Ever Felt Unprepared For an Interview? Try PREP.

Brian explains the key factors that you must prepare for in order to have a successful interview.

Have you ever come back from an interview feeling unprepared? As you were driving home from the interview, you instantly had all these examples/answers start flowing away in your head for the questions asked during the interview. You are thinking to yourself, “I wish I would’ve brought that up”.

“80% of the success of an interview is determined on what you do to prepare before stepping foot in the meeting.”

If so, don’t worry, as it is a pretty common phenomenon. The work that we do to prepare for an interview is critical to prevent these experiences from happening. I believe that 80% of the success of an interview is determined on what you do to prepare before stepping foot in the meeting. We have a recommended approach towards how best to prepare before an interview.

One of the first recommended steps is to think about the role you are interviewing for and define what the three key traits being sought after. Within our company we refer to these as lenses. In other words, viewing it through the employers mind as to what are the most important skills needed for this role to drive the organization forward.

Most of the time a job description would be a great resource for this as most roles have mandatory functional skills to fill a role. If you’ve phone interviewed with the employer I would reflect on the questions that were being asked and use those as guidelines for what is most important in the role. There are usually good reasons behind why they are being asked and also the patterns (i.e. leadership/management/change management/talent gap) in the line of questioning.

“I would recommend committing time to physically write out 6-10 success stories”

If you are working with a recruiter ask for their guidance from what they have experienced on the specific role. These three lenses will be the most important qualities (from employer’s perspective) that you will be evaluated and will be used as your compass for the stories used during your interview. Once you’ve created the three lenses, I would recommend committing time to physically write out 6-10 success stories (where you made a successful contribution in your role) that will answer how your experience addresses the needed skills in this role.

It’s very important that you create your stories with focusing on using the lenses to guide the stories you create. As an example, if one the lenses is to have someone with a skill in change management within a struggling business, then you will need to give a couple of stories of how you were instrumental in turning a business around. Using those 6-10 stories, write out a couple of paragraphs that utilize the systematic format of describing the Problem, Resolution, Explanation, and Performance (PREP).

Problem can be described as the “what”. In other words it’s describing the project and/or problems that arose. Every job in the market has some element of solving problems, so it’s important to identify these issues in projects. Take some time to describe all aspects of the project or situation.

Resolution is really the “how”. This describes “how” you approached the project and/or “how” you solved the problem. There is always more than one way to get things done, so it’s important to be clear with how you arrived at the solution.

Explanation can be characterized as the “why”. What we mean here is “why” did you choose that approach to solving the problem or approaching the project. It allows the interviewer to get inside your head and understand how you systematic think in terms of solving problems. It also in the more technical positions allows interviews to understand your depth in knowledge in knowing when to use certain tools and/or technology.

Performance is described as the “outcome”. Providing tangible results in how you’ve significantly made an impact in your role. The Performance step is where you have an opportunity to use any quantitative data, facts, and figures. Quantitative data is going to be the best measure in helping to tell the story your business impact. As an example it could be something like reducing the launch time of a project by months because of process that you innovated during the project. If you are in sales, it could be growing year over year sales by 13%.

In my experience the major reason candidates do not get job offers is because of not going in enough detail about their work experience. The PREP method will allow you to develop talking points, so you are prepared to have clear and concise examples about your success.

By doing this exercise it allows you to take the time to pull out relevant experiences that in some cases might have slipped your mind. The PREP method will make it easier for you to recollect details on experiences that happened several years ago and make them fresh in your mind. There is nothing worse than walking away from an interview wishing you would have answered the question a different way or that you would have brought up a relevant experience.

Before your next interview, use the PREP method to secure the job offer. Enjoy the experience and use it to get better. You got this!

Ever Felt Unprepared For an Interview? Try PREP.

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