Four tips for High-Level interviews.

Four tips for High-Level interviews.

Interviews for High-level positions are typically more nuanced, intense, and behaviourally based when compared to interviews for entry-level or junior management roles. Companies doing the hiring evaluate overall compatibility of candidates while focusing primarily on experience and behavioural qualities. However, it is common for high-level interviews to delve into other aspects as well, such as overall emotional intelligence and leadership. 

If you have a High-level executive interview in the pipeline, you might benefit by learning how you can make your case stronger ahead of time. 

Research and Prepare

Businesses appreciate candidates who take the time to learn about their probable employers before the interview process. This requirement amplifies significantly for high-level positions. Your research should ideally extend beyond going through an employer’s website. For example, if you’re applying for a job at a publicly listed company, going through its last couple of annual reports will hold you in good stead. Even better is using the information you’ve gathered to create a report that touches upon performance ratios, comparative strategy analysis, and areas of improvement. 

Try to find out who will interview you. This gives you the ability to go through the interviewer’s LinkedIn profile, from where you can gain valuable insight into the interviewer’s background, career path, and current role. Also, see if you have any mutual contacts and if you feel comfortable speak with them and ask their experience or knowledge of the interviewer. At an interview for a high-level job, bonding well with your interviewer can be crucial. 

Focus on storytelling

Your storytelling gives interviewers easy means to picture different scenarios and increases the probability of their remembering the content that’s been shared. Applying storytelling to your interview requires that you practice explaining different situations as stories, highlighting how they are relevant to the position you seek. Using the S.T.A.R method works well:

• Explain the Situation
• Describe the Task you needed to accomplish
• Discuss the Action you took
• Highlight the final Result

Prepare to answer tough questions

Interviewees for senior-level positions often need to dig deep when answering questions. This gives interviewers means to determine how self-aware you are and how you respond to different situations. Questions can be along the lines of:

• When was the last time you failed at something and how did you deal with the failure?
• How do you handle criticism?
• How do you deal with someone who is not on the same page as you?
• Why are you looking for a change, and what has held you back with your current employer so far?
• What significant change have you brought about in your professional or personal life recently?
• What is the achievement throughout your career that you are most proud of.

Remember what not to do

There are a few basic ground rules surrounding what you shouldn’t do at an interview for a high-level position.

• Don’t be late
• Don’t take your telephone to the interview or if you have it, turn it off
• Don’t get defensive if probed around answers to their questions
• Don’t take over the conversation or go off track
• Don’t dwell on why you’re leaving your current job or say anything too negative about your current or previous employers
• Don’t list being a perfectionist as a weakness
• Don’t apply for a position that requires relocation if the other decision-makers in the household are not aware and happy to consider as otherwise, the interview will waste everyone who is involved time.

Throughout your interview, try to come across as someone who is thoughtful, humble, and an inspiring and inclusive leader or employee. From an interviewer’s perspective, you need to fit the culture, meet the required skills to a high-level, and also bring uniqueness to the table.