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Showing posts from June, 2015

Job interviews: being likeable

Dr Steve Joy It's been a long time since I sat down to write a blog post, because I took a lengthy sabbatical & absconded to the French Alps, where I ran a small chalet - almost as far away from academia & careers advice as you can get. That's if you don't count all the people who, on finding out what I do for a living, would immediately respond, "Oh, I could really do with some careers advice!" Yet there was a striking way in which I could see a parallel between the academic job market and my chalet experiences of cooking for the guests, cleaning up after them, dealing with their questions and concerns, handling the occasional complaint, even sorting them out when they were frightfully drunk. If you liked the guests, you were happy to help them. But if you didn't like the guests, you didn't enjoy it. The same is true of the job market: be likeable & people are more likely to want to hire you . Be unlikeable at your peril. Likeable What do