how good – or poor – a fit the candidate will be for the job. Assessments help you get under the resume and the candidate’s interviewing persona. The right assessments will unearth a wonderfully rich body of information which you can use to help you continue the interviewing process and make your decision. The information you get from the right assessment reports can even serve as coaching guides for those candidates you hire or incumbents you are working to develop. One of my clients, who has been using assessments for the past three years, says “I don’t know how we could effectively make a hiring decision today without the information we get from these (assessment) reports.” Another client says “These reports have saved me, more than once, from making a terrible hiring mistake.” Benefits of hiring employees who fit their job Managers who are clear about the requirements for success in a job - including the ideal profile of personal attributes, motivators and behaviors - will have high levels of success when they hire. Filling each of your job openings with candidates who really fit is simply good business. It improves productivity, morale, and ultimately, the success of your organization. It reduces the burden on the manager because the employee will like their job. It creates energy for those who work around someone who loves their job. It creates loyalty (yep, there is still such a thing as loyalty). It inspires creativity. And finally, it saves money and reduces disruptions to the business which is the result of having to fire someone or having them quit (whether they actually leave of not). Article Source: http://bit.ly/OdwsfMhttp://bit.ly/OdwsfM

Workplace Ambience

                                                       

Workplace Ambience

By: Bart Icles

An office is a place where people go to work. It's a place that should make you feel relaxed and comfortable so that the work you're trying to successfully finish would be fruitfully made. Do you own an office? Does your office have furniture? In this article, our goal is to give you an idea on what kinds of office furniture would be ideal for you and your office.

Office furniture isn't really any different from the regular furniture you see at home, but it varies depending on how big your office is. Let's say for example you have a small office, would you bring a sofa in there? Maybe if it was a little bigger, then you would. Instead, why not just a desk, some nice looking chairs, and maybe a small waist-height refrigerator to store cool beverage for guests or clients? How about a nice shelf or a filing cabinet to keep all of that stressful paperwork you keep on bringing back and forth from home to the office?

What if you have a big office? Well, that's the time the couch comes in. Also, a big filing cabinet a nice looking sofa, a coffee table, and curtains would be great. It could build a nice ambiance for you, your work and your clients. Keep in mind that when it comes to office furniture, the aim is to give you a good homey space in your workplace; a nice place to relax after a hard day's work. 

Having an office usually means having to work plenty of hours in a week anyway.

Imagine if you were working 24 hours a day and seven days a week, you call your office your second home, but all you see in the office is a huge pile of paperwork. If that was your office, would you not want it to look comfortable so that your work would seem a little lighter?

Having to furnish your office may be a little expensive, but it'll all come back eventually. Having a highly furnished office will not only make you feel good about yourself but it will also make your clients want to go back to your office as well. Because of the comfortable environment that you created, it will definitely make an impression to other people. It gives them the impression that you are a credible professional because being whatever you are, you were able to furnish your office so well.

Article Source: http://www.avidarticles.com

Image Source: Ogilvy & Matter, TBWA

KL Job Dating - September Edition : 16th Sept 2012,10.00am-10.00pm @ Sunway Pyramid (Orange Atrium)