There is no question you can’t answer with these helpful insights
Interviewers are trained to gain as much as possible information outside of your resume. Here are the top 3 areas they will check during an interview: reasons to change a job or company, career progression, and gaps in which you were unemployed.
- Job changes – answer openly and with confidence. Provide high-level details and never complain about a previous employer. Do you want to share you had a „bad manager “? Why not say „my manager and I have different strategic visions? “ Do you want to say you did not like the company? Why not say „It was not a cultural fit.“
- Career progression – an interviewer will look closely at your different roles and promotion cycles to gather evidence about your career growth, which is a strong performance indicator. Have you stayed longer than 3-5 years in a role? Share how the role evolved in this period and what new responsibilities you took. You are making a lateral move with the role you are interviewing for? Share what triggers you. A new company, new market, other customers and so many opportunities to grow through this new experience. You are interviewing for a bigger role? Highlight your strengths, learning ability, and what you would do to close potential experience or knowledge gaps.
- Unemployed phases – some candidates will just hide them and start with their experience only from the last 10 years. Why not share about the exciting startup project you run just after university or about the time off you took to dedicate to your family and not to miss important moments in life? Another reason for gaps is burnout periods, especially occurring in leadership roles. You don’t need to share the vulnerable experience with interviewers, but you can be bold and share that after an accomplishment of a big project or role, you decided to take a sabbatical and time to think about your next challenge.
It’s not about what happened to you in life, but how you overcame it and grew through this experience. Behind each resume, there is a colorful personality and a vibrant life story.