10 DO’S AND DON’TSJEN JEHAN - WIL PLACEMENT FACILITATOR

HOW TO IMPRESS THE INTERVIEWER

It’s getting harder and harder to land your dream job. Competition is tough and there is so much you need to do to get an edge over other applicants.

ICMS Work Integrated Learning facilitator and trainer, Jen Jehan, shares her top tips.

This may sound pretty obvious but you need to make sure that you actually want to be somebody that the recruiter wants to meet. In order to do that, you need to take the time to tailor your resume to the role.

Now, what do I mean by this? I mean that you need to look at the job description and you need to try and match it to your resume. I’m not saying that you need to copy great chunks of text from the job description, but you do need to make sure that you have some of the key points there so the recruiter, or the person from the company reading it, knows that you’ve read that job description and that you’re the best person for the role.

DO PREPARE

YOUR RESUME

Make sure that your resume sounds like you. If you’ve got a friend that you’re working with, don’t copy each other’s resume. It’s not the best look. You need to make sure that your resume sounds like your voice, like your tone. It needs to sound like somebody that the recruiter wants to speak to. And also when they get in

front of you, they don’t want to be meeting somebody who looks and sounds completely different to the way that they sound on their resume.

YOU’RE SOMEONEBUT DON’T PRETEND

YOU’RE NOT

This is very important: ask somebody to proofread it for you. Whether or not English is your first language, make sure that you ask somebody to have a look through your resume and look out for any grammatical errors or any spelling errors; anything that may raise a red flag to the recruiter reading through the text. You can ask a friend. You can ask a family member. Here at ICMS, if you choose to study with us, you can ask the Work Integrated Learning Team and we will be happy to read through your resume and point out anything that you may wish to change or look at.

DO PROOFREAD

YOUR RESUME

To put it bluntly, don’t make things up. It will soon become very apparent to the recruiter if you’re making up things on your resume. If you’re saying that you have worked somewhere, make sure you have, in

fact, worked there because they might know somebody who works for that company and they might call them up and ask about you. And if you haven’t actually worked there, then it’s soon going to become very

apparent to that person who is interviewing you. So, make sure that everything on your resume is accurate and you’re proud of what you’re sending to that recruiter

YOUR RESUME WITHBUT DON’T ‘PAD’

STRETCHED TRUTHS

Triple check your contact details. Is your email address professional? At ICMS, our students have an ICMS email address and we always suggest that this is something that you put on your resume because it can mean that the recruiter can see this at the top and may want to interview you just

because you’re studying at ICMS. If you don’t have a school email address or you don’t have a professional email address, then it’s time to get one in order to put it on your resume. You don’t want something like Minniemouse@hotmail.com or Givemethejob@gmail.com. You need to have something that sounds professional, and something that isn’t going to cause anybody to laugh, in which case you can laugh off your job prospects at that company before you even get an interview.

POINT OF CONTACT

Are the contact details for your referee correct and current? You want to make it as easy as possible for those recruiters to get in contact with your referees. You don’t want them to have to call you to ask for

contact details for your referee. A lot of resumes have references on request or referees on request, which is fine, but if you put your referee’s contact details on your resume, it makes it even easier for whoever is

recruiting or whoever is interviewing you to get in touch with your referee. And that’s what you’re aiming to do. You’re aiming to make it as easy as possible for that company to hire you.

YOUR REFEREE’SBUT DON’T LEAVE OFF

CONTACT DETAILS

DO PICK A PROFESSIONAL

Is your voicemail active? If it’s not, then this is the time to make it active. This is very important, because if somebody can’t get through to you and they can’t leave a message then, chances are, they might move on to the next person on the list and you might have lost the chance to get that interview.

VOICEMAIL

Your voicemail should also be professional. I’ve heard some very funny voicemail messages in my time. One of which, when I called up a student and the answer was, “Hello.” And then I started saying, “Hello,

it’s Jenifer from ICMS Industry training,” to which the voicemail message said, “Ah, got you. Please leave a message after the tone.” I wasn’t very happy with that student because we had already gone through this

point about making sure that your voicemail was active, but that your outgoing voicemail message was also professional. If that was a recruiter calling up that student, they probably wouldn’t leave a message. That

person probably wouldn’t have gotten the job.

ON YOUR VOICEMAILBUT DON’T TRY TO BE FUNNY

MESSAGE

DO ACTIVATE YOUR

It’s a digital world nowadays and people will find out things about you on the Internet. Undoubtedly, recruiters will be searching for your name and they will be seeing what they can find out, which pictures they can find, what you’ve been doing, what your interests are. Make sure that you are happy with what strangers, and by strangers we mean recruiters, can see online.

SOCIAL MEDIA

You need to make sure that your social media privacy settings are set in such a way so that you can’t be tagged in another post, if you have friends who like to play practical jokes, for example. We have heard

some stories where this has happened and, unfortunately, it has meant that students haven’t been offered a position because of a photo on Facebook or something on Instagram, where one of their friends has tagged

them in a post and it hasn’t been the right look for that company.

If you’re not sure what somebody can see about you online, then ask somebody who doesn’t have a connection with you to review your profile on Facebook or on Instagram. Ask them what they can see. Get

them to do a bit of investigative work for you. Make sure that you are happy that what you’re portraying is a professional image that you would be happy for your future place of work, your future colleagues, to see also.

A POTENTIALBUT DON’T LET A TAGGED PIC COST YOU

JOB

DO REVIEW YOUR

SETTINGS

There are a number of ways in which you can practise your interview skills. Number one, research commonly asked interview questions. There are always the same interview questions that will come up through your life and through interviews for you. For example, what are some of your key strengths? What do you think are your personal weaknesses?

INTERVIEW SKILLS

Make sure that you know the ways in which to answer these questions. Have a few answers up your sleeves. Obviously, it needs to be a natural conversation with the interviewer, but that doesn’t mean that

you can’t prepare in advance. You don’t want to be too scripted but maybe there are certain points that you do want to make throughout the interview and that you feel will help you get a job.

BUT DON’T BEOVER REHEARSED

DO PRACTISE YOUR

Have a look at their company website because you want to be able to answer questions if they’re asking you about what the company does, for example. You don’t need to recite passages of what the company did years ago and how they were funded but what you do want to have is some background knowledge on what they do and why they do it. See if they have been mentioned in the media any time recently. Have a look at their social media pages and see what they’re currently talking about because they may well ask you something and you might be able to say, “Oh well, I saw that a few weeks ago you put up a post about,” whatever topic it may be, which could then, in turn, show the interviewer that you’ve taken a keen interest in the company.

Have the right facts and figures at your fingertips about the company you are interviewing for; the recruiter or interviewer will know straight away if you’re bluffing or, even worse, citing facts and figures about a rival

company. There’s no recovery from that.

THE WRONGBUT DON’T RESEARCH

COMPANY

COMPANY LOOKINGDO SOME RESEARCH INTO THE

TO HIRE YOU

At the end of the interview, the interviewer will always ask if you have any questions. You need to think about what are the types of questions that you might ask that interviewer or that recruiter.

You can ask them things like, “What do enjoy about your job? What do you enjoy about working for such and such a company?” This will give you an insight into the culture there and it also opens up an interesting conversation between yourself and the interviewer or the person working for that company. You might also ask them, “What are the next steps? When am I likely to find out whether I’ve been successful in this role?”

If you can’t think of anything, if the worst comes to the worst and your mind goes entirely blank at the end of the interview, then what we would suggest is that you say, “I did have some questions, but we’ve actually

covered them through the course of the interview. So, thank you very much. I don’t have any further questions at the moment.”

HAVE A STANDARDBUT DON’T OVERTHINK IT

ANSWER READY

QUESTIONSDO HAVE YOUR OWN

LINED UP

Always make sure that you dress like a professional. Even if the company has a casual dress policy, you can dress casually later. For the interview, it’s really important that you make a good first impression. Make sure that you’re looking neat and tidy. Ladies, make sure that you’re wearing

something that your grandmother would be proud of. Gentlemen, make sure you’re wearing a shirt which is ironed and a tie. Make sure your shoes are shined and make sure you’re looking spic and span for when you arrive at that interview. If it’s raining, take an umbrella.

Also make sure you take a hard copy of your resume along with you. In this digital world, it’s not always needed, but it’s worth being prepared just in case they ask you for a copy of your resume. Make sure that you take it with you. Make sure it arrives in pristine condition. By this I mean, don’t pull something crumpled out of your bag, which has got a bit of yesterday’s sandwich all over it or a bottle of water has spilt on it. You can take it in a presentation folder and that means that it should arrive in mint condition.

You want to make a good first impression and that means showing up on time. Because if you’re not able to show up on time to the interview, then they may think you’re not able to show up on time for work, which is

not the impression that you want to make. Make sure you know where you are going. A tip that you can use is that we often tell students to have a look at Google Street View for the building or the address of where you’re going, because then you’ll be able to visualise the company and the building for the setting where you’re going to be arriving. And sometimes it’s then easier to locate the actual office where you’re having

your interview. Make sure you know the address. Sometimes companies have multiple addresses and different sites, maybe even in different cities so make sure that you know which one that you’re going to

Aim to arrive 10 to 15 minutes before the interview start time. You don’t really want to arrive any earlier than that because otherwise you’ll be hanging around the offices and the interviewer may feel pressure that they

need to get to see you very, very soon. If you do arrive earlier than that, make sure you locate where the office is or where the location is for your interview and then you can always go away, have a bit of a walk.

OR ARRIVE AT THEBUT DON’T BE LATE

WRONG VENUE

HARD COPY OF YOURDO DRESS PROFESSIONALLY AND HAVE A

RESUME ON HAND

Before you apply for your dream job, or any job, look for experience. This can even be through volunteer opportunities. At ICMS, students have access to our ICMS work integrated learning or industry training Facebook page. We often hear in our department about volunteering opportunities and we post these volunteering opportunities up for students to be able to apply for. It’s a fantastic

way for you to be able to gain experience. If you’ve never worked before, then this is a great way to put something on your resume. Not only that, but you never know the network that you may build.

Moving on to networking events. It might be through those volunteering experiences. It might be through another event. There are lots of online virtual networking events that you can be a part of at the moment. If you don’t feel like you can go out there and get experience, have a look into it. Take a look on Google and see if you can find any networking events that may interest you.

And finally, LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a great way for you to get to know people. It’s an interesting way for you to find out about companies and to find out about what it’s like to work in specific companies or industries. There are lots of articles that you can read, but also you can get in with people fairly easily from companies that interest you.

We know all of the above seems daunting at the start of the process. If you are an ICMS student, we will guide you through it all. At ICMS we know how to prepare students for work and for landing their dream job.

We have a whole team dedicated to doing just that.

Our students receive training and advice on how to approach the job application process. Then we send them out to our valued industry training partners for their interviews which our team have lined up. Our

career-focused education helps our students absolutely ace their interviews!

Visit https://www.icms.edu.au/ to find out how ICMS can help you ace your interviews, your work experience, and land your dream job.

PANICBUT DON’T

AND GET ONDO SEEK EXPERIENCE, NETWORK,

LINKEDIN

WORK INTEGRATED LEARNING

At ICMS we believe that the best learning experience combines practical ‘real-world’ experience with a strong academic foundation.

All our degrees include Work Integrated Learning (WIL) subjects in which students undertake a placement with an industry partner (also known as Industry Training or Internship). At ICMS our undergraduates undertake a placement with an industry partner (also known as a Professional Placement or an Internship) within their chosen industry – giving our students a distinct edge over other graduates. Your placement is facilitated by our dedicated ICMS on-site WIL team who provide coaching and guidance throughout.

MORE INFORMATIONwww.icms.edu.au

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