An interview can be a make or break moment. It’s a chance to clearly communicate who you are and how you can add value to an organization.
Part of being successful in an interview is differentiating yourself from your competition through a well-defined professional brand. To make your professional brand stand out in a finance interview, try these three tips.
Credibility Indicators
Your professional brand is partly fleshed out by your credibility indicators such as the school you attended, the places you’ve worked or the courses you’ve taken. To make your credibility indicators relevant during the interview connect them to the company, industry or role you’re applying for. This will help the person interviewing you see how you can add value right away, and this makes your professional brand stand out.
Choices
Communicate a career story, and consequently a professional brand, that is founded on purposeful choices. Before the interview identify what the theme of your career is i.e. what particular motivation drove your decision-making processes. By answering questions with your theme in mind you will help the prospective employer understand how you define yourself and what you might be good at. Once someone understands the choices that you’ve made, they begin to see where you might fit into the company and that creates buy-in.
Lessons Learned
In our research with Clarity Labs we learned that two of the qualities that lead to success in any finance role are resilience and motivation. Consequently, it makes sense that during an interview you position your personal brand as one of resilience and positivity in the face of adversity. If you’re asked to explain a time that you made a choice that didn’t lead to the outcome you hoped for, don’t be afraid to clearly articulate the lesson you learned and how you would make a different choice in the future. Prospective employers want someone who can dust themselves off and learn from their mistakes. You’ll be seen as someone who takes purposeful action and this makes you even more appealing.
You can make your professional brand stand out during an interview by positioning yourself as someone who makes purposeful choices, learns from mistakes and has the credibility indicators to back it all up. Be the candidate of choice by communicating a compelling professional brand.
