Second Mock Interview

My second interview did not go as well as my first sadly, but I learned a lot about myself and what I need to work on so I still consider it an invaluable experience. It seems that the typical open ended interview questions cause me to freeze up, and my discomfort is actually noticeable. Obviously this is a bad thing to have, but now that I know about it I can work towards fixing it. I plan on looking at common interview questions, and think on what my answers could be; this way I'm not going in to interviews cold and hopefully won't freeze up when asked. I also am going to keep practicing interviews so that I can get more experience hearing the questions from others too.

Eye contact is also an issue with me, again when I'm being asked questions. I have a tendency to look down and away, so that's something that I need to work on as well. Same plan as the other, get practice in, remember to maintain eye contact when questions are being asked, and if I need some time to think on an answer let them know that I just want to think on the question for one second. I also learned a nice trick from my interviewer, which is to look at the top of the ear; it looks as though I'm maintaining eye contact, but I don't feel as uncomfortable as I sometimes do by not knowing where to look for eye contact.

I also had an email this morning for an internship I applied to with my updated resume with a design test that I need to do and get back to them, so my activity has already helped to get me further than I was before.

Resume Iteration

It took me a bit of time due to other matters, but I have made what I feel are significant improvements on my resume. I have more clearly defined what I have done on my previous projects. I have restructured the timeline of my work into a nicer chronological order, as I apparently had two of them out of order. I also move some of the position of the text around in order to make more room and give more information. All in all I feel that I've made it more streamlined, gave more and better defined information, and cut to the heart of the matter more quickly.

First Practice Interview

While this was supposed to have happened last week, all of my previous interviews were either cancelled or rescheduled by the interviewer. However, I finally had my first practice interview yesterday afternoon. I got some very valuable information about my resume and how I present myself.

I'm happy to say that I didn't completely blow it. I payed attention to what was happening, and more than just answer the questions I was given I asked my own questions to make sure I had as much information as I could think of before answering. While I felt, and my interviewer agreed, that I presented myself fairly well, there are still things I need to work on during an interview, not the least of which is what my body language is saying about me. I had a hard time sitting and looking attentive while also being personally comfortable, typically moving too much. I think I may have simply been too self conscious about the subject and so always thought I was either looking too casual or too stiff and could never decide, but whatever the reason it is something I need to work on.

I also received good feedback on my resume, and my interviewer was nice enough to allow me to look at their own. The first thing I noticed was the brevity of theirs; using the same amount of room for Skills, they had three times the amount of information that I did. They also took much less time explaining what the projects were and instead explained specifically what they did on the project, which is something that I next plan to incorporate into my own resume and will likely be the next subject of my next update.

What the project is, and how I'm addressing it

So, for my project in GAT 399 I originally chose to create aboard game, and it was slow going. After getting a great lecture on Resumes however, I realized that I didn't have to work on more projects in my portfolio; I needed to work on selling myself better. So, I'm now switching gears and doing just that.

My plan is to work on three aspects of it: my Resume, my Website, and selling myself during interviews. I'm going to approach it the same way as any other design project: what do I want to teach the viewer, and how best to do that with the medium I'm using.

Resume: rapid iteration and testing. I have a Resume I don't mind, but it's too generic. So, I plan on iterating it, having others look over it, see what information they glean from it and how quickly, and if it doesn't reinforce what my stance as a designer is, they change it some more.

Website: again, more iteration is needed, especially around information given. I will be putting in more projects, not necessarily portfolio pieces but other work that I've done, and give postmortems on my design decisions for each one. I also plan on adding to the current postmortems of my portfolio pieces and change the layout of them to given the information I feel is strongest nearer to the top so that it can be gained faster.

Interviews: I will be gathering as much information as I can, attend every presentation I have time for, and see what works best and what doesn't. I will also be scheduling mock interviews with several teachers and students who have interview experience, and go to each company day with my Resume in hand and submit it to them.

My goal with this project is to really tailor these three aspects to allow me to sell myself much better, get across easier what my strengths are and why I should be hired for a position, and ultimately get a job.