Australian Fire Services: Crucial Interview Tips
Hi, everyone! The Fire Recruitment Australia Team hope you’re all doing well and thought we would give you some tips for your firefighter interview.
As fire recruitment takes a pause while Australia and the rest of the world are dealing with the Coronavirus outbreak, the team has compiled 5 crucial interview tips that you can work with to help make this time more productive as you channel it towards preparing for your postponed interview.
How Do I Prepare for a Firefighter Interview – Top 5 Tips
1. Showcase Your Strengths
The final interview is the biggest opportunity you have to showcase your strengths and convince the panel that you’re the person for the job. If you’re lucky, you might get 60 minutes to cover off specific questions and…
2. Outperform The Competition
The interview is usually where there is the least amount of competition as far as numbers go. If you’re a numbers person it might be worth thinking about it like this. If there are 20 positions up for grabs and 200 people left in the process, you might want to consider what you’re going to do to outperform the competition.
3. Do Your Homework About The Organisation
Gain an understanding of what you are likely to be asked and what is important to the organisation. The more you understand the organisation, role, and what’s important to the organisation’s values, strategic direction, and political issues they may be facing at the time, the better off you will be.
TIP: If you know someone who has recently landed a position at the same service you’re looking to gain employment with, pay particular attention to what they were asked. More importantly, how they answered the question. Remember, this is only part of the process and not a silver bullet.
4. You Need To Stand Out
When I say you need to stand out, this does not mean that you need to do anything drastic. It’s about being able to communicate effectively while you’re in the interview. It’s about your ability to interact and show some personality. This will be extremely favourable when a panel has been sitting listening to, possibly, a great deal of what may be boring interviews. If you can get to the point where you are confident in your skills and your ability to communicate them, it will allow you to breathe life into your responses. This will hopefully, make the experience interesting to the panel. Pretty simple really, but 90% of people never get there.
5. Get Help and Practice in Real Life
The interview stage is the closest you’ll ever get to the job but it can also be a very long way off if you muck it up and don’t grasp the opportunity with both hands. I’ve known of many people who decided to wing it at this point and for one reason or another, never managed to make it back to this point of the process. Practice…and when you are practicing, try and make it as real and uncomfortable as possible.
The more familiar you get with the environment and feeling of unease, the better you’ll perform. The process will become familiar and you’ll feel more confident. This tends to have exponential benefits on the day. Treat this life-changing opportunity with the respect and seriousness it deserves and you’ll reap the benefits. It’s too big of an opportunity not to ensure you’re as prepared as possible. When you’re seeking help to prepare for an interview, make sure the person you’re getting advice from is in fact qualified and up to date so that the advice is not detrimental.
Final Thoughts
Gaining interview skills can be difficult but it is within reach for anyone willing to do the work required.
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You can also get great tips from my blog: http://www.firerecruitmentaustralia.c…
Cheers,
Brent and the Fire Recruitment Australia Team
