Let me reiterate my strong interest in the position we have been dis-
cussing. I am very impressed with everything I have heard here today.
What’s the next step? How do we progress from here?Don’t Worry If Interviewing Stages Get Skipped or Scrambled
As noted earlier, except for helloing and closing, the above stages may
not go in their prescribed order, and some of the stages we have de-
scribed may not happen at all.
But if you know what can be achieved with your portfolio in each
of the stages that do occur, you should be able to use your portfolio to
your advantage during the job interview.HOW TO FOLLOW UP AFTER THE INTERVIEW
A week or so after the interview, it is perfectly appropriate for you to
call (or e-mail) your interviewers about the status of your candidacy,
provided you do not contact them on or before the date they said they
would get back to you. But well before you make any follow-up calls,
there are some things you must do almost immediately after the inter-
view.Make some notes on what happened. As soon as you can after an
interview, jot down some notes. This is particularly important if you are
going to another interview in the same day. You certainly do not want
to confuse one interview with another. You might think you can keep
everything straight in your head and don’t need to write things down
until the evening. But at the end of a long, tense day, the events can all
seem like a blur. You don’t need to write pages, just jot down enough key
words and phrases to bring the conversations back to you.
These notes will become crucial if you are invited back for a second
interview. Your notes should include key things you learned about the
company and its future, your impressions of the people with whom you
met, and what you would like to learn more about.
Were there any topics raised during the interview that seemed to
elicit very strong positive or negative emotions? What seem to be the
particular interests of each interviewer? How does each of them view
the future of their organization?
Be sure to note when you can expect to hear from them, whether
or not you promised to send something, and if you agreed to make a fol-
low-up call on a certain date.
If you did not receive business cards from the people you met, you
may call the company directly when you get home and ask the recep-
tionist for the correct spellings of those people’s names and their titles.
Record P.E.A.K.S. they are seeking and portfolio items that most
impressed them.It is particularly useful to write down your impres-
sions of what the people you met are looking for and which of your
P.E.A.K.S. seemed to most impress each person. Were there items they
particularly liked in your portfolio?94 Part I: Building, Using, and Maintaining Your Career Portfolio