Why Telephonic Interviews: Telephonic interviews may save time and cost

Employers conduct telephonic interviews for a variety of reasons. Here are few of them:

• Employer may have received hundreds of responses to a vacancy advertisement and do not want to go through a face-to-face interview with each applicant.
  
• A number of applicants may be living in other cities, and the organization wants to save on the time and travel cost involved

Employers, therefore,the used of telephonic interview as an initial screening interview. It also helps in finding out the answers to the some basic questions about the applicant/candidate

• Is the candidate really serious about the position offered?
• Has he/she made any effort to research the company/position or has just mailed his/her resume?
• How good are his/her communication skills?

Scheduled V/s Unscheduled Telephonic Interviews

There is no fixed system for when a telephone interview is held, unlike a face-to-face interview where the time, date and venue are scheduled well in advance. Some employers could inform you before-hand when they are likely to call. Others may just decide to pick up the phone and call you in the evening when they expect that you would be back from work. You also cannot be sure who is making the first call, whether the HR person or the recruiting agency.

In this scenario, it makes sense to be prepared because you never know when you will receive the telephone call. In case you receive the call, without prior notice, at a bad time, when you are in the middle of some domestic chore, you could take down the person’s name and telephone number and say you would call back after 5 minutes. Or, you could request the caller to hold on for a few seconds till you get your act together in terms of getting a paper/pencil and your documents ready. Otherwise, you may not be psychologically prepared and could be caught on the wrong foot from the word go.

If you are lucky, you may be informed of a date and time when the telephone interview will be held. This will may things easier for you in terms of being mentally prepared, having the relevant papers by your side, speaking suitably for the occasion etc.

It is always advisable to understand whom you are speaking to. There is nothing wrong in asking for persons name and role in the organization. Just ask “Before we continue I would like to know whom I am speaking to?”

Your aim should be to get short-listed to the next stage of the face-to-face interview

What is your aim in a telephone interview?

As the telephonic interview is usually the initial screening interview that works as an elimination round, your objective is to get short-listed! Getting short-listed implies that you move on to the next round for the face-to-face interview. You need to, therefore, prepare for this telephone interview and not take it as a casual call. However, do not let the significance unnerve you. It is important that you remain cool, calm and confident throughout the duration of the telephonic interview, as this will do wonders to your performance.

Tips for telephonic interviews

• The primary concern of the interviewer, during a telephonic interview round, is to judge you by your (1) communication skills (2) Knowledge of Position or company (3) Interest in Position or Company (In this order)
  
• How well do you communicate on the telephone, where you cannot see your interviewer?
• Do you seem uncomfortable since you cannot see the interviewer’s reactions? Do you sound confident, qualified, interested and enthusiastic despite the absence of non-verbal cues from the person at the other end? Or are you left stuttering and groping for words, distraught by occasional awkward silences during the telephone call?
• Since you may receive your telephone call without warning, it would help if you kept important papers within easy reach of the telephone.
• As you cannot be seen, you could quickly glance at the papers for any assistance that you may need in answering questions that you had not anticipated.
• Keep papers such as your resume, the cover letter and any other information that you may have researched on the employer such as company size, market share, turnover, job responsibilities etc., easily accessible near the telephone.
• Do not be in a situation, where you have a friend or relative prompting you as this could turn out to be disastrous.
• Ensure that there are no distractions such as the blaring noise of the TV set or anything else at home, while the interview is going on.
• Follow these guidelines and then look forward to a good telephone interview!

Think through your answers to improve the way you communicate on the telephone

Improving the way you communicate on the telephone is not just how you speak and your accent. What is crucial is what you say i.e. the content of your answers. You can definitely make a difference to your answers by a certain degree of smart preparation. Your preparation should involve thinking through certain questions that you could be asked with regard to your resume, and how you could possibly answer them. This does not mean that you should memories canned and standard answers, but just that you draw up a list of anticipated questions, and think through how you would answer them. You could jot down points for each answer or just write a few key words to clarify your thought flow. This will eventually help you in the actual telephone interview by reducing the time taken to answer questions, will ensure that the answers are brief and to the point, will reduce unnecessary gaps and long silences at your end. In addition, it will also indicate to the interviewer that you are a thinking person with clear career plans and are seriously interested in the position at the employer organization.

Some of the common questions asked in telephonic Interviews

• Tell me something about yourself. OR Introduce yourself
  
• Provide us summary of your career/previous work experience
• Why do you want to quit your current job?
• Why have you applied to this Position?
• Why have you applied to this organization?
• Why do you want to work for this organization?

Tips for answering questions in a telephonic interview

• Keep your answers short and to the point: Avoid lengthy detailed explanations in your answers. Stick to what you have been asked. Do not get into a long preamble before you get to the actual answer. This will show clarity of thought and can be achieved by your preparation. Describe yourself in a few adjectives to cover your strengths and weaknesses, or you could give a brief outline of your current employment and your career objectives etc. What you say should be prepared before hand so that it ensures that your answer is short and to the point.
• Speak clearly and slowly:Regarding your style of delivering your answers, try and speak clearly and slowly. You have to rely on the interviewer’s listening skills to evaluate what you say, so do not take any chances in messing up at your end. You have to be sure that the interviewer has heard and understood what you say, so initially you may need to be careful about the pace at which you speak. However, do not concentrate on it so much that you forget what you were talking about.
• Be positive in what you say: You should approach your answers in a positive way i.e. do not criticize your former employer or give a negative picture of why you want to leave your current job. You are obviously looking for a change because you are unhappy with your existing job, Give the real reasons, but put it across in a positive way .
• Ask questions to show interest in the job you have applied for: To avoid just a one-sided conversation on the telephone, where you just speak when spoken to, if there is an opportunity, you could ask the interviewer certain questions about the organization or the job that you are being interviewed for. For instance, you could clarify the responsibilities that your job will entail, the number of people working in the group/department or team that you will be joining. You could also ask what your immediate priority would be if recruited, in terms of a problem that the organization is currently facing in that area, or any project that you may need to initiate as soon as you join.This will just go to show that you are a serious candidate for the position, and that you are really interested in the job.