Each semester, the Career Development Center hosts employers who wish to conduct their first round of interviews on campus for summer internships and full-time openings they have. We call this the On-Campus Interviewing Program.
Interviewers are given a feedback form to complete and they include positive and negative comments about student preparedness for these interviews. While many remark on UST students’ professionalism, politeness, and good communication skills, we thought student readers of this blog would benefit by knowing the few areas that interviewers think you could work on.
Areas for candidates to Improve:
- Weak resumes “compared with other schools”
- Responses to behavior based questions need specificity, use work not just class examples, and need to articulate the results of their stories [Make them positive].
- Students don’t “sell themselves” well – don’t know their strengths
- Not dressed professionally [This means a suit, yes, for internship interviews too!]
- Thank you notes lacking [Always send 24-48 business hours after the interview]
So, what can be done about these impressions?
- Attend a Career Seminar on resume-writing or interviewing
- Make an appointment with a career counselor (call 651-962-6761)
- Utilize Pop-in Hours without an appointment to have quick questions addressed
- Review the many online resources available: www.stthomas.edu/careerdevelopment
The Good News is that I did not see many complaints about a lack of research or poor questions asked! Hurray!
Remember, with practice, interviewing will get easier and you will get better at it! Let us help you practice in a Mock Interview.
Happy Interviewing,
Jennifer Rogers, Employer Relations
