Page 40 - You're Hired! Interview Answers

n Careers: clearly important, you should read all the relevant information PRePaRing FoR the inteRview
under headings like ‘Meet our people’, ‘Why join us?’ as well as looking for
definitions of different job roles, job specifications and any overall company
values and competencies they provide.

n Publications: it is well worth looking at the company report, not just in
terms of the organisation’s performance (remember, the company report
is a PR document!) but also in terms of values, objectives and company
culture.

Even small organisations will have websites that include a lot of relevant
information.

other websites

If you put the name of your target organisation into any of the main search
engines you will get a lot of other hits in addition to the company’s own
website. It’s worth exploring some of these because they will give you a view of
how the business is seen by outsiders. Organisations are all keenly interested
in their reputation. By having a sense of how the world sees them you will
be much better equipped to give intelligent answers (and ask intelligent
questions) during your interview. Wikipedia, market intelligence websites,
newspaper sites, consumer sites and profession/trade sites can all provide very
useful background. Be nosey, try to understand what makes the organisation
tick!

newspapers and magazines

While these are most likely to be useful for direct information about large
organisations, they can also tell you a lot about what is going on in a particular
market or sector. So, while a small retailer you are applying to may not get
much in the way of regular coverage, the financial pages of the main papers
will tell you a lot about the retail climate, which parts of the sector are doing
relatively well or badly, and so on. If you are applying to a listed company it is
also well worth knowing the current share price and whether its trend is up or
down – while you might not drop this information into the interview directly, it
will tell you something about the likely mood in the business.

For broad information about trends and wider market factors, The Economist is
a particularly good source. It conducts regular sector reviews that can give you
a strong insight into what is keeping the directors of your target organisation

29