Page 43 - 301 Best Questions to Ask on Your Interview, Second Edition

THE RULES OF THE GAME

ners in romance, recoil at displays of desperation. Employers don’t
want to know about your financial plight, any more than they want
to hear about your failing romances. You must avoid any hint of
discouragement when a job offer is not immediately forthcoming.
By all means avoid:

I simply must have this job. My rent is late, and my wife and I are going
to be out on the street if you don’t make me an offer.

Even a hiring manager sympathetic to your plight cannot afford to
continue the interview. This next question is also too desperate:

I had hoped that my interview would be so good that you’d offer me a
job. What did I do wrong?

The only attitude of a candidate that really makes sense is relaxed
confidence.

13. Don’t Ask Questions That Focus on What the Company
Can Do for You

The hiring manager is less interested in how much you want to bet-
ter yourself than what you can do to ease his or her problem. “What
about me?” questions like this are a turnoff:

I’m very committed to developing my intellectual property by learning
new technologies. What kinds of tuition benefits and other educational
support can I expect?

It’s nice that you want to improve yourself, but the hiring manager
is not interested in your commitment to education on the company’s
time. He or she has a problem to solve and wants to know if you can
help solve it. If you can, maybe then the company can invest in your
skills so you can solve even more of its problems. Compare the above
question to:

I want to put all my experience and everything I know into the service
of solving the challenges you have outlined. At the same time, I hope
to increase my value to the company by learning new skills and tech-
nologies. What programs does the company have that will help me add
value by learning new skills?

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