High-performing organizations are looking for specific personal qualities to enable the hiring of great people. The ideal candidate has qualities beyond the basic job description, education, experience and technical skills. These organizations look for candidates with superior qualities and high standards.
What will enable you to put your best foot forward during interviews with high-performance companies and demonstrate your superior qualities and high standards? You need to know what outstanding organizations are specifically looking for in highly desirable candidates. You can boost your interview performance using the two-step formula below.
Knowing the Questions and Answers
First, know that there are a few key questions high-performing organizations will ask regarding your superior personal qualities. Ask yourself these questions and have good answers before the interview. There are many variations, but they all boil down to the same few questions:
- Why am I attractive to high-quality organizations?
- How am I a results driven employee?
- Will I be able to meet and exceed the expectations of the organization? How?
- Am I a good fit for the organization?
- How will I be contributing to the culture of the organization in a desirable fashion?
Once you think about your answers, reflect on how you answered them. Did you demonstrate high standards? Did you give credit where credit is due? Did you answer them with a desire for growth?
Let’s look at the second part of the formula. What is the method for successfully answering these and other interview questions? Your answers to the previous questions should demonstrate high standards. There are some specific qualities or standards high-performing companies seek. Here are four qualities to reflect upon when developing your answers to the questions above.
1. Are your answers humble?
When answering interview questions, try to demonstrate you are ambitious for the mission of the organization, but not self-ambitious. Your discussion should be about the team and not about yourself. Look like you are interested in learning rather than implying you know everything associated with the position. Talking about yourself in a self-centered manner is not displaying humbleness and providing the psyche of a team player. Finally, humble candidates admit that they have made mistakes.
2. Are you honest?
Honesty and integrity never go out of fashion. However, it seems these traits are ignored by many in the workforce. People will spin stories to explain failures or shortcomings. When answering questions in the interview, do not be afraid to withhold negative experiences. Explain what you learned from the situation in an honest and self-effacing manner.
3. Do you appear hungry?
Your hunger should be demonstrated through your desire to reach for more and consistently setting higher goals. As a hungry employee, you should not dwell on past accomplishments; instead look forward to what you can do next to help the organization move forward. You are constantly growing mentally, reading, studying, and learning new things to share with others. Being hungry means being prepared. You’re on top of email, preparing for meetings in advance, taking notes, asking lots of questions, coordinating assignments. Most of all, a hungry person wants to win.
4. Are you smart?
As a smart team member, you learn quickly, and you know how to connect the dots. You can have all the books sense in the world, but organizations are looking for you to quickly figure out and solve problems. Often organizations overthink problems and come up with complex solutions. You know how to smartly step back, look at the problem objectively, and develop simplified solutions and solve challenges.
If you are a hungry, honest, humble and smart on a daily basis, you are very desirable by high-performance organizations. Think about your answers well in advance and demonstrate these traits to supercharge your next interview.
