I don't want you to take this the wrong way.

However I am going to guess that you interview in a similiar manner to the way you write your CV - I could be wrong though.

However my concern would be that the examples that you may have given to the questions they asked were based around 'temp' work and the like - and you may have failed to put a more positive spin on them.

Now obviously I don't know you, or the details of the interview, however you have to remember that an interview isn't to prove you can do the job - the job is for that, its the time you should be selling yourself for everything you have - make sure you get all your good points in, for example someones says, 'Have you managed a team in your office' - you can either say 'no' and leave it at that, or move the question to somewhere you could make a better answer, 'no, but...I have led a small team in uni and while doing so I learned that it was sometimes difficult to deal with the demands of everyone blah blah'.

You get the idea, even if you don't have experience of a question they ask you, put that spin on it to take the question somewhere else that will allow you to show your 'good' skills.

Does this make sense?

Can you give a bit more detail about the interview, questions, answers etc?

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I prepared alot for the interview, it was a competency based one. I understand what you mean, but I never down played my roles as just temp or part time. I went with the angle that they gave me valueable experience and some great skills.

The interview was with two guys, the manager of the department I'd be working for and his deputy. They were very friendly and stressed the importance of being relaxed. The interview went like this:

- describing the past three roles I'd had.
- skills experience using such things as Excel and all that
- the 3 competency based questions:
- can you think of a situation where you have improved levels of customer service?
- have you had to deal with a problem at work? how did you solve the problem and what was the end result?
- can you think of a time when you went outside of your job remit?
- a little about the role I'd be doing and whether I thought I could do it.


I gave honest and relevant examples from recent jobs, that I had prepared beforehand. They seemed impressed with my answers.

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You could have done well sometimes however people just don't think your the best fit, so don't take from my post that you didn't do well.

Can you give a run down of what your answers where?

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By all means, there was 3 other people who could have had more relevant experience - I just don't know.

First answer I gave relating to improving service, I mentioned how I would strive to have customers cars at the front of the car park ready to be driven away - so that they wouldn't have to faff around with collecting their keys and finding where their car was parked.

Second answer relating to a problem, a customers keys were lost. Another driver collected her spare key off her and I personally drove her car all the way to Aberdeen. Her car was prone to over heating so I travelled the whole way with the roof down and the heater on full blast - while it was sporadically raining.

Third one relating to going above and beyond my position, was an example of sorting a letter for an adviser in my current role. He had made a mistake and it had already gone to the printers. Standard practice would be to issue an amendment and apology letter but this would make the adviser and the company look bad. I personally went down to the printers and found the letter before it could be sent out, as the printers refused to find it - as far as they were concerned it was done and out of their hands.

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Okay, being hard-headed about this - interviews always leave more people disappointed. You've got limited experience, so you need to play it for all that you can - and you still might lose out to people with more relevant experience.

It's a bank - maybe they decided against taking anybody on!

You 'strive' to improve service. A better answer might be one where the improvement was embedded in the organisation. The example you give shows commitment, but it sounds like you couldn't guarantee the improvement would happen every time. Either spin it better ( and don't 'strive' but actually do it!)

This is, again, a commitment response rather than problem solving. The stuff about the rain etc makes you sound a tad whiny - they don't need to know that. Again stick to the main point.

Did the company lose the keys? If so, did you do anything to prevent it happening again?

Again, this sounds a bit of a one-off. What about work-based issues - rather than lost keys? (Although, of course, I have incredible sympathy with people who can't find their car keys.)

The narrative is not clear to me (maybe because I don't really know your current job), but that may just be me. It does sound like you show an ability to take responsibility, so in an interview that may play well.

When I interview, a positive attitude is always important, and I think people have said enough about putting the past behind you. You seem to have taken it well, and look like learning from the experience. Good on you.

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It wasn't, and I couldn't. I was being honest that it culdn't always happen.

The rain detail was mentioned in passing, not me moaning about it. Another member of staff lost the keys, and the process was never changed. How the keys were stored and found was integral to how the car park worked, so it was always an issue at that job.



I'm over it now, just a shame is all. One of the other 3 people could have quite easily had more experience than me, or given industry related examples. Interestingly I asked for feedback from their HR department and she offered to give me a call today. We'll see if she does adn what she says.

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Well RBS kindly phoned me to give me feedback and it's as I thought, one other canditate just had more relevant experience. We were the only two (of four) to pass the competency interview and there was no negative feedback at all - which is nice at least.

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Well thats good!

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Yesterday had to explain a bad reference from the long stay car park I worked at last year. Basically the woman I worked for has been bitter and given me a bad reference, just because I left the job. What a joke, not one person liked working there and I was absolutely miserable being there most of the time.

Fortunately it's fine, as unsuprisingly, all my other references were good. Now though I'll hesitate to ever use them as a reference, even though as my job before this one I'm kind of obliged to. How petty

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That's crap mate. I thought employer's weren't allowed to give a bad reference, it's either a good one or none at all. Then again I'm a little out of touch

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