By Dilip Saraf

As a practicing career and life coach I often get clients and prospects calling me about their interview rejections. When they call there is always that familiar refrain: I answered all their questions, everyone liked me, and they told me that they would get back to me in a week. Then they admit that it has now been several weeks and the company is not returning their calls or responding to emails.

When I meet with them and go through the actual interview script as they remember it I often find that they have done a variety of moves to sabotage their own prospects, some subconsciously and some ignorantly. This has nothing to do with not having all the answers to the interview questions—no one does, or not getting along with a difficult interviewer, or even not being mindful of the body language signals on either side. Instead, it has more to do with some key statements the candidate made during the interview that should be the cause of concern.

What are they?

In my analysis of debriefs with hundreds of disappointed candidates it all boils down to the attitude, their conversation tone, and the actual language they use to communicate what they have on their mind during the interview process. Not being aware of such cues—unconscious incompetence—can drag down your interview score significantly, often, even resulting in an outright rejection. This is despite your finessing all the tricky questions, being on top of all the proceedings, and not messing-up the tablecloth during your lunch with the VP!

So, what are some of these cues that can scuttle your interview? Here are some tips:

1. In the early stages of the interview, with each person, there is an icebreaker period, which can be about a 2-5 minutes, during which the interviewer is trying to connect with you at a personal level (“calibration”) and assess if they can work with you. So, during this initial period they will ask some benign questions to put you at ease. For example, “Sorry it took so long to get this interview scheduled, Jim. Most of us were busy organizing our CES showcase and we just got back last week from Las Vegas.” To such a statement your only response must be: “No problem, Joe, I am glad you had a dynamite show there (say something about their YouTube video or a blog you read on this). I am glad we were able schedule so soon after.”Instead, some are tempted to use this opener for lodging a complaint to Joe: “You know it is funny you bring this up, Joe. Since our last telephone call more than a month ago I called Sally (the recruiter) many times and even sent her emails about scheduling this interview, but she never responded to me.” If you respond thusly (and some do, as I find out during their debrief) it is game over for them.
2. When it comes to the company product or market position, take some trouble to not highlight the problems it is facing in dealing with its challenge negatively. Show some constructive approach to help them with the problem. Do not say, “Your sliding down to #2 spot in this important market should be a major concern to you. What are you doing about it?” Instead try, “One of the reasons your competition is making so much noise these days about its products is that they have not really addressed the key issues you have about the customer needs, and yet they are getting all the press. One way to finesse that would be to xxxx. This is what I’d love to work on when I join your team.”
3. When an interviewer compares you to some other candidate and implies that she is better qualified than you are, do not challenge that assessment. Also, do not gossip about that candidate, or to say something negative to elevate yourself. Although it is rare that an interviewer will make a direct candidate comparison, it has happened in a few cases, where there was an internal candidate that my client knew and the hiring manager brought that up during the discussion. My client went to great lengths to negate the manager’s assessment of her and lost the opportunity. Instead focus on what you bring to the party independently and try winning their mind.

Interviewing for a job is selling yourself. The same applies if you are making any sale to a customer. You may even have a great product, but if the customer is not sold on you they are not going to buy your product.

Good luck!