There’s been a period of dead time since my last post about how my interview went. At first, I didn’t plan to name to company I was applying for, but since now I don’t think I got the job, it was DDB in LA.
For the past week I’ve been haunted of my interview at DDB. Haunted in the sense that I replayed the interview over and over again in my head of all the parts where I failed to sell myself to my fullest potential. So during this week, I came up with a few interview tips.
The first thing that came to thought was that DDB had a pretty nice office (except parking was a *itch to find since it was hidden right under the binoculars). Right then, I was intimidated by sheer size of the company. The only thing running through my head was, “I REALLY WANT THIS JOB” (put on repeat).
Tip #1: Remember what you can bring to the company. Don’t let the company size nor the company’s prestige put you off your game plan.
I was a little caught off guard when the interviewer asked for me to talk about myself. Most people usually don’t boast about themselves too often so its easy to have your guard down.
Tip #2: Have a copy of your resume in front of you. Its basically your outline of yourself and what you’ll talk about throughout the interview. Most interviewers ask for you to tell them about yourself. When they do that, just take out your resume and hit each point, top to bottom.
Here’s the most important lesson I learned from my interview at DDB, you have to ask the right questions. What doest that mean? Its a combination of Tip #1 and bringing a sheet of questions to ask at the interview. I asked pretty pointless questions. They weren’t irrelevant, but they didn’t have anything to do with me or my skills. Ask questions where you can turn the question around and talk about yourself. Here’s and example:
Ask, “What are some duties the _________ position is looking for?”
They’ll probably answer with a list of duties.
Then use that to mention how you have skills in that certain area and so forth.
So that’s what I’ve been doing all week. I actually have another interview setup for tomorrow morning. It’s not with an advertising agency, but with a print company – I think… I need to do a little more research tonight. Its not as big as DDB, so I’ll be a little less nervous and will stay more on course with my game plan.
