Present Your Dessert Tray

Please share experiences you had in interviews?
We discussed in a previous post how you answer all interview questions with one of four types of answers. Our last post describe how to hit home runs to answer one type of question.
Today, we will discuss how your dessert tray can answer the dreaded question “Tell me about yourself” or “Tell me why you chose to enter this occupation?”
How You Build Your Dessert Tray
Fine restaurants use dessert trays to entice well-fed diners to indulge in rich desserts. The server brings the tray to the table. The tray exhibits the desserts in their finest.  You entice potential employers to hire you by presenting your attributes in the best possible light.
Using the visual image of a dessert tray helps you remember what to say. Picture the tray holding the following information:

1. Your family or hobbies
   
2. Associations, clubs, teams or boards that occupy your time and attention
   
3. Your training or education
   
4. The 5+ best jobs you ever held
   
5. 5 words or phrases that best describe you
   
6. 5 accomplishments that mean the most to you

How to Use Your Dessert Tray to Answer Questions
Just as restaurants do not expect diners to eat everything on the dessert tray, you should not expect interviewers to digest everything on your dessert tray. You give them samples. In other words, you select the elements on your tray that will appeal most to that interviewer. Selecting portions allows you use your tray to answer multiple questions.
Allow me to demonstrate:

• Q: Tell me about yourself?
  • A: (the numbers refer to the parts of the dessert tray listed above
    
  • “I’ve been blessed with great health because I run 4 miles 5 times a week (1). I’ve always loved reading (1) history and business books. Reading helped me earn my MBA from the Holton School (3). People describe me as service and results oriented (5). For example, when I volunteered on both the United Way advisory board (2) we increased donations by $310,000 (6). The best job I ever had was solving a production problem at Boundaries Inc. (4). We redesigned the production flow and increased productivity by 45% generating an additional $630,000 per year.”

Notice that I only use 2 of the 5 words and 2 of the 5 accomplishments. I only referred to one of my best jobs and one training experience. Finally, I mentioned 2 hobbies and one association. Using the whole tray would lose their attention. You can use different parts of your dessert tray to answer similar questions. Always select the offerings from your dessert tray that will most entice your interviewer.
Now you know how to answer 2 of the 4 types of questions asked in interviews.
Join me on Wednesday to learn how answer questions with questions