Travisthetrout's Blog

The Elevator Speech (not just for networking) February 1, 2011

Posted by travisthetrout in Interviews.
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Last week Ayelette Robinson (at 3 Geeks and a Law Blog) wrote about her “Elevator Speech”. The elevator speech is a common “tool” blogged about in many contexts (usually in reference to networking). Ayelette’s job is unusual and difficult to explain – using a parallel such as google as an example seemed to work for her. But it may not be for everyone.

The post got me thinking about an “elevator speech” in an interview context. My current job description is “Paralegal”. Close friends and colleagues also fall under the job description of Paralegal, but do a very different job. From a recruiters point of view this is a problem. With more and more prospective applicants completing a longer period of experience as a paralegal before their training contract it becomes necessary to have a better idea of what candidates actually do in their job.

Interviewers have often asked me: what I do, what are the highlights of my job, what is my typical daily routine, what I contribute to the team, etc. (There are many ways to phrase the same question). My job is different everyday. I am passionate about what I do and could potentially fill my whole 45 minute interview slot talking about “what I do”. This is where the “elevator speech” idea comes in. I would recommend that as part of your interview preparation for upcoming training contract / job interviews – you should write a brief description of what you do. Use it and keep it simple – after all the interviewer is likely to ask you to expand on the main points (but do make sure you get everything you want to say in as concisely as possible).

Personally I include – what area of law I work in (commercial property), what area within commercial property I specialise in (using examples of clients/deals), what function/role I do (e.g. case handling, business development, project management, account co-ordination) and types of transactions. I can then branch out and discuss specific achievements, targets, deals and answer their questions. (After all it is an interview and the 30 sec time limit doesn’t apply).

I find that having a clear idea in my head of what I do before I go into the interview makes it easier to explain. Not only that I don’t forget about other lesser key elements of my role. A couple of interviews ago I forgot to mention that I also work on the business development/client relationship side of things as well as the standard case/file handling aspect. That soon got fixed and it is now one of the key points in my “job description elevator speech”.

Have you successfully condensed  your job description?

 

Interviews: Client Confidentiality August 8, 2010

Posted by travisthetrout in Interviews.
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Somewhere inside of me is a geek.

A geek that gets excited about what I do, and wants to share it with everyone because I love it. Luckily, through blogging I’ve a certain amount of self control.

Earlier this year , I attended an interview when I had just started on an exciting new project, for a client who shall of course remain nameless. At the time there was even more confidentiality issues as everything was hush hush to the public. A few months later and what our client is doing is public knowledge, or at least more so. But how much can I comfortably say about the project?

Law firms make their well known clients public knowledge. We are always hearing about which firm appears on which panel of experts for which company. In a situation where I know something I have worked on appears in the legal press I am happy to drop it briefly into conversation during an interview. and I have. It is a good selling point.

This other project was different. A project that takes up 12 hours of my life every day and I couldn’t talk about it was a hard experience for me. I talked around this issue, and didn’t do a very good job explaining what I did for fear of revealing too much. In hindsight should I really have worried?

With over 400 matters for the one client, and about 200 different solicitors on the other side anyone in the business will have had a sniff of the project I am overseeing. The firm I interviewed with had heard of me, my work and my position, without knowing it was me (a situation where you come to realise just how small the legal community can be) so is anything really kept confidential? After all – if they had heard about me, a paralegal working in a particular department at a particular law firm – they most definitely will have heard of the project.

All things considered, the partner interviewing me, respected my choice to keep details to a minimum and brought up the importance of confidentiality himself.

But the question remains: how much do you reveal about what you do in a job interview?

Interviews: “What do you know about this firm?” July 18, 2010

Posted by travisthetrout in Interviews.
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Looking through my previous drafts I found my thoughts on this question from last year, I’ve now added further thoughts based on the more recent interview experiences.

What do you know about this firm?

Nearly every firm will ask this question in some form and there is no way round it. So have something prepared. During my second year of University, at my very first interview with a top 50 firm I made a miserable job of this question. I simply had not put the care and effort into it that I should have and ended up in a sticky situation where I was talking about a case that my interviewer had been involved in and realised I really knew nothing about it. I am glad that the interview came to nothing as I now know it would not have been the firm for me. In addition I learnt a valuable lesson about research and preparation which has helped me greatly since: whatever you think is enough; double it.

The Large Firms

If you are applying for the larger firms there is really no excuse for not being prepared there is so much information out there. The internet is a good resource. Starting points should be:

• The firms website
• Legal press
• subscribe for the firms updates (using their website)
• subscribe to legal news websites Firm RSS feeds. For example Legal Week firm specific feeds relating to the top 50 firms is great to ensure you don’t miss anything.
• Use Google alerts.

The Small Firms

Obviously smaller firms are harder to research, but in my experience they know this and ask you less. The key thing is to know their website inside out (and anything else you can find). Google Alerts can also be pretty useful for the odd gem (although I did always get a lot of useless stuff from business directories).

However, in one of the interviews I had earlier this year I came across a different problem. I had researched the firm (8 partner firm): read all the legal press  / cases, noted their clients, researched how they had gotten involved in the local community etc and I thought I knew it quite well all things considered. Then one of the interviewers talked for 10/15 minutes at the start of the interview about their firm – discussing background history, offices, cases, clients and local involvements. Everything I knew (and more). Which would have been all good, it was an interesting talk, but the downside was that later in the interview they still asked what I know about the firm.

There was some umming and ahhhing before I said “you seem to have already covered everything but…” and then went on to say the key things that interested me about the firm and how this differed from other firms. not really answering the question but a technique I came back to for a later interview.

In a more recent interview, they employed the same technique of telling me a bit about the firm. They didn’t ask outright what I knew about the firm, but asked a hybrid of what about the firm made me want to work for them. Another perplexing question to which I answered by explaining my different experiences in both a medium sized firm and a large firm and comparing it generally with a small firm but focusing on the services that they offered. Showing my knowledge about what they did and why their services were special and different from other firms and mainly why I was impressed.

Finally, not all firms tell you a lot. Another firm (medium sized) that I interviewed with 2 years ago took the approach of telling me about their firm and not asking the what do you know about this firm question. And I took the opportunity to ask further questions in the interview. In hindsight it was probably not the best idea at the time as it probably made me look like I didn’t really know much about the firm, but the truth was I was genuinely curious. But probably should have been left until after I got the job.

In my opinion: if you genuinely want to work with a firm – you will know a lot about the firm as it will directly correspond with why you want to work there.

Interview Preparation: a look at what iphone apps have to offer April 10, 2010

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This week on the train I’ve been trying out the range of free Job interview apps available for the ipod/iphone. I’ve always been doubtful of such resources, but I’ve found a lot of them have got my brain ticking and have inspired me.

These resources are of course general and are in no way law specific – some in fact proved to be of little use. but I thought I’d share me thoughts in case anyone else was contemplating giving them a try. In many cases there is no REAL difference between these application, if you feel like buying the extended version of one of them I would suggest that you should go for the look and feel of it. Although as you will see only a couple made the couple of retaining a place on my ipod.

1. Interview Wizard:

Interview Wizard splits the questions into 3 categories: self assessment, education and job history.  Each category has a series of topics, which lead to a question and answer on that topic. The answer describes what the interviewer is looking for and then gives an example. There are only a handful of questions – and if you’ve ever had an interview before, the odds are you have already answered them. I covered all the questions in a matter of minutes. More questions are available in the paid option. £1.19. The look of interview wizard isn’t that exciting, but it is straight-forward and easy to use. But in all honestly I failed to see the point of spending £1.19 on the pro version and since I whizzed through the lite version, this one will be departing from the ipod.

2. Free Interview Questions (Swipe Q Interview)

This one has 40 questions: starting at the basics. The question will be on the page and you can use the arrows to navigate. Each question has an “answer” which is basically tips on what the interviewer wants and things to think about. The “notes” are an example answer. You also have the option to favourite questions. This application I think is great. I’ve not gone through all the questions yet. There are a good number and I’m savouring them on my daily commute. The “answer” page gives you lots of things to think about and the key points you should be stressing. Great advice – all at my finger tips. This one is staying.

3. 101 great answers to the toughest interview questions.

This app is certainly designed well and is powered by tap stack. So you swipe, tap, rotate and shake to navigate. Making it that bit more interesting… but is the content good? Unlike the previous two apps it is not questions and answers – it is a mini version of a book of tips.

For example:

Remember why the interviewer is asking you such open-ended questions: to get you talking, hopefully so you reveal more than you would have if he or she had asked a more pointed question. Avoid wishy-washy answers that force the interviewer to ask more and more follow up questions to get some sort of handle on what makes you tick. Answer such questions succinctly and specifically – but avoid any temptation to confess your many sins.

It’s free, so add it to your list of reading materials for a quick read as it never hurts to brush up on technique as well as questions.

4. Interview Prep Questions

This one is another deck of flash cards. One question – hit the flip button – and you get a short but sweet tip on how to answer it. Great for if you have already worked out a lot of what sort of things you want to say, but just need help going over the actual questions.

For example: “Do you think you would excel at this job?”

flips to: yes. provide specific reasons to defend your answer.

There are also options to favourite questions, shuffle the deck and search.

5. Interview Guru Lite

This app was a bit basic, so obviously the “good” features are in the pro version. But nothing in this app enticed me to buy more. One of my pet hates is where there is advertising straight away for the pro version before I’ve even had the chance to look at the app. Interview wizard had the better idea – you go through all the questions in the app and then it asks if you are interested in getting more questions. With this one: it gives you tips on preparation and what to do when waiting for the interview. But I’d just skip this one altogether. There is not much on offer.

6. Interview Buzz Lite

This is an impressive app at first glance. will complex but easy to use sections.

The Q&A section holds 55 interview questions. As well as the question and suggested answer – there is a text box for you to write in your own answer (although on the ipod typing long answers can be annoying but is good for brainstorming.) Again there is a favourites option and you can view the questions by category as well as a simple list.

The second section is a collection of do’s and don’ts. The do’s help you prepare for the interview and streamline your thoughts and includes a series of tips. The don’t’s are a series of tips of what not to say/do in the interview.Then the third second is another selection of tips include – attire, dining and how to tie a tie. The fourth section is the practice section with even more questions to answer (without giving you hints so you have to think on your feet).

And finally the references section links you to other helpful websites and resources so you can prepare even more. Overall a very complete tool and this is just the lite version. This free app by far has the widest choice of questions.The full version can be bought for a mere 59p.

7. Top 50 interview Q&A lite

The lite version gives you 10 questions with a couple of tips on how they should be answered. If you have downloaded any of the above, you’ve covered them already. The app is simple – a list of questions, when you tap them it reveals the full question and answer – not the most exciting – but does the job it you are the no frills type – but with only 10 questions it is more limited than the other choices.

8. Job Coach Lite

This one is about preparing you for the job – it breaks down the process of getting the job into manageable steps. Breaking it down into a series of 2 minute to-dos in relation to 5 main categories: career direction, materials, connecting, applying and interviewing. You set up how many goals you want to achieve each week. It will then give you a to-do, which you can either accept or reject (note not all to-do’s will be relevant for your own situation).

Should you choose to accept the to-do you then have the opportunity to do it

• You are writing a list: it will generate a box to type in and this when completed will be emailed to you.
• Or they give you advice in the form of a podcast. (the downside is that if the ipod/iphone goes into standby the podcast will stop.)
• Or if they want to you visit a website they will take you there.

The free “lite” version only has a handful of to-dos. The full version is £1.79. Which isn’t a lot for getting you motivated in bite sized chunks. Have a go at the free version because I know some people will just love this method – it is excellent if you are the type to need a prod in the right direction.

Conclusion?

I’ve kept the  Free interview Questions because it is a good selection of questions if I just want to read, and think. but not have the pressure to “Achieving a goal”. Interview Buzz lite also made the grade. A large selection of questions, different angles to tackle and good as a stand alone version without the need to upgrade. And finally, Job coach is another full package. However, the free version is limiting and this method won’t suit everyone. But it is worth a try to see if it is for you.

First Impressions are a two-way thing March 20, 2010

Posted by travisthetrout in Interviews.
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Graduates. Looking for a training contract (or any job as the case may be at the moment). When we have an interview we are so worried about making a good impression, saying the right thing, looking the part, particularly in these difficult times. We forget (sometimes) that the firm also has to impress us.

I’m not saying that anyone is holding out for that *one firm* when training contracts are scare but consider this: if you had the pick of firms, would the firm be an absolute yes, a contender or would you say no straight away?

On another note, I was talking to a colleague about interviews, he had told be about a bad interview he had had with a particular recruiter at a well-known firm. My colleague made the decision that the firm wasn’t for him, and ended up working at another large firm. When the time came for him to be considering a move (now with 5 years experience under his belt) that same firm heard he was looking to move and approached him. He said no. In the end the firm got the previous recruiter to call and apologise. He still didn’t take the job – but it goes to show – we are the lawyers of the future. One day, recruiters may regret not hiring us when they had the chance. They should still be trying to impress us – even if we are not right for them there and then – they should realise – we will be back!!