As a candidate, you can help the interviewer throughout the interview process. Your main objective is to provide them enough pertinent and related information for them to say "yes." The most effective way to do this is to follow a simple sales method of identifying the company’s needs and selling the value of your products or services. That means you! In other words, align your background and experiences to the position requirements. Alignment is used throughout the entire process from the initial phone call through the face to face interview and reference checks.

In order to align your experiences to the position you must first know the position requirements. Typical questions to ask include: what are the top three skills required; what makes the position unique; what are the first twelve month objectives and projects; describe the organization structure; what can I do in my first four weeks to make your job easier; what do you need to know about me to refer me on or hire me for the position.

Once you have the answers to these questions, you can reflect into your background and share similar experiences in which you have been successful and provided solutions in a similar situation. In other words, your best way to demonstrate your "fit" or potential for the position is through explaining past successful performance/experiences that are in direct alignment with the position. You must manage this process with the interviewer and provide experiential based answers, even if you are not being asked experiential based questions. You must sell your value through your past experiences.

Good interviewers will ask focused, open-ended questions that require an explanation, typically starting with describe, explain, elaborate, etc. Some interviewers may ask unfocused broad questions, such as "tell me about yourself." This is the most common broad question yet, most people don’t know where to begin. We suggest something such as "there is a lot I can tell, but in the interest of your time and to demonstrate how I can add value to your organization, what specifically would you like to know?"