Speaking English: How to WIN Your Job Interview | 7 Critical Questions

This video will help you give a great interview by preparing you for the spoken English you’ll need. Speaking English well during an interview can help you get the job!

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Video Transcript:

Today, I’m going to interview you for a job here at Rachel’s English.

This is for you to practice a job interview. You don’t know the exact questions you’ll be asked in an interview but you can absolutely prepare by answering some questions that are likely to come up. Actually, practicing is imperative. You will do better when you practice.

I’m Rachel, I have a background in opera singing and I’ve been teaching the American accent to non-native speakers for over 20 years. Scan this QR code or go to Rachelsenglish.com/free to get my free course, The Top Three Ways to Master the American Accent. It will change the way you think about speaking American English.

Today I’ll ask you seven questions, and I’ll give you some hints on how to answer them. A great way to win the interview and land the job you want is to practice ahead of time and record yourself. Review your video. See what can be better, practice and record again.

To incentivize your practice, you can even send your video answers to me. I may put them in a future video to further teach interviewing for a job in American English. Send me your job interview answers in a video to help@rachelsenglish.com, let me know your native language and your general field of work. This is going to be fun. I cannot wait to see your videos, I love this idea.

Let’s talk about the job you’re interviewing for today. The pretend job, I’m going to give you three different positions, choose one and form your answers around the job that you’re interviewing for.

Here are the jobs:

First, admin assistant. This would be someone who handles my emails. Customer support. Also does some administrative tasks like creating video transcripts, maybe a little bit of project management to get my new videos and lessons published.

Teacher. You are an accent specialist who loves helping non-native speakers of English speak with more confidence.

And the third position, Video editor. I use a lot of video editors in my work and I could use some more help.

Okay, here’s your first question:

What makes you interested in working for Rachel’s English?

You absolutely want to make sure you’re saying something specific here. Something that wouldn’t apply to any other job. For example, let’s say you’re applying for a job at McDonald’s. There are so many fast food restaurants just like McDonald’s. Don’t say you’re applying because you love fast food. That’s way too general. You want to say something like I’m applying for this job because I’ve always thought McDonald’s has the best hamburgers.

Or: When I was little, my aunt took me to McDonald’s every week for a Happy Meal and I still have some of the best toys that I got in those Happy Meals.

In other words, be specific to be memorable. And make sure your answer reflects that you know something about the company. So, I’m going to ask you again, pause this video, open up your camera app and answer this interview question.

What makes you interested in working for Rachel’s English?

Can you talk about a job you’ve had in the past where your responsibilities were similar?

The same advice applies to this question as it will to every single question you answer, be as specific as you can. This is why it’s a great idea to record your answers and send them to me. I won’t be giving you personalized feedback but I may use it as an example in a video if I think there’s a great amount of detail or not enough detail. I’ve done a lot of job interviews. I know how a strong candidate answers this and a weaker one. Let’s make sure that you are the strongest candidate at your next job interview.

So, I’m going to ask again, be specific about your responsibilities and give examples.

Can you talk about a job you’ve had in the past where your responsibilities were similar?

In this position, you’ll be working with a team. Can you talk to me about how you work with the team and how you handle deadlines?

This one is kind of tricky because I’m asking two questions at once how you work with a team and how you handle deadlines. Make sure you always answer the complete question, an employer isn’t going to want to have to ask you again if but there’s a part that you forgot to answer, you could even shape your answer in a way to remind yourself to answer all parts. You could say to answer the first part of your question and then put in your answer, and then you could say: “And regarding deadlines..” or “as far as deadlines are concerned..”

Remember always to be specific and give examples, here’s the question again.

In this position you’ll be working with a team. Can you talk to me about how you work with a team and how you handle deadlines?

Whoa, I forgot one thing. I was working with a doctor once, who was going to have a remote job interview. He never had a remote interview before, and part of what he needed to do was to send ahead a small video presentation as part of his application. Seeing as making videos is a huge part of my work, he asked me to review his application and there was one major problem with it. Because he was looking at a camera, he forgot that he needed to make a connection with the person who would be watching the video. How do you do that?

Remember to smile. Your body language in a job interview whether it’s remote or not is going to be important. So sit up straight, have relaxed shoulders and smile. Okay, next question. How do you think your boss or co-workers would describe you? Now, if this is your very first job ever, then you have no co-workers, you have no boss. So you can describe how teachers friends and family may describe you. With this question I’m trying to get a sense of your personality and how people relate to you. Don’t just list adjectives. Give a specific reason why. A specific story. For example, if your boss would describe you as highly dedicated and a team player, then say this:

My boss would describe me as highly dedicated and a team player because one time, I worked all night to correct someone else’s mistake on an important presentation.

Say that. Not just dedicated or team player. Be ready to explain at least three adjectives about yourself.

Okay here’s the question again.

How do you think your boss or co-workers would describe you?

What’s your least favorite thing about your job right now?

An important tip for this question is don’t complain. Whether it’s a lazy coworker or a crappy boss, I wouldn’t focus on individuals but more on work tasks and the work environment. For example, if you can’t stand your boss and you don’t think she takes you seriously, instead, talk about how you don’t see room for growth in your current position and that you’re really motivated to keep growing and keep learning new skills.

So here’s the question again, you answer it.

What’s your least favorite thing about your job right now?

What are you passionate about?

Again this is the interviewer wanting to know more about you as a person. Your answer doesn’t have to be about work. And it’s probably better if it’s not about work. If it does relate to your work, give an example that isn’t directly about work.

For example, I’m very passionate about the voice and how we use it which relates to accent reduction and teaching English, my job but the root of it is when I first started taking voice lessons in high school and I actually ended up studying that all the way through graduate school, earning a Master of Music in Opera performance. So I would lean into that part of the passion, that’s not directly about work. But you can also talk about something completely different, a hobby that has nothing to do with work. But make sure you do say something. People who can’t come up with something they’re passionate about in a job interview seem kind of boring and disconnected from the conversation.

Okay, here’s the question again, give me your best answer. What are you passionate about?

This position is work from home. Can you tell me about your setup, equipment, internet reliability and your availability?

This won’t apply to every position but all of my hiring is for remote workers. When I hire a teacher, I want to know that the videos that they make for our students are going to be of an acceptable quality. When I’m hiring an admin assistant, I need to know that their internet and equipment is reliable enough for me to get in touch with them when I need to. So since you’re applying for a pretended job at Rachel’s English, give me the rundown of your situation.

This position is work from home can you tell me about your setup, equipment, internet reliability and your availability?  

I can’t stress enough how important it is to prepare for a job interview by going over potential questions. And it’s even more important if English isn’t your native language and the interview is going to be in English.

I have several different video series on applying for a job and interviewing for a job in American English, be sure to check them out if you’re in the market for a new job. And don’t forget practice and record your answers to these interview questions. Even just one or two. It doesn’t have to be all seven. Send them to me at help@rachelsenglish.com. I won’t be giving personal feedback to each individual on your job interview question answers, but I am interested in pulling them together into a video to teach interview techniques. I may use your answer as an example of a standout perfect answer or I may use your example as an answer that needs a little bit of work. And I’ll tell you exactly what to do to improve your answer to make the best impact in your job interview.

So make sure you only send in a video if you’re okay with it showing up on the Internet. Don’t forget to head over to Rachelsenglish.com/free to get my free course, The Top Three Ways to Master the American Accent. The techniques there are a great way to improve your accent for that upcoming job interview.

Keep your learning going now with this video and don’t forget to subscribe with notifications on. I love being your English teacher. That’s it and thanks so much for using Rachel’s English.

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