For The Business Professionals

[Jaybird]

Ford Motor Company published the following items they look for during the hiring process. Hope this give you some food for thought.

Leadership Behaviors
Our ideal candidate exhibits 12 characteristics that we find in our successful leaders. Many of these emphasize the development, motivation and treatment of people. They also focus on competencies needed to foster the imagination, ingenuity, creativity and courage required to inspire and implement better ideas. They are aligned with our mission to be a consumer-focused company and are grouped in three clusters, Integrity, Flawless Execution and Relationship.

Integrity (behaves with honor and dignity)
demands the truth (holds self and others to highest standards)
does the right thing (takes the enterprise viewpoint)
drives diversity (respects and values each employee)

Flawless Execution (passion for excellence)
business acumen (know-how that moves the company forward)
innovation and technical excellence (discovers better ideas and applies expertise)
commitment to quality (applies a Six Sigma mindset)
courage (fights to turn dreams into realities)
drive for results (sticks with it to get the job done)
customer satisfaction (makes a difference for the customer)

Relationship (cares, develops, safeguards)
develops employees and teams (fosters teamwork)
connects with customers (customer is Job 1)
community commitment (acts to enhance the community)

Good Luck!
Jay

 

[slo' mo]

just to cheer you up Ivan...

just so you don't stay bummed about the interview, here are some thoughts for you to ponder...


Rules to live by for computer users from the Tech Suport Department:

1. Don't write anything down. Ever. We can play back the error
messages from here.

2. When an I.T. person says he's coming right over, go for coffee.
It's nothing for us to remember 3,000 screen saver passwords.

3. When you call us to have your computer moved, be sure to leave
it buried under half a ton of postcards, baby pictures, stuffed
animals, dried flowers,bowling trophies and Popsicle art. We don't
have a life, and we find it deeply moving to catch a fleeting
glimpse of yours.

4. When you call the help desk, state what you want, not what's
keeping you from getting it. We don't need to know that you can't
get into your mail because your computer won't power on at all.

5. Don't put your phone extension in your e-mails to the help desk.
We need to keep an eye on the address book performance.

6. When I.T. support sends you an e-mail with high importance,
delete it at once. We're just testing the public groups.

7. When an I.T. person is eating lunch in his cube, walk right in
and spill your guts right out. We exist only to serve.

8. When an I.T. person is having a smoke outside, ask him a
computer question. The only reason why we smoke at all is to ferret
out those clients who don't have e-mail or a telephone line.

9. Send urgent email all in uppercase. The mail server picks it up
and flags it as a rush delivery.

10. When you call an I.T. person's direct line, press 5 to skip the
bilingual greeting that says he's out of town for a week, record
your message and wait exactly 24 hours before you send an email
straight to the director because no one ever returned your call.
You're entitled to common courtesy.

11. When the photocopier doesn't work, call computer support.
There's electronics in it.

12. When you're getting a NO DIAL TONE message at home, call
computer support. We can fix your line from here.

13. When you have a dozen CGA monitors to get rid of, call computer
support. We're collectors.

14. When something's wrong with your home PC, dump it on an I.T.
person's chair with no name, no phone number and no description of
the problem. We love a puzzle.

15. If you hate your mouse, get some other pointing device and
discard the manual. We know all the keyboard accelerators.

16. When an I.T. person tells you that computer monitors don't have
cartridges in them, argue. We love a good argument.

17. When you get a message about insufficient disk space, delete
everything in the Windows directory. It's nothing but trouble
anyway.

18. When you get a message about a hard disk controller failure,
and then you reboot and it looks okay, don't call I.T. support.
We'd much rather troubleshoot it when it's dead as a doornail.

19. When you have an I.T. person on the phone walking you through
changing a setting, read the paper. We don't actually mean for you
to do anything; we just love to hear ourselves talk.

20. When an I.T. person tells you that he'll be there shortly,
reply in scathing tone of voice: "And just how many weeks do you
mean by shortly?" That'll get us going.

 

[Patman]

1. Do you know anybody that scares sheep?

2. Do you require more than 8 hours sleep (per week)?

3. Do you have friends outside the work environment (because nobody here will like you because your "the boss")?

 

[fatherandson]

The last couple of times that I "interviewed" for a new job, it felt more like a conversation than an interview. Very few questions, but two-three hours of tlaking. Both situations provided a job offer, but the benefits package did not warrant a change in employers.
Good Luck Ivan!

 

[Magellan]

I met a guy for a job with a consulting firm at Starbucks for an "informal" interview one night. It was just meant to touch base since he lives out of town, but just happened to be in town that day.

Ended up talking about all kinds of stuff, but very little about what the job. He made me an offer the next day. Said he based it on attitude, personality, and gut feel. I ended up not taking the position, but I still keep in touch with the guy and have sub-contracted through him.

As a consultant, I interview a lot for contract positions. My experience has been that while you need the minimum skills required for the job, things like organization, communication, and the ability to play well with others go a long ways.

Mag