Tag Archives: IT jobs

Weird Questions in IT Job Interviews

Periodically all IT professionals and IT recruiters encounter odd questions in interviews for IT Jobs. Questions like “What kind of cereal would you be?” or “What is the color of money?” are common, if not the prevalent in interviews for IT consultants and IT managers.  What is their use, though?

IT contractors and IT staffing agencies should take these odd questions seriously because they demonstrate a few important things about a candidate that resumes do not.  For one thing, IT jobs, especially customer-service oriented ones like tech support, tend to require the ability to think on one’s feet and respond to unexpected and sometimes stressful situations.  Questions that are bizarre can be the opportunity to test that in a job interview.

Another imperative reason to take these questions seriously is that they can be a moment to demonstrate how you are a cultural fit for an organization.  More than anything, these questions are good moments to showcase your personality.  If you know you’re interviewing at a team-oriented company or perhaps a company that really values creativity, these questions are the moment to show you have these qualities (rather than simply tell somebody you have them).  So be prepared to really give these questions a go—they might be the ones that get you the job!

 

The First 30 Days of Your New IT Job

The new year is a common time for IT recruiters to be placing IT contractors in new IT jobs.  There are plenty of obvious pieces of advice that IT staffing agencies give to their IT consultants starting new jobs.  There are a few subtle things that IT professionals can do to really impress their IT managers in their first 30 days on a new job.

Learn your new company’s business:  Learning your role and your job expectations is pretty par for the course, but to really stand out you can make a concerted effort to learn about the bigger picture for your company.  What are some of the major factors of your its industry?  What are the big challenges your company faces currently?  What are its goals?  Knowing these things and how your role might relate to them will make you really stand out from the crowd quickly.

Show passion and excitement for your new role:  Without getting on your managers’ or coworkers’ nerves (or taking up too much of their time), display an enthusiasm for your upcoming workload.  Show initiative and try to find ways to make sure you will truly succeed in your role.

Build relationships:  Build relationships with coworkers and managers, but also with contacts in your industry.  Create relationships with people who can act as resources within and outside of your company—whether it be the obvious, like potential clients, or the not-so-obvious, like a vendor that might get you a nice discount on some material your company uses.

 

Soft Skills IT Professionals Should Acquire

Having strong resumes in the Information Technology field is obviously imperative to nabbing IT jobs.  However, having some key soft skills carries a surprising amount of weight in the interview process for IT managers and IT recruiters.   While the value of these soft skills is different depending on the IT recruiting companies and jobs, the list of skills below are all worth working on as an IT professional.

Service skills: Working on these skills pay off particularly well in support positions or positions with a lot of client/end user interaction.

1. Flexibility/adaptability
2. Problem-solving skills
3. Positive attitude
4. Customer service

Internal Employee skills: These skills will serve anybody well within the office.  Whether it comes to how managers or co-works view you, these skills will come in handy.

1. Confidence
2. Independence and work ethic
3. Ability to accept and use feedback
4. Creativity
5. Time management
6. Teamwork

 

Factors to Control in Your IT Job Interviews

Technical recruiters prepare the IT consultants (and their resumes) working with them as thoroughly as possible for interviews for IT jobs.  However, there are a few things that IT contractors need to control themselves to make sure their job interviews go as well as possible.

Time:  While IT headhunters will make sure interviews occur at times that work for IT managers, the best thing you can do is to try to get your interview scheduled as closely as possible to Tuesday at 10:30 am.  This day and time are the ones in which research shows people to be most awake, alert, focused on work, and to feel the least rushed.

Space:  Do you best to show the utmost respect for the interviewing company’s space.  Wait until you’re asked to be seated to sit.  Don’t roam seeking water fountains or a bathroom—ask a receptionist. Don’t leave marks on any tables or chairs, and throw away any garbage you might create while you’re there.  You want to give the impression that you are going to do nothing but improve things for the company.  Leaving behind any damage or disrespectful impressions will not help your case.

Eye contact: Make comfortable eye contact with everyone you meet, even the receptionists or any doormen or drivers the company employs that you come in contact with.  Don’t be fawning or make eye contact that is too intense or uncomfortable.  Simply make sure you convey interest in what people have to say, confidence in yourself, and ease in dealing with people in any station.

Physical Appearance: Be well groomed and try to dress in a way that fits in well with the company culture (albeit the formal side of it).  If your appearance feels somewhat familiar to your interviewers, this might work in your favor.  Portraying yourself as a cultural fit for the company visually is certainly not going to hurt your chances!

 

Should IT Professionals Shake Hands During Cold and Flu Season?

IT recruiters and IT professionals from Boston to Los Angeles are finding themselves in the midst of cold and flu season.  While there are plenty of issues that come with cold and flu season, one of the most surprising is dealing with handshakes.  Everyone in the Information technology field, from IT headhunters to IT managers to IT consultants, all are likely to be faced with a situation that requires a handshake.  Sometimes it’s for interviews for IT jobs or sometimes it’s merely for an introduction. Whatever the case, though, a simple gesture becomes a bit of a minefield when one party is sick.

So what should be considered if IT contractors or IT professionals find themselves in a moment where a handshake is necessary, but they or the other party is sick?  The handshake is a surprisingly important gesture in American business culture.  It’s best to do everything you can to not avoid making it.  Washing your hands ahead of time, taking cold or flu medication, and using hand sanitizer discreetly are all acceptable ways to sanitize a handshake so it’s safe for both parties.   Doing these and still shaking your business acquaintance’s hand is preferable to withholding a handshake.  If you are the one who is well, simply shake the other person’s hand and proceed to wash your hands well afterwards.   The likelihood of avoiding a cold simply by avoiding a handshake is relatively low anyways.  Most viruses are airborne or wind up being unavoidable during this season.  Why possibly hurt a business relationship for only a slightly likely edge for your health?

 

Keeping Your Speech Professional at Your IT Job

IT professionals tend to work behind the scenes in less formal settings, but even those who do can make missteps in their speech and hurt their professional reputations with their IT recruiters, IT managers, or coworkers.  Below are a few things for IT contractors to avoid and suggestions to improve the way they communicate at their IT jobs.

Speed:  IT consultants who speak at a moderate, even pace, especially during stressful times, will give off the best impressions.  It’s easy to speak too quickly, particularly when you’re nervous or the people around you are nervous.  Maintaining an even pace helps you to stay calm and gives off a calmer air to everyone else.  This calmness can also be very effective in giving people the impression that you are competent and trustworthy because people who feel confident in their abilities to deal with a situation will usually sound pretty even-toned.

Pauses: Obviously resumes full of relevant skills and experience are the best way to demonstrate your competence to IT recruiting companies and managers.  However, a well-timed pause can go a long way to this goal, as well.  If you replace every “um,” “ah,’” “like,” or “you know” with a simple pause, you can increase other’s confidence in you.  People would rather you say nothing as you consider the next thing you’re saying rather than reach for a verbal stall like “um.”  The switch seems small, but it will make a big difference.

Cursing:  The rule of thumb with cursing is to generally avoid it.  There is a big caveat here, though.  A rare and well-timed curse in front of the right people can help you bond a bit with coworkers or possibly clients.  Sometimes it’s helpful for everyone to drop their professional demeanor for a moment and reveal their more human side.  If you think it’s a good time or place to do that, a mild curse can help.  Exercise caution with this tactic, though.

 

How to Interview Your Next Boss in IT

Bosses have a surprising amount of power in IT contractors’ lives.  Having a good one can make your time at work pleasant.  Having a bad one can make your time at work terrible and possibly ruin your time out of work, too (perhaps too many off duty calls or just sleepless nights worrying about his or her next blowup).  It’s crucial to make sure that as you interview for IT jobs, you are honest with your IT recruiters about what kind of IT managers you work best under.  It’s also crucial that you interview your potential boss thoroughly on your next job interview.

Interviewing your potential boss as they interview you requires some nuance.  IT recruiters prefer not to work with IT consultants who are too demanding or difficult, because they don’t tend to come off well in interviews—no matter how impressive their resumes are.  It’s imperative to ask questions that will subtly reveal what you need to know about a potential manager. Your intention should be to gain the information you need without demanding it.

So what is the information you need to decide if a manager will be a good leader for you?  This will vary from person to person, but a few major categories are pretty universal. Asking about somebody’s management style will give you some good ideas about how they lead.  So will asking about the best and worst employees they’ve worked with.  It’s helpful to know what they think of as a successful employee and one worth firing.  Depending on how the conversation goes, you may feel comfortable enough to throw out your own expectations of a manager.  Try posing these expectations as your best case scenario. If your potential boss seems amenable to all or most of them, you may have found your perfect future boss.

 

How IT Managers Can Deliver Negative Feedback Effectively

One of the toughest duties managers in information technology take on is delivering negative feedback to the IT contractors who report to them.  IT jobs can be high stress and difficult in their own right, so the best IT professionals in management positions know how to give negative feedback in a way that does not exacerbate any existing stressful circumstances.  There are a couple of major things to seriously consider so that IT consultants receive negative feedback in a constructive way.

IT managers should start by making sure that negative feedback is given in a conversation full of positive feedback, as well.  Starting with an honest, genuine compliment will put the IT professional at ease.  Ending the conversation with one will also help keep the entire experience a positive, constructive one.  People tend to remember endings and beginnings better than any other part of a conversation.

The second thing to consider is how the negative feedback can be approached.  If you approach it as an issue that you as the manager and your report need to deal with together, things will be better.  Giving the report the feeling that you’re truly on their team will make them feel more open to finding solutions.  Speaking of solutions, it’s also important that the conversation revolve around those.  It’s important to identify the problem, but making sure it gets fixed and doesn’t happen in the future is far more important.  Note that both of these tips require a face-to-face interaction.  You can’t create a team and solution-oriented feeling over an email in the way that you could in person or on the phone (at the very least).

 

Unplugging from Your IT Job During Your Vacation

Information technology can be a 24/7 field, but there are ways for technical recruiters to tactfully unplug from their IT jobs during the holidays and vacations.  IT recruiters want their IT contractors to make sure they’re reliable and satisfy their IT manager’s needs.  Keeping this goal in mind as you make your plan to unplug for vacation or holiday time will make all the difference.

The first thing IT consultants can do to successfully leave work at work is to plan ahead.  Taking a survey of the projects and issues that may need attention during planned holiday or vacation time is key.  IT headhunters are looking for IT professionals that would not only get their work done, but make sure their team’s goals are not compromised if they’re off the clock.  If a project will come up when you’re off work, consider trying to get your part of it done ahead of time or leaving behind the resources your team will need to cover your part of it.  Making sure you have done everything you can to anticipate any major issues that come up while you’re gone will give you peace of mind and give your teammates and managers confidence in you—now and in the future.  Being a considerate team player is invaluable.

The second thing IT professionals should do is to set up a contingency plan for contact while they’re away.  Depending on the situation, you may need to set up an emergency contact protocol.  Without being obnoxious, get your manager and teammates on the same page with you about what constitutes an emergency.  This will save you from a lot of phone calls or emails you find unnecessary.

The last step is to stand by your own word.  If you draw boundaries, you need to make sure you don’t destroy them yourself.  Nobody will respect boundaries that you yourself don’t respect.

Red Flags to Watch for in IT Job Hunting

Good IT recruiters want to put their IT contractors in IT jobs where they fit both in terms of the skills on their resumes and the workplace culture.  While IT headhunters can do their best to try to make good matches for workplace culture, IT consultants can do the most to make sure they wind up in a job with a great boss and good coworkers.  There are two kinds of red flags to watch out for in interviews: Red flags that indicate your boss will be difficult to work for and red flags that indicate the company culture is too toxic for you.

Though a single red flag isn’t really enough to avoid a job on its own, a few or more of these signs will show you that you may not be compatible with this boss.  If your interviewer comes in very late, hasn’t read your resume at all previous to the interviewer, or checks email and/or takes calls during the interview, it’s worth considering how much guidance you need from a boss.  If you rely heavily on a boss who is organized and provides pretty frequent direction, this isn’t the boss for you.  Their inability to be prepared and focus on the interview at hand shows quite a bit about how they’ll act during the regular work day.  On the other hand, if you prefer to work as autonomously as possible, these signs aren’t necessarily a problem.

Another major red flag to notice is how your interviewer/potential boss  speaks of the person who holds or previously held the position.  If he or she is warm and commends the person, this is a great sign.  However, if your potential boss skirts the issue of the previous person who held the role, or trashes them outright, take time to consider how you deal with difficult personalities.  If they don’t bother you, it’s not an issue.  If you need to have a positive, friendly relationship with your boss to be productive, however, this may not the job for you.

The last red flag that IT staffing agencies would want their IT professionals to watch out for is how the workplace culture looks.  If you find reviews of the workplace culture on glassdoor or other similar websites that terrify you, try to confirm or disprove these for yourself when you go on the interview.  You might also consider checking around with professional contacts in your field.  Word can travel fast, particularly when a work environment is toxic.  Better to know before you take a job if you’d like the workplace culture there or not.