Author: Paul Michael / Source: Wise Bread
You may have heard of the term “job crafting.” You may even have done it without realizing. Job crafting is a technique used by employees to redesign their own specific roles to foster greater job satisfaction. It’s a mind trick that turns a bad job into a tolerable one, or a good job into a great job.
The techniques employed in job crafting can also be used in an interview situation, putting you in the driver’s seat and making you a star interviewee. It’s called cognitive crafting and it can work wonders.
What is cognitive crafting?
The simplest way to describe it is a paradigm shift; you are looking at the exact same information or scenario, but in a different way. One example of this is the infamous rabbit and duck illusion, described by philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein as “seeing that” versus “seeing as.” You may look at the image and see a rabbit. You may see a duck. The shift happens when you go from one to the other, opening your eyes to a new view without anything changing other than your own opinion.
Another example of this comes from a story about a man on a train, sitting solemnly as his two children cause havoc. They’re jumping on the seats, running around, shouting, and he is doing nothing. A bystander says, “What a terrible parent, he should do something about his kids.” Then, someone tells the bystander, “I was just with him at his wife’s funeral.” Suddenly, the bystander has a complete shift in perspective. Nothing has changed. The kids are still running around, the man is still sitting in silence, but now the feeling felt is one of empathy, not anger.
With cognitive crafting, you are responsible for creating these kinds of paradigm shifts to benefit yourself. With this technique, you can make yourself a much more impressive prospect in your next job interview.
They’re not interviewing you; you’re interviewing them
Perhaps the simplest piece of cognitive crafting you can use is to turn the tables on the whole situation. As soon as you are asked to go in for an interview, start telling yourself that you will be interviewing the company to see if they are a good fit for you. In fact, go one step further, and tell yourself that they have to prove they’re good enough to have you as an employee.
Of course, don’t go so far that you become aloof and arrogant — but by taking this approach, you become less nervous and more confident in your own abilities. Confidence is an excellent trait for an interviewee to have, and it makes a huge difference. (See also: 15 Soft Skills Every Employer Values)
Give yourself a self-review before the interview
Give yourself a genuine self-appraisal before your interview, and use performance appraisal…
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