Interview Question: What do you know about this industry?

Interview Question What do you know about this industryThis question is usually asked to gauge your level of education or understanding of a particular field. Employers will use this question to gauge your level of innovation, commitment and how you follow trends.

Here are some tips on how to prepare:

Search for trade journals. If you want to find out more about the company, get your hands on some trade journals. This is an effective way to find insider information. With trade journals, you can find out whats happening in the industry, current trends, significant people in the industry, and more, and this can help give you a leg up.

Use LinkedIn. Search for a particular industry and know whos who in your field by using LinkedIn. You can easily search for educational backgrounds and job histories by using their search function.

Cover the history and connect it with the present. Share something about the origins of your chosen field, no matter how old or new the industry is. After that, you can connect that info to the current trends of the field and how theyre affecting todays society. You can share your insights (be sure to keep your tone positive, no matter what the circumstances). Avoid any doom and gloom predictions.

Share your own insights. Do you have an idea where the industry is headed a few years from now? If so, feel free to share your own insightsthis is valuable information during an interview. Doing this helps show that youre a forward thinker.

Practice. Just like any other interview question, you have to practice your answer in order to keep control of any anxiety that may arise. You can ask a friend or mentor to help. Be careful not to memorize the answers it can negatively affect your overall performance. Memorized answers can cause a recruiter to think you dont have enough skills, or that you lack the personality to do the job well. Practice the delivery of your answers, but be careful not to sound too predictable. Be natural as much as you can, and go with the flow of the conversation.

These tips should help in answering this interview question. Be confident and do your part to ensure a good interview that benefits both parties.

Read 8736 times Last modified on Saturday, 20 June 2015 13:07
Alan Carniol

Alan is the creator of Interview Success Formula, a training program that has helped more than 80,000 job seekers to ace their interviews and land the jobs they deserve. Interviewers love asking curveball questions to weed out job seekers. But the truth is, most of these questions are asking about a few key areas. Learn more about how to outsmart tough interviewers by watching this video.