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claim damages against you in a court of law. Now, the nature of your
role and how important you are to the organisation will determine the
employer s willingness to resort to litigation.
It s easy to imagine your notice period as a time to relax and stop
making an effort, but this shouldn t be the case. You ll likely have plenty
to keep you busy, finalising any outstanding work and ensuring you
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properly handover your responsibilities. What s more, being seen to
make the effort right up until your last day will ensure your reputation
as a professional and reliable employee remains intact. And you never
know when you might deal with your employer again.
Make sure you allow time to say goodbye to everyone and swap contact
details with as many colleagues as you can. Moving jobs is a great way
to extend your network and you may find you see some of your
colleagues again sooner than you think.
Don t feel guilty about resigning. Feel good! Working is the nature of
business and job mobility is part of business.
While others may think you re resigning from a perfectly good job,
you re the one in control of your career and only you can decide which
direction it should take. If resigning from your job will bring you closer
to meeting your goals, then it s a legitimate step on your career path.
Now go and enjoy your new role!
CHAPTER 9
TELEPHONE INTERVIEWS
Telephone interviews are being used more and more these days as they
are extremely time efficient for the recruiter. Once used only by
recruitment agencies, many private organisations use these as an initial
filter. Undoubtedly you will come across these at some stage in your
career, so it s best to have some idea what to expect beforehand.
Think about what you are trying to achieve here. It s not about actually
securing the job at this stage. It s about getting to the next level which
involves a face to face interview
Everything I have said previously about you doing research on the
organisation still applies. The advantage you will have this time is that
you can have all your research notes in front of you to refer to, rather
than having to commit it all to memory. This goes for your CV and
covering letter too. Have them in easy reach. Even better, why not
prepare a reference sheet with points to jog your memory on specific
tasks you have worked on, achievements you have made or projects
you ve taken part in?
When you agree to an appointment for a telephone interview, make
sure that you choose a time where you know you can definitely be in an
environment conducive to you giving your best. That means no
interruptions, no background noise, etc. If you can, make sure you
receive the call on a landline. Then there is no worry about batteries
going flat or reception being lost. You will be more likely to be relaxed
and give a better account of yourself in this type of environment.
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The biggest drawback, from both the recruiter s and the candidate s
point of view, is the lack of visual feedback during the conversation.
These subtle, visual clues to how well we are doing are denied us, so we
must be focused and alert to picking up on purely verbal indications. If
the interviewer is good at what they do, they will have prepared well at
their end and the call will have a clear structure and purpose. This is
good for you as it stops the conversation straying into areas which may
have pitfalls in them for you.
In your responses, try to be clear and concise. Remember that the
reason a telephone interview is happening in the first place is to speed
up the whole recruitment process, so highly detailed, long-winded
answers are not called for here. I would also suggest that you make sure
that your diction is good so the interviewer understands you clearly. If
anything, slow down your speech slightly to allow extra time for the
interviewer to make written notes about what you are saying. If you
don t have shorthand skills and have ever tried to capture people s
words verbatim, you will know exactly how difficult that is! Do what
works for you. Some people have found that standing up during a
telephone interview helps them focus (no opportunity to doodle) and
helps with their breathing and posture. This translates into sounding
composed over the telephone.
You may want to rehearse beforehand. Try writing your own set of
questions and have someone telephone you and ask you these
questions. Remember that this is unlikely to be the hiring stage, so the
questions are unlikely to be complex or demanding. Get them to write
down your responses and add their own critique. Analyse these notes
and amend your approach accordingly.
Part of the purpose of the telephone interview, from the recruiter s
perspective, is to find out how much you want the job and (in the case
of sales jobs) whether you have closing skills.
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As soon as it seems appropriate during the conversation, ask for a date
to meet for a face-to-face interview. Say something like: 'Well, this
certainly sounds like just the job I'm looking for, Mr X. I'm sure I can
contribute a lot to your organisation. I'd really like to visit you to show
you what I can offer. When and where would you meet me?'
You may have to be content with the response: Well, we have a few
other candidates to talk to yet, but we will be in touch , but at the very
least you can ask When am I likely to hear from you? . If the manager
umms and ahhs, decide upon a reasonable timescale, and suggest Well,
I'm very keen to know if I'm going forward to the next stage, so if I
haven't heard from you by next Friday, would you mind if I call you then
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