Questions

Chapter 15

Building Careers and Writing Résumé

1. How can you “think like an employer” if you have no professional business experience?

           

Your perceived ability to perform the job is obviously an essential part of your potential quality as a new hire. However, hiring managers consider more than just your ability to handle the responsibilities you’ll be given. They want to know if you’ll be reliable and motivated, if you’re somebody who “gets it” when it comes to being a professional in today’s workplace.

2. If you were a team leader at a summer camp for children with special needs, should you include this in your employment history if you are applying for work that is unrelated? Explain your answer.

           

Yes. Because many employers are involved in their local communities, they tend to look positively on applicants who are active and concerned members of their communities as well. Consider including community service activities that suggest leadership, teamwork, communication skills, technical aptitude, or other valuable attributes.

3. Can you use a qualifications summary if you don’t yet have extensive professional experience in your desired career? Why or why not?

           

Yes. Because the qualifications summary “brands” you as a candidate and also expresses your career objective and title of the qualifications summary signals the type of job opportunities you are seeking.

4. Some people don’t have a clear career path when they enter the job market. If you’re in this situation, how would your uncertainty affect the way your write your résumé?

           

I would make a functional résumé, sometimes called a skills résumé, because emphasizes your skills and capabilities, identifying employers and academic experience in subordinate sections. This arrangement stresses individual areas of competence rather than job history. The functional approach also has three advantages:

(1) Without having to read through job descriptions, employers can see what you can do for them.

(2) You can emphasize earlier job experience.

(3) You can deemphasize any lengthy unemployment or lack of career progress.

Or a combination résumé meshes the skills focus of the functional format with the job history focus of the chronological format. The chief advantage of this format is that it allows you to focus attention on your capabilities when you don’t have a long or steady employment history, without raising concerns that you might be hiding something about your past. If you have little or no job experience and not much to discuss outside of your education, indicating involvement in athletics or other organized student activities lets employers know that you don’t spend all your free time hanging around your apartment playing video games. Also consider mentioning publications, projects, and other accomplishments that required relevant business skills.

5. Between your sophomore and junior years, you quit school for a year to earn the money to finish college. You worked as a loan-processing assistant in a finance company, checking references on loan applications, typing, and filing. Your manager made a lot of the fact that he had never attended college. He seemed to resent you for pursuing your education, but he never criticized your work, so you thought you were doing okay. After you’d been working there for six months, he fired you, saying that you’d failed to be thorough enough in your credit checks. You were actually glad to leave, and you found another job right away at a bank, doing similar duties. Now that you’ve graduated from college, you’re writing your résumé. Will you include the finance company job in your work history? Explain.

           

It will depend because to a potential new employer it may leave an unfavorable connotation on the candidate but, if there is little to no relevance between the positions, you do not have to showcase it on your resume. The hiring company is primarily interested in relevant experience and skills you can bring to their company. If the reason you were terminated was due to a minor issue that can be easily explained and seen from your point of view by a potential employer, than including the position on your resume should not be a concern. Be honest with yourself and think through your response to a potential interviewer. Your answers to the questions above will tell you whether it is appropriate to include the job on your resume. If it is included, consider the following to help you through the application and interview process.

Chapter 16

Applying and Interviewing for Employment

1. How can you distinguish yourself from other candidates in a screening interview and still keep your responses short and to the point? Explain.

         During these interviews, show keen interest in the job, relate your skills and experience to the organization’s needs, listen attentively, and ask insightful questions that show you’ve done your research.

2. How can you prepare for a situational or behavioral interview if you have no experience with the job for which you are interviewing?

         To prepare for a behavioral interview, review your work or college experiences to recall several instances in which you demonstrated an important job-related attribute or dealt with a challenge such as uncooperative team members or heavy workloads. Get ready with responses that quickly summarize the situation, the actions you took, and the outcome of those actions. In the situational interview, the situations will likely relate to the job you’re applying for, so the more you know about the position, the better prepared you’ll be.

3. If you lack one important qualification for a job but have made it past the initial screening stage, how should you prepare to handle this issue during the next round of interviews? Explain your answer.

Recruiters don’t need that much information about you at the initial screening stage, and they probably won’t read it. But, if you lack one important qualification, then in the selection stage, show keen interest in the job, relate your skills and experience to the organization’s needs, listen attentively, and ask insightful questions that show you’ve done your research.

4. What is an interviewer likely to conclude about you if you don’t have any questions to ask during the interview?

           

            The questions you ask are just as important as the answers you provide. By asking insightful questions, you can demonstrate your understanding of the organization, you can steer the discussion into areas that allow you to present your qualifications to best advantage, and you can verify for yourself whether this is a good opportunity. Plus, interviewers expect you to ask questions and tend to look negatively on candidates who don’t have any questions to ask.

5. Why is it important to distinguish unethical or illegal interview questions from acceptable questions? Explain.

If an interviewer asks a potentially unlawful question, consider your options carefully before you respond. You can answer the question as it was asked, you can ask tactfully whether the question might be prohibited, you can simply refuse to answer it, or you can try to answer “the question behind the question.”  Only you can decide which is the right choice based on the situation. Even if you do answer the question as it was asked, think hard before accepting a job offer from this company if you have alternatives.