Mock Interviews
Mock interviews give students the opportunity to brush up their interview technique, learn about their chosen profession / sector and reduce anxiety for the real thing. They also highlight the knowledge, skills and personal attributes of your students to potential employers.
“Although very busy, the employers were happy to get involved because it wasn’t too much of a commitment. They were also able to raise awareness of future opportunities with their companies”.Frank Hamer,Teaching Fellow, University of Plymouth
In this section you will find:
Case study
School of Computing, Communications & Electronics, University of Plymouth
Working with the careers service we organised mock interviews for second and final year students from our electrical engineering programme with employers from local engineering companies. The aim was to give the students a real insight into the interview process and some interview practice.
We contacted seven local engineering companies and four agreed to help, although one subsequently pulled out. Some of the contacts we made were with Plymouth graduates and we also contacted employers that either we or the careers service already knew. We arranged the interviews at the end of the autumn term when the students were starting to think about forthcoming interviews, either for jobs or one year industrial placements. It was optional for students to sign up for interviews but there was a lot of interest and we filled all of the available slots.
The employers conducted their interviews in the careers service and each one set aside half a day for this, interviewing six students each. Each interview slot was thirty minutes, with twenty minutes for the interview and ten minutes for feedback. The careers service hosted the interviews for us and so looked after the employers and provided a reception service for the students.
“The students liked having a real interview experience and felt more nervous before hand because they were meeting somebody from outside of the university. They also valued the feedback they received”.Frank Hamer, Teaching Fellow, University of Plymouth
Tips
- Contacting employers you already know can make it easier to persuade them to get involved. It also means you know whether they are suitable for this activity or not.
- To give a real experience, ask the employers to provide a real job advert that they would use and ask your students to apply for this job.
Pitfalls
- Take care that the employers you invite in give an appropriate interview experience and feedback.
- If this an optional activity for students, ensure they are interested in taking part before going to the effort of organising this as it can be time consuming. One way to do this is ask them to submit CVs.
- If you make this an optional activity the students who might benefit from this experience the most, because they are least able or confident interviews, might be the most likely to opt out.
Resources
- Financial: Refreshments for the employers and somewhere appropriate for them to interview.
- Time: Contacting employers was time consuming and because this was optional it was also time consuming promoting this to the students and gauging their interest. There is also some administrative work that is needed e.g. booking rooms, sending out confirmation letters or emails, booking parking for employers and booking refreshments.
Resources
The resources below can be downloaded and customised to suit your needs.
You will want to prepare different questions for each mock interview so it is difficult to provide a standard set. However, an example mock interview for a Maritime Sustainable Developments Officer is given. If using an employer for your mock interviews they are likely to have their own set of questions.
The example given of Maritime Sustainable Developments Officer shows how a mock interview can fulfil a number of purposes. The mock interview pack can be printed and given to the student to:
- Show how criteria can be picked out of the job description
- Show how questions are linked to those criteria
- As a means of providing feedback, since during the interview process the interviewer writes notes against each question and some summary notes at the end
- As a reference document for the student after the interview
Staff or employers tend to put together more questions than they ask which gives the candidate extra examples to take away and work on.
When you organise the mock interview, you will need to agree whether you will stick to your roles or break out to offer advice. The latter is more of a coaching role, and whilst valuable, will not recreate the interview situation.
Mock Interviews - Advice for Staff
Mock Interviews - Selection Criteria and Sample Questions
