If i may continue..

Hello class!

As you all know, I ran out of time during my group's peer teaching session earlier today. Since we'll be having mock job interviews next week and like I said, non-verbal communication accounts for 90% of what you are trying to convey in your job interview, I feel that is quite a disservice to you that I did not manage to cover what I had intended. So here are a few pointers picking up from where I left off. This is a long post but I hope you'll find it useful!

In the hot seat
Politeness
-don't yawn
-don't keep glancing at your watch
-switch off your cellphone
-do not interrupt the interviewer

Eye contact
-in a panel interview, establish eye contact with the interviewer that posed the question and when you're done delivering your answer, establish eye contact with the rest of the panel
-looking down is only acceptable when taking notes

Posture
-enter the interview room with your head up and walk in a self-assured manner (indicates confidence)
-sit down with your legs crossed at your ankles or feet placed flatly on the ground (indicates professionalism)
-sit up straight and slightly leaned forward (indicates attentiveness and interest)
-sit on front portion of the chair, but not on the edge
-do not slouch (indicates sloppy work ethic, carelessness, low energy)
-the further up you cross your legs, the more defensive you appear
-refrain from raising on leg/ankle on the other leg (appears casual or even arrogant)
-refrain from placing your feet to far apart or stretching your feet too far in front of you (appears casual)

Gestures
-limit your gestures (otherwise, appears unprofessional and dramatic)
-body language experts say that the less your hands are waving around, the more confident and in control you are
-refrain from crossing arms (indicates negative attitude, closed personality, defensivesness, even aggressiveness)
-arms should be loosely placed with hands clasped loosely on your lap or the table
-smile and nod when appropriate (keep the smiling under control if the interviewer appears very no-nonsense and serious)
-if interviewer says something amusing, it is appropriate to laugh only if interviewer laughs first

-do not fidget
-refrain from touching face or hair (indicates discomfort and is very distracting and unprofessional)

Mannerisms

-know your nervous ticks and suppress them (e.g. twirling hair, shaking leg, clearing throat, picking nails etc.) or you will appear awkward and nervous
-interviewers will expect you to be nervous but make sure that when you are answering questions, try to keep your nerves under control so as not to take away from the strength of your answer

Voice-adopt a clear, controlled voice delivery
-refrain from being monotonous (appears unexciting)
-instead, vary your tone and pitch (appear engaging) but do not overdo it!
-when posed a question, breathe (always a good idea), pause (as mentioned by Titus) and react.
-you should act as if you are an equal to the interviewer, not a subordinate. consequentially, do not take on an apologetic or defensive tone during any part of your interview

Read the interviewer's body language
That's right. Turn the tables to help you determine how to gear your response.
-hand fiddling, loss of eye contact are signs of boredom. wrap up what you have to say and ask the interviewer if they require further details
-finger drumming or rubbing one's face indicates irritation. bring your point home and clarify that you are indeed answering the question.
-crossing arms or leaning away shows the interviewer is uncomfortable. perhaps you are invading his/her space. shift yourself to create more space between the two of you.

Lastly,
PIE! - Poise Interest Expressiveness

Poise: appear confident, comfortable, in control of yourself, in control of your nerves and attentive

Interest: exude interest in the job, the company, the interviewer by establishing eye contact, refraining from behaviour that makes you look disinterested and maintaining good posture

Expressiveness: demonstrate high positive energy by being enthusiastic, smiling and emoting (not excessively though!) your answers. however, refrain from expressing negative emotions (scowling, or frowning) when bringing up negative things.

Please take some time out to help us with our survey?

Calling all NUS students that happen to come across this blog post, please do my group a favour and take our survey (click to follow the link):

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It's a survey about route planning to get around NUS campus and should take only 5 to 10 minutes.
Thank you very much for your feedback and time!

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P.S. Good luck to everybody for any upcoming mid-term examinations!
P.P.S. If you're viewing this via a laptop, you can de-stress by feeding the fish at the bottom of this page. :)

A Hopeful Transmission

I can't figure out where the little excerpt that we went through in class on Monday came from. I'm referring to the short paragraph in which the author claimed that communication was an art, not a science. The reason I brought this up is that this exercise got me thinking outside of the main objective of the exercise. Seeing how other classmates had picked up on the debatable nature of the author's opinion made me ponder over why the thought to challenge the author's opinion had not occurred to me at all.


This came just days after I had attended an ethics module for engineering students in which the lecturer lamented that engineers often do not have a mind of their own outside following instructions, to which I responded with violent objections in my head. Of course the ethics lecturer had been talking about things on a much bigger scale such as the implications of blindly following instructions ultimately leading to human casualties but it certainly made me realise the importance of actively thinking on top of following directions. I thought about how long it has been since I've been academically engaged in something that required me to have an opinion and exercise it.


Perhaps the last times would have been a critical writing course for engineers back in year 1 sem 1 and prior to that, GP in JC but come to think of it, even then, there were certain cues that limited the open-endedness of every question from which I could systematically approach a question and tackle it according to a certain format. In short, the little exercise on Monday made me realise how different a module ES2007S is from anything I've done in a long time. No formulae to digest, definitions/laws to memorise. No answer key. No rigidly structured correct answers.

It's a refreshing change but at the same time, in a lot of ways, this module is forcing me to step out of my comfort zone and into somewhere that makes the introvert that I am feel awkward and contrived. Yes, I do have opinions and I do like to share them but the context in which I am comfortable with sharing them is in a one-to-one basis or via a faceless portal (e.g. blogging here now) and so presentations, however brief, freak me out. When I think presentations, I think about my many bad experiences with them. Most presentations are rehearsed in my head from days before the presentation itself but for some reason on the presentation day itself, I manage to spaz out such that I come across as someone who free-rode for the entire project.

However, the fact of the matter is that presentations/interviews/nerve-wrecking situations are part and parcel of working life and so I'm embarking on this journey hoping to improve myself and I know that's going to require me taking the metaphorical bull by its horns. So here goes...

Fight Test

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