Facing the Promotional Interview – Part 15

CLOSING THE INTERVIEW

In the last several articles, we considered closing the interview by (1) making no statement and just leaving the interview room as soon as possible, (2) looking at covering any missed points (in the interview) and making no statement, and (3) considering an option that is based on the principle of “you have nothing to lose and everything to gain,” IF, your final response is able to adhere to an extremely specific criteria. That criteria is spelled SHORT and RELEVANT!

As we discussed, it is possible to give the Interview Board a short, positive, upbeat statement and challenge without exhausting your welcome. This viewpoint can be used to close an interview and can accomplish the following:

Leave the Interview Board with a fresh positive image of you when they are determining your final grade.
Give the interview board a positive statement based on your demonstrated performance.
Leave the Interview Board with a positive challenge relating to your future job performance.

So, to close this series of interview articles, let’s review a few more considerations that you should evaluate at the conclusion of your interview:

Immediately following your final concluding words, confidently stand and remember to firmly shake the hand of each board member as you look them in the eye (and if possible, use their name, and rank if appropriate).

If you have your department uniform hat or cap, be sure to take it with you.
If you moved the chair, remember to leave the chair where you found it.
Lastly, and most importantly, if there are multiple doors, choose the right door to exit the interview room. I vividly recall an interview room that had two identical doors behind the candidates. One door went to the hallway, and the other door went to a closet. At the conclusion of a particular interview, this candidate quickly stood up, hurriedly shook our hands, turned around, confidently walked up to the closet door, opened the door and entered while closing the door behind him. About 30 seconds later, he opened the door, looked at the Interview Board members and said “everything seems to be OK in there.” He then exited through the correct door.

Several days after the interviews were concluded, I happened to see the candidate (whom I knew). I asked him what his thoughts were when he entered the closet.

This was his response: “Chief, when the door closed and it was totally dark, I knew I was in trouble. I briefly considered the following options:

- Stay in the closet until the board members had left at the end of the day and then leave, hoping they didn’t notice that I went into the closet.

But I knew they noticed.

- Punch a hole in the drywall and step into the hallway and then leave.

But I knew this option would make too much noise.

- Just step back into the interview room and then exit the right door.”

Interestingly, although this incident was extremely humorous, it did not affect his final grade, and may have helped slightly. However, I do not recommend this approach.

SUMMARY
Generally, Interview Boards will conclude an interview by giving the candidate time to add any points that were missed or neglected during the interview.

When Interview Boards are concluding an interview, they are finished with the candidate and ready to move on to the next candidate in a timely manner.

By closing with a short, positive, challenging statement, a candidate can leave a fresh positive impression in the minds of the Interview Board members when they are determining the candidate’s final grade.