Page 143 - How To Sell Yourself

142 How to Sell Yourself
The approach of highlighting your general skills has two main
advantages.
First, it’s flexible and you’re flexible, depending on the needs of the potential employer.
Second, it stands alone, stripped of ties to your previous em- ployer and open to future applications. As your interviewer, I’m not as interested in what your duties and responsibilities were in your last job as I am in what you can do for me now.
Cite specific examples of
your accomplishments in measurable terms
Give numbers that quantify what you were responsible for, how effective you were, the changes you brought about, the vol- ume you handled, the number of people you supervised, the in- crease in sales or productivity, the size of your budget, and the scope of your function. Use whatever yardstick is appropriate, such as degrees of growth, improvement, or accuracy; honors and citations; promotions and bonuses; decrease of complaints; in- crease in income, membership, output, or stock value. These kinds of objective measurements say more about your ability and actual accomplishments than any claims you may make. And wherever possible, use the techniques of storytelling, anecdotes, and per- sonal examples.
Learn what you can about
your potential employer and the business
Check out the company’s Web site. Learn what you can about the company, its problems, strengths, plans, operations, goals, and past successes and past failures. There may even be information available on the company’s hiring practices. This will allow you to orient your statements to the company’s needs and also establish that you’ve done some homework and know what you’re talking about.
Getting across these three points is the primary objective in any interview. No matter what the interviewer wants to talk about, you want that person to hear what you can do, how well you can do it (or how well you’ve done it in the past), and how your skills and experience relate to and can benefit that company.