Probably the most scary interview to come in my career

I am having an interview next week as Senior Virtualization Consultant.

I think this is one of the few interviews where I actually have to prepare for.. and where I am scared s***less ...

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networker050184

Be confident and be yourself. Good luck man!

N2IT

Jibba good luck. Being scared is not necessarily a bad thing. Channeling those endorphins properly can actually be to your gain. Potentially you will be quicker witted and a lot sharper than normal. In a heightened state your senses can actually perform at a much higher level.

jibbajabba

Thanks.

Hardest bit will be the scenarios they will put me through ... I'll write down some scenarios I was involved in and see where I go from there .. what could possibly go wrong ... The fear is probably about looking like an idiot - thinking you know a lot and ending up knowing naff all

Iristheangel

Good luck!

Everyone

Knowing how to say you don't know something, is often more important than actually knowing it.

Good luck.

Krones

Very exciting. Best of luck to you.

log32

don't forget one thing, they maybe need to want you, and that sometimes is quite scary because you can't tell what to expect. but YOU also need to want them. ask the right questions in the interview. it puts you in a position where they will only valuate you more.

YuckTheFankees

Good luck, definitely let us know how it went!

techdudehere

The worst interviews are the ones where some non-IT person sits in. Of course, they have no idea what to ask so they say something like, "tell me your greatest strength/weakness". I doubt you'll get any of that, though. I'm sure they are going to ask you about some of your experiences. I'd try to have one in mind where something went wrong that could have been prevented and one where something you did worked out awesome and saved the day.

quinnyfly

Everyone wrote: »

Knowing how to say you don't know something, is often more important than actually knowing it.

Good luck.

Must agree, sometimes it is what people do not say that tells a lot about them. Best of luck:)

jamesleecoleman

techdudehere wrote: »

The worst interviews are the ones where some non-IT person sits in. Of course, they have no idea what to ask so they say something like, "tell me your greatest strength/weakness".

Or one of those people who are supposed to be the head of IT but doesn't know anything...

paul78

techdudehere wrote: »

.... Of course, they have no idea what to ask so they say something like, "tell me your greatest strength/weakness". I doubt you'll get any of that, though....

I want to offer a slightly contrarian view of those types of questions. Employers (and good interviewers and hiring managers do this) will often ask leading questions where there are no right or wrong answer as a way to gauge the prospects intangible skills and talents. When there is a plethora of candidates and many have the same hard skills (i.e. technical knowledge), it's really the ability for that candidate to grow and work within that organization's culture that should ultimately be the deciding factor.

@jibbajabba - good luck in your interview. One way to help ease the interview conversation is to be prepared to ask questions and/or speak about the specific industry that the company is in. An interview can go both ways, its an opportunity for you to see if it's even someplace you want to work - but since it's a senior position, it's a way for you to show interest and demonstrate your ability to think more than just about the technology. If you can demonstrate your ability to learn and grow - it may be less of a concern if you don't know some technical specific item related to virtualization.

jibbajabba

Thanks guys. I don't normally have problems with interviews per-se and because I got burned a few times (as in, surprise on-call, no overtime paid, additional tasks expected as part of the "package", having to do tasks they had in mind but didn't tell me etc.), I am normally quite thorough when it comes to asking questions.

I always presume this is a one-interview-only process and as a result I want to have a complete picture of what to come. Unecessary surprises means I will be updating my CV in no time.

So "softskill" wise I am usually alright (well I think I am anyway), but technical is sometimes a different story. A lot of interviews which didn't go well are sometimes down to the agency, thinking that when I mention "Basic Linux Skills", that it equals to "Senior Unix Admin who can compile custom kernel in his sleep".

I think this one is a mixture of feelings as this is the first time I actually have an interview in a job I really want, as in, working with solely on the technology I love, not just working with it every now and then so I guess I put myself under pressure.

I have never worked as consultant but did similar work in a hosting company where I had to provide people solutions they need (not want).

What I did in preparation is trying to write down the design I created which I intend to take with me. I obviously cannot take the original tender with me so it needs to be somewhat generic and scribble-ly ..

I also attended the Design Course for VMware vSphere 4 a year back so dug the workbooks out and used my 2hr commute "wisely" and write down some bullet points which I will / can / hopefully will use in the at-hoc design during the interview.

As for the guys I am meeting, they are the Enterprise Architect & Enterprise Sales Director, the former being quite technical apparently.

According to the agency it is probably mostly about the approach I am taking and not so much the design itself.

Essendon

You'll be fine mate, you'll ace it, for sure. We just want a start date!

jibbajabba

Don't we all lol

jibbajabba

man that better be worth it lol

Agent mentioned that they haven't even seen my CV yet but trust him, hence the invite.
Now since I am meeting two guys I prepared folder for them, each containing

1. Copy of my CV / Resume
2. Writedown of a vSphere Cluster Project for a customer across multiple sites
3. Writedown of an Exchange 2010 project with no single point of failure
4. Writedown of me being responsible for the migration of public and private clouds between datacenter without downtime, making sure Cisco gear and hosts are being upgrade "while I am at it".

Never went through so much hassle .... ever ...

jibbajabba

Well, only a few more hours to go .. Did my homework which wasn't asked for, created some neat folder for the two directors I will be meetingand hope for the best

Forsaken_GA

paul78 wrote: »

I want to offer a slightly contrarian view of those types of questions. Employers (and good interviewers and hiring managers do this) will often ask leading questions where there are no right or wrong answer as a way to gauge the prospects intangible skills and talents. When there is a plethora of candidates and many have the same hard skills (i.e. technical knowledge), it's really the ability for that candidate to grow and work within that organization's culture that should ultimately be the deciding factor.

I am one of those interviewers. There are questions I ask that, I don't particularly care what the answer is, I want to see how you answer it, because it offers me a glimpse into who you are.

While I absolutely demand a person have a good grasp on fundamentals required to do the job (if you don't have that, I'm not going to recommend a hire under any circumstances), when I'm asked to rank the candidates, the folks with the most technical knowledge aren't at the top of that list automatically. More important to me is how well I feel I could work with the candidate, and how well I think he'd fit into our team and culture. We can shore up gaps in knowledge, but an ******* is an *******.

Forsaken_GA

jibbajabba wrote: »

What I did in preparation is trying to write down the design I created which I intend to take with me. I obviously cannot take the original tender with me so it needs to be somewhat generic and scribble-ly ..

I get around this simply by taking my design documentation for my home lab with me. There's no chance at compromising an employers operational security, it's an environment I know quite well, and if they want me to prove it, with a wireless connection, I can login and provide proof that it works on as deep a technical level as they want to validate. Any resemblance of the design to past environments I may have worked in is purely coincidental

jibbajabba

I COULD probably connect remotely to those environments I have written down, but I am sure that company (I used to work for) wouldn't appreciate that

My manager always said he would be almost disappointed if his guys wouldn't find a way to hack their way back into the network lol

* tests VPN *