Job interviewing skills essential, Humber experts say

Mar 5, 2013 | News

By Stephen J. Donkers

With the end of the school year nearing, Humber officials say that improving you interviewing skills will help score a job.

Improving your interviewing skills is just as important as building a social network resume when looking for a job, said Karen Fast, Humber’s Career Centre manager, told Humber News on Tuesday.

“When looking for work, everything is much more online based,” Fast said. “It’s once you get into an interview, you have to prove yourself and your skills.”

Fast said she recently conducted a mock interview session with students and was disappointed with how they performed.

LISTEN: Karen Fast on the need for good job interviewing skills

“Not one student did a good job,” she said. “So, some of it is your online presence, but a lot of it is how you conduct yourself during an interview.”

Statistics Canada reported last week that the Canadian GDP climbed to 0.6 per cent on annual for the fourth quarter of 2012.

The national unemployment rate currently sits at 7.1 per cent whereas the youth unemployment rate is 14.1 per cent, according to Stats Canada.

Fast said many students will only prepare resumes and assume that alone will get them jobs.

“I have found that many students don’t practice,” she said. “They think a resume is when really you need to put together a whole package and prepare.”

Humber Employment advisor, Christine Colosimo, told Humber News that websites like LinkedIn are important to use for possible employers but students should take time to develop interviewing skills.

“Human connectivity is important,” Colosimo said. “Getting yourself out there and tweek your interviewing skills will help land you work.”

Humber Career Centre employee, Jessica Blakey, said the career centre has been getting graduating students looking to improve both their resumes and interviewing skills.

“A lot of students who’ve been coming here want to improve their interviewing skills so we’ve been helping them with that,” she said.