We’ve talked a lot about the importance of fit. In an interview, most hiring managers settle on this in the first three minutes then spend the rest of the interview confirming their initial judgments. So, it’s really important to nail the opening, but good hiring managers also need you to hit these three marks to seal the deal.

Skills/Brains

Hiring managers are not going to risk the embarrassment of hiring someone that isn’t very smart. It reflects to starkly on them. You may not need a specific skillset but then you have to show you can quicky adapt and that you can stick with something till it’s done and done well.

Passion

The big thing a manager gets paid for is aligning passionate people to the right position. So you have to show your passion and show specifically what drives this passion. We’ve seen a lot of hiring managers hire someone but not for the position they were interviewing for. This means they saw the passion and liked it and then found a spot for it after all the other boxes where checked.

Execution

Get er done. Can you finish what you start? Do you drive the project or just respond to emails and schedule meetings? A good hiring manager will sense this in you, but you need to demonstrate how it’s part of your DNA — that you’re someone who gets things done.

So, maybe you can think of it like gymnastics. Mental gymnastics. Know that the judges are scoring you on these three things. Know that hiring managers from companies you probably want to work for are going to hire on brains then dig deep for passion and test your ability for execution.

About NextGen

NextGen is the brainchild of longtime telecom professionals with nearly 50 years of experience and millions of dollars in Telecom Recruiting Services. We focus on establishing long term relationships with our clients and candidates so we can recruit the best and the brightest in the telecom industry. This ‘quality over quantity’ approach is at the heart of everything we do and has resulted in successful job placements at Fortune 1000 firms worldwide.