Why You Didn’t Get the Job: 5 Ways to Improve Your Performance!

Last year’s layoffs, high interest rates, and market correction have made it hard to land an in-house job, so don’t be hard on yourself if you’re not getting the job you want. Here are five ways to improve your odds:

1. Understand the market and hiring dynamic. You may think you were perfect for the job, but in the final round, employers are looking at three other people who could also do the job. This nugget came from on LinkedIn’s Get Hired podcast with Andrew Seaman, the podcast host, and Eliana Goldstein, a career coach. He notes that employers “don’t care about your mortgage, they don’t care about your skills unless it can help them.” You need to change your perspective to see from the employer’s point of view. #2 below sets out strategy.
2. Three-step strategy for jobseekers. Eliana’s recommendations are the same as mine: (i) know your top skills (skills that you want to keep doing and are good at!), (ii) understand what problems the employer needs solving, and (iii) pitch how your unique skills can help them. Give examples and show value. All this takes research. (For you procrastinators, here’s what to do if you only have five minutes to research before an interview.)
3. Likeability matters. If you were perfect for a job, why was someone else hired? Likeability is a big factor according to Eliana. She acknowledges “interviews are a high-stakes situation where you’re not necessarily fully being yourself” and “it’s hard to come across as relaxed and confident in a stressful situation.” For optimal performance in an interview, she suggests you imagine that “someone’s interviewing you to be their roommate” so you can “present[] a sense of ease and a sense of comfort … that easy, lighthearted version of yourself.”
4. Control your attitude; it can be a long painful process. In the GetHired podcast How to Job Search Like a Recruiter, talent acquisition partner Nicole Fernandez-Valle (who has been both job seeker and recruiter recently) cautions against negativity bleeding into interviewing. One way to keep a positive attitude is to celebrate small wins. For example, success isn’t only if you land the job. Instead, Nicole says even “getting through the interview process or just getting that first interview is a huge win because I think then it gives you data as a job seeker to say, ‘Hey, at least I know that my resume is in a good spot because I got the interview.’ So at least it’s taking away some uncertainty about why am I not moving forward? Because at least at that point, you can eliminate … your resume” being the problem.
5. Connections matter. Sometimes finalists get the job because they know someone at the company. That may feel unfair, but you too can look through your network to see who you know for a referral or for inside information on the company. Nicole says, “In the same way that maybe you feel like somebody else has a leg up in a certain scenario, I think that you can also find ways in the job search process to give a leg up to yourself. So for example, I always tell people to really do their sleuthing when they’re going into an interview and asking the recruiter, ‘Hey, what can you share about the interviewer?’ Or seeing if there’s any clubs that they were a part of on LinkedIn or on their Facebook, seeing what information you can find out about them before. Because sometimes it’s that one piece of information that just jump starts the connection that already sets the call off on a positive foot because it’s making the interview feel more connected to you.” You will go into the interview more relaxed, and use that information to build a connection.