Sunday, October 28, 2007

Mock Interview Reflection



Overall, I would say that my interview went pretty well. Considering I see myself as a pretty confident person, I was surprised with my anticipatory anxiety.
After arriving 15 minutes early to Strode, I remembered that I had left my cover letter and resume behind at the library. I would consider this an important lesson learned. It is imperative to remember all of your materials and arrive early so that if anything unexpected occurs you have ample time to deal with the situation and still appear prepared and composed.


When I walked into the office I knew to immediately shake the hand of the interviewer before sitting down. I then experienced an awkward exchange of my resume and cover letter for unknown reasons. I think that Ms. Rogers thought I was going for a second hand shake. During the interview, I sat upright and made eye contact. I thought that the questions were relatively easy to answer and used my past educational and work experience to answer the majority of them. Problems that I faced were incorrect word choices. For example, I said anesthesia as a drug has always “surprised” me instead of “amazed” me. I tried to fix it by adding correct word choices after that word slipped out. I think it was just the nerves talking, but in order to avoid this I will be sure to rehearse answers out loud to commonly expected questions.

Furthermore, it is important to use the correct terminology when asking questions. Although, Ms. Rogers did compliment my final question to the interviewer her response let me know that I should be used different terminology. For instance, I asked “ Does your hospital offer any programs for Registered Nurses to sign a contract and continue their education and have the hospital pay for it?” Her response, “Yes, we do offer tuition reimbursement programs and I will be happy to send you information about that” let me know that is should have used the words tuition reimbursement instead of my lengthy description I chose in my question. Overall, I found the mock interview experience to be very informative and educational for my future career endeavors.

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