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5C h a p t e r

Seven Ways to
Stand Out During
the Interview

Interview preparation is essential. Laying the groundwork for a suc-
cessful interview minimizes your anxiety and boosts your confidence, as
well as your ability to think on your feet and provide the information in-
terviewers need to make an educated hiring decision. Advanced prepa-
ration sets you up to deliver concise, competency-filled responses that
address the requirements of the open position.

Advanced preparation will also allow you to stand out from the
crowd—to differentiate yourself from all the other applicants, most of
whom won’t have done their homework. For instance, with a little
preparation before the interview, you can determine your personal
brand, find ways to control your anxiety, fine-tune your speaking voice
to remove kinks or inflections that make you sound unprofessional,
choose words in advance that will convey your message while also
avoiding words that could sabotage your efforts, refine and reshape
overly general statements, and script your answers so they are ready
when you need them. This chapter helps you tackle these jobs and run
toward the goal line.

American Management Association
www.amanet.org