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Episode 3 : Recruitment & Sourcing Strategy

Tuesday, October 24th, 2023|

Now that you’ve clarified your employer brand, and written your job description, let’s talk about your internal and external recruitment strategy.

Before you start looking externally for candidates, have you considered anyone from your current team who may have the skillsets you need to execute? Perhaps they are in another department or are ready to take on a new challenge or for a promotion.

An internal hire could be a morale boost and build trust, bring recognition, growth, and internal mobility within your teams…and in the long run, be a great retention tool. It reduces the need for someone to look for a “better opportunity” elsewhere because they trust that opportunity exists within and you’ll look internally first.

However, if you do need to hire from outside of the organization, you’ll need a recruitment & sourcing strategy that is best suited for your needs.

If you have an HR or recruitment team in place, then you have great support as a first line of reviewers to evaluate the incoming candidates.

However if you don’t have the bandwidth or the support to plan your own sourcing strategy, you may want to consider working with a recruitment agency that will work with you to showcase pre-vetted and pre-qualified candidates.

Let’s do a pulse check:

Who do you know who may know someone?
Do you offer incentives internally for referrals?
Are there companies that are aligned with your expertise, or your mission/ values where you want to see people from?
And…what companies or verticals do you NOT want to hire from? ie. Potential vendors or existing customers, or competitors
Do you want to hire from a competitor?

If you decide to pursue the route of working with an outside recruiter instead of doing it internally yourself, then it’s critical to ask the right questions to find the recruiters and agencies that best suit your needs.

Recruitment agencies typically work either as a retained or as a contingency agency.

A contingency firm will invoice you after a placement is made. There are no upfront fees, however in a contingency search typically the agency is working on several roles with multiple clients at the same time, and every role has equal focus and attention.

A retained firm, on the other hand, typically charges a 1/3 to get started and the balance when the candidate is hired; or a third to get started 1/3 when they present candidates and the third one that hire is made.

In a retained relationship, specific focus and priority are given to an open role, and a dedicated team is assigned. They often will help you write the job description, take you through an in-depth pre-qualification process to learn about the role, team, and your company, and in return will send you a handful of qualified and pre-vetted candidates to review. So if you have an urgent need or have a very specific requirement, this may be the right route for you.

In both cases, fees are typically anywhere from 20 to 30% based on the candidate’s first-year salary, and a guarantee period is extended.

Even though in a contingency agreement there is no upfront fee, there is still an internal cost to consider.

Do a cost analysis of what it means to hire a professional recruitment agency versus the cost of internally doing it yourself.

Internal costs include your or your team’s resources, bandwidth, and expertise, as well as the cost of that open role, the cost of lost productivity

This exercise is no different than doing a cost analysis whether to work with an outside marketing agency, an outside accounting firm, or a payroll agency vs doing those functions in-house.

If you do determine that working with a recruitment agency is the route to go, then hire a firm that has a specific focus and expertise within the skill set that you’re trying to fill versus working with a generalist recruiter.

When you’re gauging potential partners, ask your peers and colleagues for referrals, and schedule a meeting to learn more about that particular recruitment agency’s policies, processes connections in the marketplace, and sourcing practices.

Look at firms whose core values, culture, and mission align with yours and who can attract the type of talent you’ll want to hire.

By the same token, you must be upfront and truthful with your recruiting agency and partner with them.

Share with them any challenges or roadblocks with this role or at your company. Let them know of any past candidates and any who are being reviewed currently. The last thing you’d want is for them to reach out to the same talent pool.

The more your agency knows the more targeted they can be in their search and be advocates for your company.

Let’s do a Pulse Check

What is the internal cost of this position being open?
Is there someone on your team who has the expertise to review incoming resumes?
Does my internal HR team have the bandwidth to recruit this new role?

Watch the previous episodes in this series:

Episode 0: Introduction

Episode 1: Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

Episode 2: Writing Impactful Job Descriptions

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Episode 2: Writing Impactful Job Descriptions

Monday, October 9th, 2023|

Once you’ve clarified why you are hiring, the next step in the hiring roadmap is to determine who the ideal candidate is.

And specifically, what are the core technical skills and interpersonal skills, that are missing within your current team that you need to address?

These answers will help determine the requirements the role needs and support the details needed for writing a viable and accurate job description to clarify the day-to-day responsibilities.

Equally important is to define the hard skills or IQ the role needs (the technical know-how, the programs, the education), as well as needed soft skills ( the communication skills, leadership skills, the EQ for the role).

Think of creating the job description as a marketing opportunity for your company. This document promotes your company to potential candidates and creates a strategic roadmap for hiring and retention success.

Writing this impactful job description is a critical step in the recruitment process, however, it is too often considered an admin task that is rushed, copied from other roles found online, or relegated to ChatGPT so it can be done quickly and posted on external or internal job boards.

Yes, you can use AI to start the foundation of the requirements, however, you’ll have to customize and tailor it so it is unique to your company, conveys your voice, and your message, builds trust, AND supports your employer Brand. Otherwise, your role (and company) will sound like hundreds of others on the web and will get lost in the noise of other job posts out there.

A good job description should demonstrate what success can look like for a candidate, clarify potential, and growth opportunities, list the company values, perks, and your company’s unique offerings.

Unfortunately, many job descriptions read like a laundry list of wants and todos, and rarely differentiate between what is a MUST HAVE. Many job descriptions focus only on what the company needs and neglect highlighting what a candidate may want.

If the salary is not aligned with the years of experience you are asking for, determine whether you can offer better benefits, sign-on bonuses, or early reviews to boost the overall compensation package. Or if the salary parameters are not aligned, consider if you really need someone with all the skills listed, or can you hire someone more junior who may not have that experience and whom you can teach, mentor, and groom?

Clarifying these parameters helps define the expectations, goals, and success metrics for any job opening. In fact, without these, you may elongate the hiring process by sifting through unqualified applicants and waste your and your team’s most valuable asset, your time!

Once you are clear about the must-have skills that are needed, you can build a process or create a toolkit to evaluate the applications that are being submitted or the interviews you are conducting.

Geoff Smart, the author of the book WHO, suggests creating a Scorecard and details his process for it in the book.

You and your team can determine and rank the hard and soft skills you are looking for and plan how you’ll move an applicant through the hiring process.

Regardless of the hiring framework you use, the recruitment tools you have, or the assessments you may have in place, these preparation steps will help determine the years of experience you need and the seniority level the role requires and that will directly correlate to the salary and the length of time it may take to find the right candidate.

Only you can decide what qualities and experiences are a must-have, what you are willing to teach on the job, or when to extend an interview or reject an application.

Let’s do a Pulse Check

How do you define and differentiate your company to applicants?
How do you differentiate between the must-haves vs. the nice-to-have skills & qualifications, as well as hard and soft skills?
How do you define what success looks like and what it offers a candidate?
How realistic are the must-haves in the job?

Watch the previous episodes in this series:

Episode 0: Introduction

Episode 1: Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

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Episode 1: Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

Monday, September 25th, 2023|

In his book” The Speed of Trust” Stephen R. Covey says “Trust is the one thing that changes everything.”

In Hiring, building trusted relationships starts before the recruitment and interviewing phases begin.

It starts with the preparation you do before you set out to hire that builds trust sets the stage for WHY a candidate chooses your company instead of a competitor’s.

In any hiring climate, You want to be a candidate’s First choice and highlight WHY joining your company is a good career move for them.

Not only are YOU interviewing a potential candidate, THEY are also interviewing YOUR firm, and in that vain they are reviewing YOU, and checking out your company’s reputation.

It is no longer a one-way responsibility on the candidate’s shoulders to promote their skills, YOU have to do the same.

What prospective candidates learn about your firm via your digital presence helps establish your employer brand and builds trust between your company and their decision to apply. Clarifying your purpose, identifying your values, and highlighting your culture, and being a subject matter expert in your industry builds trust with applicants.

Building trust includes the communication you have with them from the time they apply, throughout the interview phase to the final step of an offer.

Trust is also built (or broken) in how you lead, how you give feedback, how you interview, and how you,= as a leader, show up.

I am going to ask you more questions to get you thinking about “why”…..

You don’t need to have the answers now….this is to transform the hiring mindset. There is a worksheet in the resources section to work on this when you are ready.

Trust is a critical component here and ties right into why you are hiring now:

Why is this role open?

Is it because of growth?
Or is it because of attrition?

If it’s because of growth:
Are you hiring because your workload is too much and your team is already tapped?

Or is your team missing key skillsets to address the new work?
Is it to offload some of the things that you are doing yourself that you just don’t want to be doing anymore?
Is there an influx of projects, however, you don’t have enough staff to be able to handle them, or are deadlines being missed or opportunities being lost?

However, if it’s for attrition:

Did an employee leave?
Or did you let somebody go?

These are very different questions to ponder and the answers may shed light on a deeper issue to address with the next hire:

If somebody left:

Why did they leave?
Was there a cultural nuance that you need to be aware of?
A team dynamic or leadership issue to be aware of?
Was it because of salary/benefits?
Did they leave for a better opportunity? What does that mean? And how can you message and build trust that they can grow and flourish right here and that your workplace is that better opportunity?

Or did you let somebody go?

Why was that?
What was missing in how they did their job?
What was missing in their technical or communication skills?

Contemplating these questions will help you determine what your team needs now, who will be the right candidate, and how your employer brand is perceived… then start building trust with your messaging as you embark on the hiring journey.

Let’s do a Pulse Check

What does your employer brand convey?
Can an applicant get a sense of your culture from your digital presence?
How is trust established via your online communication?

What the previous episodes in this series:

Introduction

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Introduction : Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

Saturday, September 9th, 2023|

Do you remember your first job interview and how you felt?

I did. I was excited. I was prepared. I even bought myself a new outfit. And I was confident that I was just going to ace that interview.

However, things changed when the interviewer showed up …late, unprepared, rushed… and then grilled me question after question without creating any space for me to ask my questions. And then they cut the interview short because they had to run to their next meeting.

The irony is, I did get an offer from them after all, and turned them down, and instead accepted another position and ended up staying at that job for close to 10 years.

That first interview was 30 some years ago, and I still remember the feeling I walked away with. Unheard.

And perhaps that’s why I am here with you. A seed was planted that grew into a passion that both the candidate and the hiring company have a win-win relationship.

For the past few decades, my team and I have worked with hundreds of companies and business owners on their recruitment objectives and have gathered great insight into when interviewing and hiring go well, and when they don’t.

Whether you have an in-house HR and recruitment team, work with an outside recruitment agency, or you yourself are reviewing all those incoming resumes, there are several critical steps to implement throughout the hiring process to create success and become a skillful interviewer.

Usually, we expect the candidate to come prepared, be open, be engaged, have high energy, and be communicative. We want them to not only have researched the role, know about our company, and be enthusiastic, we want them to want the job!

Today, we are going to flip the script and focus on us as the business owner, hiring manager, or department head who maybe deciding when it is the time to hire, or greenlighting the budget and salary, or perhaps conducting the first or final interview.

This series is divided into the 3 phases of hiring to transform the hiring mindset and set the stage for a successful hiring practice that will set you apart from your competitors. The three phases are:

The Preparation required before interviewing & hiring can begin
The Process for set-up, and follow-up on applicants and interviewees
The Presence of mind is needed during the interview and onboarding.

Together we will review the importance of establishing trust in your employer brand, writing impactful job descriptions, becoming a skillful interviewer, and creating follow-up procedures to transform your hiring practice.

So, let’s start at the beginning of the hiring journey before you decide to hire!

Enjoy the first of our 9-part series.

Katty Douraghy | President | Artisan Creative

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Hybrid Onboarding Best Practices

Friday, July 21st, 2023|

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Reposting this onboarding graphic from a while back as it is even more relevant today as we navigate the remote and hybrid workforce.

As managers, we have to create a sense of culture, belonging, and teamwork amongst teams who may not be physically together in one place. Onboarding, whether remote or in-person, is essential to the development of empowered, dedicated, and productive teams.

A successful onboarding process allows for greater employee retention and engagement. Here are some things to try and connect your remote and onsite teams with each other for a successful hybrid experience.

Utilize the technology that is already widely available:

Collaboration technology such as monday.com or Trello allows for teams to connect and collaborate successfully. Zoom and Teams allow us to stay connected and to see each other. Since 55% of communication is non-verbal, being able to see one another on video conferences allows for better connection.

Keep the communication going:

Communication is key to onboarding success, especially when managing employees remotely. Create trust and encourage your new hire to give feedback, voice concerns, and ask questions. It is important to set clear expectations, give constructive feedback and keep the lines of communication open.

Over-communication is essential when working with a dispersed team. Planning daily huddles and video meetings, using Slack, or other messaging tools keeps the lines of communication open.

Document your SOPs Build a library of your standard operating procedures so that new hires (and the rest of the team for that matter) can easily access this info. This will save you and other managers from responding to the same questions over and over, as well as set the standards needed for the team to adhere to. Tools such as Loom and Trainual build a knowledge bank of best practices and training.

Remote does not have to mean impersonal: Working from home can feel lonely or disconnected, you make new hires feel as welcome as if they were walking into your office on their first day. Sending a welcome gift from Snackmagic or the Goodgrocer, reach out on their first day with a welcome message, schedule a Zoom team lunch with the whole team to provide a genuine introduction, and create a positive employee experience.

Keep up the team spirit: Working solo from our homes does not mean we have to be in a silo. Create a cohesive work remote environment to enhance your company culture by having group social Zoom gatherings. Gatherings such as online cooking events, painting classes, or planning for a virtual scavenger hunt helps builds teams connect, build trust, and grow engagement.

Onboarding is much more than an orientation, it helps assimilate new hires into their work environment and culture. It is important to create an ongoing onboarding process that promotes greater efficiency and employee retention.

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How Adults Learn

Wednesday, June 21st, 2023|

Whether you are training new hires or making a presentation to a large group, it’s important to communicate your ideas properly. And whether you do this in person, or online it requires additional steps to create engagement and interactivity.

Adults learn differently and bring their life experiences and cognitive abilities with them, and thus have different ways of learning and processing information that may not necessarily resonate with everyone in the same way.

Presenting material in different styles and modalities can transform a training experience from frustration into an epiphany. Balance your training where some work can be done collaboratively in a peer-to-peer environment and where your new hires can learn from each other while solving problems.

Personalize the experience to enable your employees to adapt to methods that best suit their learning style. Storytelling and linking situational examples with past experiences or scenarios can lead to better retention.

Adult learners have specific learning styles and balancing your training where you can combine the various styles can also have a positive impact.

For example, some people learn best through pictures and graphics. Others connect with metaphors and associations, while some learn best through reading or listening to an oral presentation. Some may have trouble sitting still for hours and may learn better by doing group activities.

Most of us learn best through a combination of pictures, sounds, and feelings, that compliment our dominant learning style. This idea is crystallized in an educational theory called “VAK,” for “visual, auditory, kinesthetic.”

If you facilitate training, and onboarding sessions, or make frequent presentations consider experimenting with visual, auditory, and kinesthetic modalities and notice how participants respond.

Auditory Learners

Auditory learners learn best through language; when something makes sense to them, they may say, “I hear that!”. If your training materials are text-heavy, encourage participants to take turns reading the material aloud. Use the Socratic method – ask questions and let the group paraphrase the core ideas in their own words. Invite compelling guest speakers to share their stories and teach in different verbal styles. E-learning materials can include audiobooks or podcasts that can be consumed on the go. Use repetition or clever wordplay to help the material “click.”

Skilled copywriters are well-positioned to help you speak your audience’s language and get them talking.

Kinesthetic Learners

This type of learner likes to move around, do things, and take a “hands-on” approach to learning. Reading a book or watching a video may become a challenge if they can’t get involved and connect to the ideas being presented. Kinesthetic learners will retain more information if they take notes by hand, work with three-dimensional models, or interact with others in the group. To engage kinesthetic learners, let them change seats, or stand as needed for part of the presentation or provide frequent breaks for snacks and fresh air. Make your training interactive, and add components of peer-to-peer learning.

The right experience designer or instructional designer can help design modules to create more interaction.

Visual Learners

Visual learners learn best with visuals, graphics, presentations, slideshows, videos, flowcharts, and infographics. To engage them, use color, diagrams, photographs, and information architecture to break up heavy text. They have keen aesthetic sensibilities and see the symbolism in imagery that others may overlook. When explaining themselves to others, they may say, “look here,” or “let me draw you a picture.”

To engage visual learners, work with the best designers and presentation specialists you can find.

If you are training online, be sure to take plenty of breaks, group trainees into breakout rooms, call on the audience to read portions of the text, use the whiteboard, and use slides where possible.

What is your learning style?

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Interviewing for Hard and Soft Skills: The Alchemy of Finding the Right Fit

Monday, May 15th, 2023|

When interviewing, it’s not enough to focus solely on hard skills and experience when evaluating candidates. Soft skills play a crucial role in identifying the right fit for a position. In this article, we’ll explore the importance of incorporating both hard and soft skills in the interview process and provide tips for asking insightful questions to assess candidates effectively.

Interviewing is an art that combines detective work, psychology, chemistry, and salesmanship.

Detective work requires that we ask insightful questions, learn about a candidate’s expertise, look at past work history, and put the pieces of their career trajectory together.
Psychology helps us unearth a candidate’s motivations, goals, likes, dislikes, and future aspirations.
Chemistry encompasses how we connect as humans. Do we feel a sense of connection, of belonging, inclusion, and how do we relate to one another with authenticity and empathy.
A dose of salesmanship ensures that we can highlight the opportunity we are hiring for well and sell the features and benefits of working for our firm. Afterall, as much as we are interviewing the candidate, they too are interviewing us as a potential boss, and our company as a potential next right career step.

Traditional interviews often prioritize a candidate’s hard skills, such as technical expertise, certifications, and years of experience. While these qualifications are important, they only paint part of the picture. In creative fields, for example, proficiency in tools like Adobe Creative Suite, Figma, or After Effects is essential, along with data-driven metrics and ROI. However, soft skills such as empathy, connection, and adaptability are equally vital.

Soft skills align with culture fit, values, communication skills, and overall compatibility with the team. Assessing these skills requires asking situational questions that delve into empathy, emotional intelligence, conflict resolution, and problem-solving abilities. Some sample questions for soft skill interviewing include:

Share a time when you successfully diffused a misunderstanding between two colleagues.
Describe a situation where you rallied your team members to accomplish a task.
How do you handle change and unexpected interruptions?
Can you explain your approach to prioritizing and planning your day?
Provide an example of fostering a sense of belonging and teamwork among your peers.
What leadership qualities do you admire most about yourself or your current boss?
How did you appease an upset client?

While hard skills can be acquired through various educational resources, assessing a candidate’s cognitive and emotional intelligence, as well as their field expertise, requires a holistic approach. By incorporating both hard and soft-skill interviewing techniques, recruiters and hiring managers can gain a comprehensive understanding of a candidate’s capabilities.

To conduct effective interviews, it’s crucial to listen actively to candidates’ responses, ask follow-up questions, and observe their body language and communication style. This approach ensures a thorough evaluation and helps identify candidates who possess the right blend of technical and interpersonal skills.

Interviewing for hard and soft skills is indeed alchemy and requires a balanced approach.

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Bringing Our Whole Self to Work

Monday, April 10th, 2023|

I decided to repost this article that I had originally written in 2021 because this past year has reaffirmed that as hiring managers we must encourage interviewing and meeting candidates with empathy and authenticity. There are gaps in many resumes these days. Before rejecting a candidate because their resume has gaps, or it seems they have job hopped, can we pause and ask why to learn more? These have been hard times for many. Layoffs are a reality. Short freelance stints are a reality. Covid and its emotional and financial repercussions are a reality.

Can we connect on a human level with one another?

This is my story:

When people hear that I’ve written a book, they generally assume that I’ve written about recruiting, human resources, or the culture of creativity. After all, with over 20+ years of experience in the creative recruitment field, it’s an expected assumption.

When they learn that my book, The Butterfly Years, is actually about the journey from grief toward hope, a puzzled look crosses their brows, expressing an initial surprise that I share so vulnerably my experience of loss and grief.

You may wonder, what does that have to do with my business? What’s the connection? Well, writing the book had absolutely nothing to do with my business and has everything to do with my business… because it has everything to do with me.

I choose to bring my whole self to my business.

In the book, Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations, Frédéric Laloux explores the concept of new organizations (Teal Organizations) where management and teams focus on creating a culture where the whole self comes to work.

My whole self has dealt with grief this past decade, including the loss of both my parents and step-parents. I wrote about grief because it was hard for me to concentrate, stay focused, or even remain positive. I worked hard to hide what was happening inside. Of course, I did not let candidates or clients, or even my team, get a glimpse at what was truly happening to me on the inside at that time. I thought that I needed to fake it so I could make it. I was wrong.

Over the past ten years, I’ve learned the importance of being true to myself, being authentic, and encourage genuineness from those around me, professionally and personally.

So this is a request to all the hiring managers and recruiters who are interviewing right now. Everyone, every single candidate that you connect with, is more than their LinkedIn profile. They are so much more than what you see on their resume. It’s key to learning more about a candidate’s interests and passions, about their core values, aspirations, and motivations.

As you interview new candidates or manage existing ones, ask yourself who is the “whole self” that you’re interviewing and meet them where they are with empathy and authenticity.

Katty Douraghy

President, Artisan Creative

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Celebrating Margaret Jung’s 28th year with Artisan Creative

Saturday, March 11th, 2023|

March marks the 28th anniversary of our senior account manager, Margaret Jung, with Artisan Creative. It is a momentous occasion and cause for celebration. Working for the same company for over a quarter of a century is quite the feat, especially in this day and age.

Those of you who have been fortunate to meet Margaret, know that she enters every room with the biggest smile, loudest hello, and is filled with joy and enthusiasm.

Working for a company whose values are aligned with hers, the opportunity to create a difference in people’s lives and to build long-lasting relationships is what motivates her. Her energy, enthusiasm, and drive come down to one phrase: creating relationships based on trust.

She is a consummate business development professional, highly knowledgeable in the world of creative and marketing recruitment, and has a first-rate understanding of the design marketplace.

Margaret shares 28 lessons learned along the way to stay strong over the past 28 years.

Stay positive
Be open to change
Be realistic
Work with and hire the right people–it goes a long way
Know you have a team to back you up
Support your team
Believe in the core values of your company and share the same philosophy with your team
Be accountable to yourself and the team
Be self-aware
Know your capabilities
Keep yourself motivated
Have a boss who gives you constant encouragement and advice
Lead by example
Have the mindset of being your own boss (especially in a remote business model like Artisan Creative’s)
Have good communication skills with both internal and external stakeholders
Understand that things aren’t always black and white
Compromise when needed
Don’t be afraid of having difficult conversations
Sometimes you need to just pick up the phone to get your point across (emails and/or text can get lost in translation)
Follow-up, follow-up, follow-up…
Control what you can control and what you can’t–move on
First impressions are lasting impressions
Stress can be managed. It’s not the end of the world
Be true to yourself, know your limitations, and stick with it
Having the 3D’s- drive, determination, and discipline
Having Empathy for others especially since we are in the “people” business
Be good to yourself – take breaks and do what makes you happy- life is not always about “work”.
Finally, life is so much better when you are laughing.

If you need help with recruitment to hire a position on your team, reach out to Margaret. You’ll see what we mean.

Thank you, Margaret, for an amazing 28 years. Here’s to creating even more impact and new relationships in 2023 and beyond.

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Tips for a Successful Video Interview

Monday, February 13th, 2023|

The ease of technology and virtual offices have made video interviews a necessary step in the overall interview process. Sometimes a video interview can pose additional challenges due to technology mishaps or the inability to see the other person’s reaction well, adding to the pre-interview anxiety.

No need to worry! Whether it’s Zoom, Teams, or a pre-recorded video resume, the tips below can help create success in your job search.

The main intention of any interview is to do your best so you can advance to the next stage.With over 25 years of helping candidates prepare for these types of interviews, we’d like to share some best practices with you:

The Video Interview

No matter the technology used adhere to this mantra: Test, and Test again. Test your device’s audio and video connections before the actual interview. Don’t wait until the interview day to download!
Confirm time zones in case the interviewer is in another state or country.
Practice ahead of time on screen and record yourself if possible. Pay attention to your posture, voice, lighting and background and adjust as needed.
Check the lighting and move your computer as needed so that your face is illuminated without any shadows. Get an external light such as a ring light if the room lighting is low.
Make sure your head and shoulders appear in the video frame – don’t get too close or move too far away from the camera.
Position the camera at eye-level and make eye contact with it! If you only watch the screen itself you’ll look like you’re not making eye contact with the interviewer.
Research the company, follow on social, and look up your interviewer’s Linkedin profile. You may find some things in common!
Ensure that you are in a quiet place.
Make sure your device is fully charged or plugged in during the interview
You’ll be using your voice and tone to communicate— be sure to speak clearly and succinctly.
Be friendly and smile while talking.
Be prepared to ask engaging questions about the company culture and the team.
Have your resume close by so you can refer to it.
Listen well and avoid talking over the interviewer.
Don’t discuss salary or benefits at this stage.
This is your first opportunity to connect and shine.
Dress and groom as if you were interviewing in person. Dress for the job you want!
Pay attention to your surroundings—especially the background. Select a clean, neutral, and distraction-free backdrop like a wall, or screen.
If you live with a roommate let them know you’ll be on camera to avoid unexpected noise or interruptions.
If applicable, have your portfolio loaded on your desktop in case screen sharing is needed. Make sure you have a clean, uncluttered desktop and if needed, change your desktop wallpaper to something creative but professional.

We wish you all the best in your next job interview! Be sure to check out all our interview tips on our blog.

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