How to do a good interview?

Everyone looking for a job knows how important a good impression during an interview is, yet most people don’t know how to do one.

Why is it so hard to impress an interviewer?

Why can’t we control our emotions during an interview?

Why do we have a hard time selling ourselves?

The first interview I ever had was horrible. I did all the mistakes possible, from being late to leaving without saying “good bye”, and honestly, it was the best thing that ever happened to me (interview wise) even though I failed. I learned what my mistakes were, what I lacked and what I needed to do. Don’t get put off by failure, learn from it and move forward.

With all that being written, I have a few tips that will help you get a successful interview and possibly, your dream job.

1- Get Informed: Do research on the company and position you are interviewed for. It’s much easier to impress an interviewer if you give details and use key words from the job in your answers.  It’s also much easier to stay on point during your answers.

2- Be prepared: And by that I mean: be 20 minutes early to the interview, dress formally or accordingly to the company’s dress code, smile and greet everyone in the room (you never know who is going to interview you). The first impression starts as soon as you enter through the door.

3- Keep control: We all get nervous or agitated before and especially during an interview. Why? It’s probably not your first and not your last. Since we cannot actually push those feelings away, we might as well try to ignore them and keep control of ourselves. Don’t try to be yourself, be yourself, but, leave your negativity and pessimism at home. No one wants to hear you complain and even worse is to say something bad about yourself.

I had a group interview yesterday with a few colleagues and the interviewer asked us to say one interesting thing about us. At which one responded with “One interesting thing about me is, I’m not interesting”. Avoid those at ALL costs. Something like that will make you unsuccessful right off the bat.

4- Impress: If you followed the first and second tip you are already on the right track, so make sure you don’t back down. Stand up when you shake hands and make sure to give a firm handshake and look into their eyes while doing so, it shows confidence and trust. Make sure you stand straight (try not to do weird hand gestures or lean backwards or forward) and give detailed answers to any question (“yes” or “no” don’t count as detailed).

5- Keep calm:  If you think you said something wrong or don’t know an answer, do NOT panic. Just apologize and ask them to give you another chance or ask them to repeat or rephrase the question, which will give you time to think about the answer. Towards the end of the interview most people become impatient and interviewers can see that. It is not a good ending. Last impression is as important as  the first. Make sure to keep it professional.

6- Finish it: When everything ends make sure to give them another firm handshake just like in the beginning while looking them in the eyes. Again, confidence and trust. Say good bye to everyone and walk out the door looking confident.

If you follow these 6 tips your chances of getting through another interview or even getting the job will just skyrocket. How do I know? One year after my horrible interview I went for the same job and I was interviewed by the same guy. I followed these 6 tips and he offered me a job right the next day. I refused in the end anyway just because his interviewing skills were horrible. These things can go round, you know.

What is happiness? Can we have it?

““Happiness” is not only hard to measure, but it is also difficult to singularly define. You can’t define happiness without using a synonym for happiness, and you can’t interpret it to everyone’s satisfaction.” says Tosin Thompson in his article. So a definition for the word “happiness” itself is practically in-existent.

I’ve asked a few people “What do you think a person needs to be happy?” and all of them explained in their own way that a person needs to enjoy what they already have, live life without worries and have no regrets. Sounds quite simple isn’t it?

People will never be 100% happy, we will always want more and we will always need more. No matter how much a person has, they will never be happy with it. Human nature is to be greedy. We will never settle happy, but we don’t need to settle.

Living a life of no worries is impossible. We think, so we feel. We are always worried of what others think of us, how we look or how we behave. We are always worried about someone, how they feel or how they are. We are worried for our health, we are worried about the fact that we don’t find our phones. You are worried that what I say, is true. I’s okay to be worried. It’s what makes us human.

Is there a possibility of no regrets? That might be possible but in a world full of rules and judges can we possibly have no regrets? If we follow the rules we will regret not living our lives, if we don’t follow the rules we regret we’ve done things that we shouldn’t do. The key of having no regrets it’s not ignoring them, it’s embracing them and accept them.

Even though we might not be 100% happy all our life, we can be happy for short periods of time. And the secret is to make those periods as frequent as possible. Do what you love and be proud of it. Don’t search for happiness, let it find you. Don’t complain, complaining makes no one happy. Don’t get attached to items, they don’t love you. Believe you are happy and belief shall become reality.

“Happiness” differs from a person to another. So don’t look at others happiness and go find yours.

 

8 Tips To Success

Many people search online, web pages, sites, videos of how to be successful and how to get there.

“But what does success mean to you?”

“Is it that you want to become rich?”

“Is it that you want to become well known?”

“Is it that you want to be a singer, an actor or a producer?”

Everyone has their own version of success and what it means to them. Every successful person will have different tips on how to be successful depending on what area, they are in.

“So, how do we know what we should or shouldn’t do? ”

The most possible thing is that if you are reading this blog you either are already a successful person, and you have nothing to be afraid of, or you are not, which is better because you  are at the beginning  and the only way you can go, is up. There should be 8 tips to success that can be applied to everything we do, and these are:

1st. Passion- whatever you are looking to be successful in, never forget, passion is what drives us from within, it’s what motivates us, what makes us get out of bed every morning. “The reason why great people are few and far between is because most people don’t even know what their passion is.” This is one of the main reasons why people don’t reach their goals.

Go out there, experience new things, get out of your comfort zone, find the passion for which you are ready to die for, and when you have found it, follow it, let it drive you, let it take over and don’t give up on it.

2nd. Hard Work- nothing is going to be handed out to you without doing anything. There are many people that find their passion but are not willing to fight for it because it’s hard, well, yes, it’s called HARD work for a reason, it’s not easy. At this point it is easy to give up, but always remember what the outcome will be, that at the end of it you WILL be successful.

It won’t matter if you fail, it won’t matter if you lose, it won’t matter if your friends tell you you can’t do it (those are not your friends by the way!), if you work hard every time, all the time, you will be successful and you will have a beautiful story to share when you do.

3rd. Be the best at what you do- “believe in yourself and believe in your ideas, these can make all the difference between success and failure.” If you don’t believe in yourself, why would others? Find that passion, work hard for it, and become the best at it. You can be anything you want, but if you choose to be something, make sure you are damn good at it.

         4th. Dedication- focus on one thing at a time. Don’t try to shove all your dreams and ideas in one, you will lose your focus, you will be distracted and lose your path. Make small goals along the way and dedicate yourself to fulfilling those goals, focus on them one at a time and “keep track of them, you’ll be amazed what challenges you can overcome.”

         5th. Push yourself- never settle for less, always push yourself for better. There is always better. Push yourself mentally and physically beyond your barrier. Push yourself past self doubt, past shyness, past the negative thoughts and problems. If you can’t do it yourself ask a friend or family member but never, never, settle for less.

         6th. Add value- add value to your work, make it stand out, prove you have something that people want. People buy something that has value to them, so make sure, you have value to offer. Be it your skills, be it your ideas or projects, make sure you add value to it, or it will render itself useless. That’s how people get rich.

         7th. Ideas- do not be afraid to come up with something new and express it. Every day people come up with millions of new ideas, but they are afraid to express themselves, they are afraid to put it out there.

Big corporations want ideas, they want something new every day so they can amaze. Everything we see around us right now, from amusement parks to Virtual Reality consoles were once an idea a person came up with and weren’t afraid to put it out there. “There is no magic in coming up with new ideas, listen, observe, be curious, ask questions, make connections and solve problems.”

        8th. Persistence-  There will be failure, there will be obstacles that bring you down.

“Persistence is the Number One reason for success.”

” You have to persist through failures, you have to persist through criticism, rejection, stress and rejection.” Don’t let yourself get stuck through problems. Face them and get past them.

Your success is how you make it, it depends on what you do, and the most beautiful thing about it, is that everyone can do it.

 

With thanks to :

http://www.lifehack.org/articles/lifestyle/10-great-tips-for-success-in-both-life-and-business.

http://www.virgin.com/richard-branson/my-illustrated-top-10-tips-for-success

http://www.ted.com/talks/richard_st_john_s_8_secrets_of_success?language=en#t-167265

Thank you for the inspiration.

Is it worth to be trained by BBC?

BBC is a world wide known corporation and people think that being trained by them offers opportunities and a higher level of qualification. But is that so?

Yes, the experience it’s not what you might expect but it opens doors you might not realize they are there in the first place. It reaches you, it connects with you, it helps you fight through your lack of skills and it offers a wide variety of solutions depending on your needs.  They take interest in you from the first day, test your skill level and train you according to your needs.

I am doing a BBC Traineeship specializing in social media. I am learning a variety of skills, from blogging, tweeting, etc to film and sound editing. I am gaining more skills and knowledge through this course than what I ever learned in school. It opens more doors than any course you may do. But I can’t vouch for that.

It is worth being trained by them but not every tutor will  take interest in you, if you do not prove to them  that you will  not give them your best. So you can try. It costs nothing to try and it is completely worth it.