Other Ways to Blow an Interview

Yesterday, MSN had an article discussing things not to do in an interview. For that lucky 1% of us, stuttering could also be on that list. In my 9 year professional career, I have had 6 different accounting jobs (though only 2 jobs in the last 5 1/2 years), so I have a good bit of experience in job interviews.

In this time, I believe I have developed a good approach to job interviews. In the days leading up to an interview, I try to really focus on monitoring my best targets. In the morning and on the way to an interview, I will really key-in on monitoring my full breath target. In the 30 minutes before the interview, I will sit in my car and do my PFSP CD. I will get into the interview and then do really well for about 20-30 minutes. After that I tend to get tired and my fluency falls off, so I try really hard to sale myself earlier in the interview as opposed to later.

When I am pursuing a new job, I go through a lot of interviews. I don't really (nor do I care to know) how big a role my stuttering plays in the positions that I am not considered for after I interview. During one interview I was doing really well and then missed one class IV sound and the interviewer looked at my like I had just spontaneously burst into flames. He was clearly rattled after that and started asking questions which made no sense.

Earlier I mentioned my prep for an interview; one time I woke up late (imagine that?), and barely made it to the interview on time and did not have a chance to prepare as I normally do. I have never been less fluent during an interview in my life. My speech was awful and I got so distracted by that, I started giving really bad answers and doing lame things like word substitutions. The interview got so bad that halfway through I was tempted to just end it early and excuse myself. However, a few days after the interview mercifully ended, I was called and offered the position (on the same morning I was downsized from my then-current position). It is funny how things work out sometimes.