Listening Is Your Interview Superpower
Hear What Matters Before You Plan Your Answer
Your interviewer can tell you exactly what matters to them while you’re so busy planning your next answer that you miss the total entire point
You’re nodding and looking interested but inside your head you’re choosing a story and wondering if your last answer sounded impressive enough
Then you hear a familiar word and off you go with the speech you practised in the car
Just stop…
Listening is your interview superpower because the person hiring you can tell you things about this job that you’ll never find in the advertisement
They might say;
‘The hard part here is getting people to stick with a decision once they leave the meeting’
You hear ‘getting people’ and launch into your favourite story about bringing everyone together for a workshop
But they’ve just told you people already agree in meetings and the trouble starts afterwards
You could ask;
‘What tends to stop people following through once they get back to their own teams?’
Now you might find out their managers give them different priorities or nobody knows who owns the next step
That gives you something useful to respond to and a reason to choose an example that shows how you’ve handled that problem before
You also give the interviewer the experience of talking with someone who takes their concern seriously enough to LISTEN and to understand it
Before your next interview practise this in an ordinary conversation;
Let the person finish and ask one question about something they actually said before you jump in with your own experience
Notice how often you want to interrupt because you’ve already decided you know what they mean
After twenty years of solving problems you can get very quick at recognising a familiar situation and very quick at assuming the rest
Give this person a chance to tell you what’s different
In our coaching I’ll ask what you heard in a practice question and we’ll compare that with what you actually answered because that’s where we can catch the habit before it costs you an opportunity
Your dog can hear the word ‘walk’ and still watch what you do next because there’s a big difference between you picking up her lead and settling down with another coffee
She’s learned that hearing the bit she likes doesn’t always mean she’s going anywhere
That’s The Dog Code in an interview
Give the person hiring you that much attention and you’ll have a far better chance of showing them how you can help
Your life is not a dress rehearsal so live like someone left the gate open
Listen closely and answer with confidence
The Dog Code gives you practical ways to stay present, listen carefully and explain your value when the conversation matters