Chapter 17
What Do You Know about This Job and Our Company?
In This Chapter
Proving that you understand the job
Showing savvy about the company
Confirming that you know the industry
Answering sample questions for practice
When you’re aiming for a professional or managerial job, expect a number of questions to be fired across the footlights to test your knowledge of the position, company, and industry.
Even when your aspirations are less lofty and your goal is to be hired as a supporting player, knowing something about some of the topics in this chapter can put you in the take-a-bow category of candidates.
Understanding Job, Company, Industry — and How They All Fit Together
Employers expect you to grasp what the job entails and how it fits into the overall company picture. For responsible professional jobs, they’re even more impressed if you’ve looked into what the company does and where it stands in its industry.
An interviewer may test your knowledge with questions like this:
Where would you rank this company in the marketplace and why?
Such a question requires you to go into some detail about the company’s place in the scheme of things — its products, profitability, industry position, goals, and vulnerability to buyout.
An interviewer may not look at your answers for definitive details, but he is interested in how you arrived at your conclusions. You could say:
You ranked second in the industry in total earnings last year, so that’s a positive. Your level of debt is a little high, but that was the result of tooling up for your next line of products due out in June. If the new line is as successful as forecast, then most of the rest of the company debt will be wiped out by new sales, leaving the company with a shot at being the most financially secure in the industry. Plus, you still enjoy an enormous potential for growth in the near future.
If you mention problems in the company’s performance, offer general solutions (additional training, financial fixes, workforce restructuring, and the like). Otherwise, you appear clueless or, as some interviewers may say, Nice cage, no bird. Or, all foam, no beer. Or, all hat, no cattle. You get the idea.
To model credibility, you can beef up your general solutions with specifics that suggest you’re doing more than merely guessing. That is, cite statistics and figures to back up the problems you note, along with your bright ideas to remedy them.
A caution: Reflect before following interviewing advice you may have read elsewhere that urges you to Superman-leap tall problems in a single bound. Certain difficulties may have eluded resolution by company managers for good reasons. On the outside looking in, chances are, you don’t have all the facts on the ground.
The Questions
Look at the following questions and the strategies you can use to answer them as you gear up to show perfect casting with the job, and the company.
Choose strategies marked as ShowStoppers; avoid those indicated to be Clunkers and Bloopers.
What do you know about this position?
ShowStoppers
From your research, discuss how the position fits into the company structure and how you would fit like a glove into that position.
Mention how you can help the company achieve its goals.
Confirm your understanding of the broad responsibilities of the position. Ask whether you missed any key points (thereby setting up topics to discuss your qualifications).
Clunkers and Bloopers
Ask what the company makes.
Use out-of-date data.
What do you know about our competition?
ShowStoppers
Discuss the current climate of the industry and how competitors are affected.
Add details that show you truly understand the industry and the competition.
Analyze the impact global competition is having on industry.
Clunkers and Bloopers
Say you know very little about the competition.
Admit you recently interviewed with the competition.
Reveal trade secrets from your current employer.
What are your opinions about some of the challenges facing our company?
ShowStoppers
Show the depth of your research by discussing some of the company’s upcoming projects.
Mention several possible solutions to potential problems the company may be facing, acknowledging that you lack certainty without proprietary facts.
Clunkers and Bloopers
Say you don’t know of any challenges, but you’re all ears.
Mention problems but add no possible solutions.
What do you see as the direction of this company?
ShowStoppers
Give a brief but somewhat detailed answer, displaying a solid grasp of the company’s movement in the industry. Add how you can help.
Support your answer with facts and figures, citing their sources.
Clunkers and Bloopers
Make guesses because you haven’t a clue.
Offer no data to back up your comments.
Why did you apply to this company?
ShowStoppers
Say that the position is a compelling opportunity and the company is a place where your qualifications can make a difference. Explain why.
Relate that you heard about a new service the company is launching, which is somewhat related to a project you helped create in a (college) senior-year project; say you find the potential exciting. Ask if the interviewer would like to hear about your project.
Clunkers and Bloopers
Say the company is in an industry you’ve always wanted to try.
Say you’ve always wanted to live in the Southwest.
Our company has a mission statement; do you have a personal mission statement — or personal vision?
ShowStoppers
In one or two sentences, give examples of your values (customer service, ethics, honor, importance of keeping one’s word, and so on) that are compatible with the company’s.
Review the company’s mission statement on its website and describe a compatible aim.
Clunkers and Bloopers
Ask what a mission statement is.
Ask for clarification on the meaning of values.
How will you help our company?
ShowStoppers
Summarize how your key skills can help the company move toward its goals.
Describe the wide circle of contacts and other intangible benefits you can bring to the company.
Clunkers and Bloopers
Give a short answer with no specifics.
Say you’ll have to get back to the interviewer on that one.