Results, Enthusiasm, and a Positive Attitude: Your First Three Keys to Cracking the Code
“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.”
—Albert Camus
Now that we’ve covered basic, commonsense interview preparation, the fun really begins. This is where we begin our exploration of the REAPRICH science that will allow you to go on the offensive and create the outcome of your interviews. With this science and a precise plan, you’ll begin to lose your fear, have confidence, and never get lost while interviewing.
We’ll start with “R” for Results, “E” for Energy and Enthusiasm, and “A” for Attitude, presented together because the force of these elements working in concert are very powerful.
When you go into an interview, the manager who spends time with you wants to know first and foremost: What is it that differentiates this person from everybody else I’m going to speak to today? This manager has already seen so many résumés for this opening. Some opportunities I’ve recruited for have generated as many as ten thousand résumés over the course of the search. Just as your results are going to appear at the top of your résumé (more on that later), they’re also going to appear at the very beginning of your interview.
Results are what differentiate you from everyone else. You need to come up with a collection of six to ten achievements you’ve had that you can list in ninety seconds or less, depending on experience. Not stories, just statements of fact that are moving, defining, and exciting.
Here’s where “E”—Energy and Enthusiasm—comes in. You need to have passion and enthusiasm as you deliver your results to a manager. Energy is the most important foundation for effectively communicating your results.
Insider Secret #3:
Hiring managers will fail you during an interview for a lack of energy and enthusiasm. They will also fail you if they can’t determine quickly that you have produced strong results in he past. If either of these factors are not evident and solid, they’ll lose interest quickly.
Think about the last time someone got you excited about something. Now imagine the most energetic and enthusiastic person you know. You’ll need to bring that kind of energy and excitement to every interaction in your interview process. People sometimes get jobs based on energy and charisma alone, because everyone loves someone who gets them excited or changes how they feel.
The energy and excitement you bring to the start of the interview sets the tone for the rest of your meeting. How will you get across those key things you need to communicate to make yourself a top-tier candidate? If you’re unable to get that hiring manager’s attention right away, you run the risk of his or her attention starting to wander. You want the interviewer to be present and attentive to you from start to finish.
While you want to show passion and energy, make sure you do it in a way that aligns with that company’s culture. Keep in mind that if you’re looking for opportunities in the engineering field, for example, or if you’re pursuing an opportunity with a company that’s perhaps on the conservative side, the hiring managers may be used to dealing with people who have a more understated demeanor. You can’t jump up on a table at a conservative company and yell, “I’m so glad I’m here! You guys are great!” That’s really not going to fly. But if you can bring some excitement to people who are in jobs they’re not enjoying—if you can bring some juice and some freshness to what they’re doing, some sunlight—you’re going to make a lasting impression.
Hand in hand with energy is the “A” in REAPRICH: Attitude. Whereas Energy/Enthusiasm speaks to your outward presentation, Attitude speaks to your inner landscape. In order to be successful, you must find the intrinsic motivation that can only come from a positive attitude. In life there will always be setbacks; there will be missteps. If you can show that you can work through your problems and see your failures as learning opportunities, you will be able to sustain your enthusiasm to stay on track for as long as it takes to succeed.
Your attitude matters not just because it will color everything you do and say during your interview, but because managers are now actively looking for a positive attitude as part of the interview process. They want you to demonstrate grit, tenacity, and focus in your work results and also in your delivery. Large, well-respected companies have fired high performers for not being respectful of underlings or coworkers. Jack Welch, chairman and CEO of General Electric, implemented a “no jerk” policy at that company, and many others are now following suit. This means that no matter how intense, awkward, or direct you are or need to be, you can deliver any communication with kindness and respect. Overt ways of communicating must be warm and nonconfrontational, without undertones of covert passive aggression.
One of the things I’ve found helpful in keeping my own attitude in check is taking ownership. By that I mean holding myself accountable for both my successes and my failures. This is empowering because it puts us in the driver’s seat. Whatever comes, we know we can not only handle it but ultimately use it to our advantage. Believing we can get better with time, even improve our IQ over time, is a growth mindset. By contrast, blaming our failures on other people or circumstances, believing ourselves to be at the mercy of bad luck, bad timing, or fate, is a victim mindset that can only hinder our chances for success. It’s important to always look for the version of events wherein we are accountable, acknowledging our personal responsibility in the outcomes we create.
The power of results, delivered with energy and a positive attitude, is that managers feel more positive toward candidates when they’re convinced that the person has achieved or, even better, overachieved. That gives the managers a comfort level—a sense of peace that they’ve made a good hiring decision. How they go about discerning whether or not you’re that person is a mental process even the managers themselves may not understand.
The Secret: The Questions behind the Questions
Managers will usually ask you a prepared set of questions in an interview, but for each manager there is also a set of questions behind the questions that are absolutely critical to the process. This is what is referred to as mental schema. One critical question is, “As a manager, can I feel secure that this hire will not fail me? Even better, can I be sure that the hire will substantially overachieve for me?” A clear, concise, and energetic recitation of your results will satisfy these concerns.
So how do you go about preparing a list of results that will be compelling and powerful?
You need to find a way to measure your work experience even if you’re not currently in a job where your performance is measured in a specific way, even if you don’t get performance reviews or career coaching. For example, what awards have you won? What percentage of results have you achieved? What things have you done—accomplishments, articles, discoveries—that have distinguished you in your field or the field you’re trying to get into? Did you bring a project in ahead of budget? Did you save the company money? Did you organize something or pull off an event? These are all the types of things that should be a part of your results statement.
Not everyone has top-caliber results, so you may need to look in your background to identify the winning things that differentiate you.
Here are some questions that will help you come up with a results list:
If there are no examples of excellence in what you’ve done during the last five years, then you need to ask, “Why not? Why haven’t I won an award or overachieved? What do I need to shift or change in myself so that I do?”
Once you have your list of results, be sure it’s featured prominently on your résumé, too. While managers do look at résumés, more often than not they just take a quick glance. So the first two bullets of your experience under each section of your résumé need to highlight your results. Where did you differentiate yourself? What makes you special? Why should a manager talk to you instead of everybody else asking for this opportunity? I’ve often interviewed people who have been number one or number two at their job in the world or who have won awards at the company they’ve been with, but those results are not anywhere on their résumés, nor do they come up when I speak with them on the phone or in person.
Presenting Your Results in the Interview Setting
When you walk into an interview, you’ll normally find two types of managers. The first type jumps right into the interview, while the second type spends some time—maybe five minutes—building rapport. That manager may take this time because you know someone in common, or have a friend that referred you. They may also be testing your ability to loosen up and build rapport quickly. So if a manager chooses to build rapport, you want to be able to spend that time talking easily. Keep the initial introductory five-minute conversation high-level and brief to create a connection. If you go on talking too long, the manager will notice that. Keep your answers short, interesting, and fact-based, with no long stories out of the gate.
If a manager chooses to jump right into the interview, you want to be able to get right into that process as well, by presenting your results list you’ve prepared and practiced. It’s key that after whatever small talk begins the interview, you jump deeply and quickly into your results statement right after. Don’t wait to be invited: that invitation will likely never come. Remember, your results statement is answering the question behind the question, the one the hiring manager might not even know she has. So take the initiative.
Many people come into an interview and sit quietly or meekly in their chairs. It’s critical to display energy, enthusiasm, and excitement. You need to light up the room when you walk in the door. Whether you’re talking to a senior manager, a vice president, or a CEO, you’ve got to be present and engaged. They have to feel your energy. If you talk about results without energy, it’s like collecting wood for a campfire and not bringing matches. Instead, you’ll reach a point in the interview where you’re rubbing two sticks together, trying to create a spark.
Do not pretend to be an expert on something you’re not in order to impress a manager or build rapport. I once had an applicant say he was an expert French speaker. The manager said later, “He claimed to be an expert in French but he’s kind of an intermediate. I think he’s full of it; we probably shouldn’t hire him.”
Practice Makes Dynamic
There are very few people for whom all this energy, enthusiasm, and self-promotion comes naturally, particularly in an interview setting where they’re nervous and invested in the outcome. But you have to break through your comfort zone to create an effective and powerful delivery. I often spend time watching people in mock interviews and giving them feedback until they perfect their interview presence, including persona, tone, and body language.
Practice smiling and showing excitement in the mirror before going in to meet with people. It’s okay to feel awkward or nervous the first several times you do this—in fact, it’s helpful. Much better to dispense with the butterflies in the privacy of your own home than in an actual interview! Practicing your interview delivery at least five times with a friend or family member can also be very valuable. Make sure you pick someone who is truly on your side and will neither spend all their time either criticizing or praising. The best choice would be someone you might initially feel a little uncomfortable around so that you can have the experience of starting over as needed, gaining confidence along the way. It’s much better to get the jitters out and perfect a smooth delivery in a safe, controlled environment than it is in the actual interview process.
Think of it like a performance. If you had to sing a song in front of an audience, wouldn’t you practice it multiple times?
Once you’ve got it down, your results statement amounts to a power pitch that you can deliver spontaneously and with passion not just in an interview but anywhere, at any time. Remember, you never know when you’re going to meet someone who’s a lead to your next job, or even your future boss.
Examples of Results Statements
Your results statement will be unique to you—it’s what sets you apart. For clarification, here’s an example of what it might sound like: “I’ve been a top 1 percent performer over the last three years, finished two major projects 20 percent ahead of time and 10 percent under budget. I was selected to evaluate all the financial software vendors, and I saved the company over fifty thousand dollars in one quarter by finding a mistake that had been overlooked in tracking. I also streamlined our shipping procedure.”
Read that aloud. You’ll see that it takes about twenty seconds to communicate something that will make a manager say, “Wow! This person is impressive.” Someone else may have more experience or a better education, but if you can communicate how you differentiated yourself and added value to your company, an employer is much more likely to hire you.
A salesperson coming in for an interview might say something like the following: “Great to be here today. Thank you for your time. I was the number one salesperson for the East Coast division for e-commerce for the last three years. I won the President’s Award in 2014. I’ve led two successful teams in the last year and a half, winning the team award from the Executive Club. I’ve also been able to break into one hundred and sixty-five new accounts over the last four and a half years, putting our company in first place out of all the other ERP competitors. Throughout the last ten years, I’ve been in the top 5 percent of achievement, and I won two President’s Awards in 2005 and 2010.”
Here’s an example from my own career: “I’ve consistently been a top 1 percent achiever. I won the Oracle Best Recruiter award and three outstanding achievement awards. I also was ranked number one worldwide recruiter for both Oracle and Siebel Systems, and duplicated those results in many other companies. I’ve built top employee referral programs and increased employee referrals by over 500 percent in some cases, while also doubling new revenues as a COO within my first twelve months after the company had experienced four years of flat growth. I built specialized teams for Larry Ellison, the CEO of Oracle, that focused on selling into the top four hundred Golden accounts.”
Congratulations! You’ve got their attention. Now you’re going to move immediately to the next part of the REAPRICH formula: Process.
Results, Energy, and Attitude Worksheet