Review of Powerful Phrases for Successful Interviews | by @TonyBeshara


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This book is more about marketing yourself, to land that gig you want. All the other books I’ve reviewed dealt with building your technical proficiency, but is that last step, articulating yourself in the right way to land the job, highlighting all those skills you have learned. Powerful Phrases for Successful Interviews by @TonyBeshara provides you with the mental sustenance, and wisdom through the interview process, from approach to negotiating your offer. Whether you need to accentuate your personal qualities, or market your already established skills better, this book ties your qualities together, to effectively and concisely get you past the interviews. Filled with ready to use responses, the book is that friend you need to run you through the various scenarios to get through the most vigorous of questions. Making that impression is crucial, and the author does a succinct job of giving you the opening, middle and closing responses.

The book commences with the initial chapter getting you familiar with seeking referrals from people in your network, in order seek job openings. With templated statements, you will feel more comfortable on how to approach people for job feelers. People underestimate the potential from cold-calling, and rely only on what’s been publicly advertised.  The book then deals with how to uplift your resume and cover letter, as well as the email. The delivery of your interest is important, and this chapters ensures you deliver something that is digestible for the potential employer.

The third chapter prepares you for your opening and closing phrases, taking into account the initial impression you will give, as well as as the closing sentiment that will be left when you leave the interview room. Filled with ice-breakers, as well as how to structure your professional history into a logical sequence, you will make a strong start and finish. The following chapters sets the framework for how you handle the meat of the interview, ways of you articulating that you can do the job, and all those tricky questions such as “Describe a situation in which you made a mistake” and “Provide an example of when you had to make a difficult decision”.

Chapter 6 covers situations in which you have difficulty explaining some of your background history, and how to mitigate any risk concerns that may arise from the potential employer hiring you. The final chapter that I took to be especially interesting, is once you have received the offer, discussing money and negotiating the best deal for you. Whilst I won’t spoil the final chapter I dare say it’s a great summary of the entire book, with some extra information to give you the confidence and mindset to go through a great interview process.

I definitely recommend this book, and whenever I am switching employers, I’d dig this book out, go through the relevant chapters and customise responses based on the author’s template, in Evernote, as I get ready to meet the hiring manager.

Concise: 5

Level: 2

Prior Knowledge: None. You have your skills, this book will accentuate them for you, with an injection of confidence and charisma.

My rating : 4.5

Author: Tony Bersha (@TonyBeshara)
TitlePowerful Phrases for Successful Interviews
Publisher: O’Reilly Media
Date: February 2014

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