Job Fair
I had a client come in preparing for a job fair and we know how important a First Impression is in that situation. The job fair is at the university he attended and in his major. He and the other candidates will all be on equal footing. You may wonder why he would come seeking speech coaching for this.
Most importantly, he has only about 2 minutes to make an impression on the human resource representatives he meets with. We all know that it takes 17 seconds to make a first impression and 27 interactions to overcome that first impression if it is bad. He is not going to get another chance to connect with those people.
First Impression
- Confident body language
- Build rapport with interviewer
- SMILE
First, one of the ways to make a great first impression that we talk about in the course, Ace Your Interview, is confident body language. There are so many facets to that, but one of the most important is how one carries himself. The client I was working with had good posture for the most part, but when we started talking about it, it got even better. His shoulders went back and his back became straighter. Walking into the situation with an air of confidence can help your chances greatly and it always helps to smile.
Also, there are subtleties in our body language that help build rapport. We discuss these in more detail in the course, but the general ones of eye contact and open body language help to create a sense of trust. That can help a candidate connect with the interviewer.
We show in Interview Do’s and Don’ts both an overbearing and a timid candidate. Of course, these are a little exaggerated, but the concept remains. Matching the interviewers communication style can help get a an advantage in this highly competitive world.
Because of this candidate’s great ability to use these techniques, he is going to ace this job fair.
Finally, if you have any questions about preparing for any situation like I mentioned, please reach out to me.
I would love to connect on social media; I am Kelly Archibald there.
Thanks for spending time with me. Let’s talk soon!
Kelly
