Every job seeker should be prepared to answer some tough questions. It’s the part of the interview process that makes job seekers the most nervous. If, however, you calm your nerves by preparing to answer the tough questions ahead of time, you may sail right through the interview.

Dave Fogg, associate director of career services for DeVry University, says, “Be calm and relaxed. Stop and think before you answer the question.” He says that many candidates “don’t know what the hiring manager is looking for. They’ve not thought that far ahead and they are just not prepared for general HR questions. Tell me about yourself … don’t give me a bio.” In order to be prepared, he advises, “Meet with a career advisor and have them do a mock interview. You’re not trying to be perfect in the mock interview, you’re trying to reach perfection for the interview — but we know no one is perfect.”

Start by anticipating basic questions the interviewer is going to ask, and prepare solid answers. This will give you confidence in the interview, and confidence is very attractive to hiring managers. Here are a few basic questions to think about:

1. Tell me a little about yourself. This is not the moment to recall your life history, nor is it the moment to ramble on. Prepare a focused, two- to three-sentence statement about what makes you the best candidate for this job.

Example: “I graduated from [insert college here] with a degree in [insert major here]. Since that time, I’ve been working as a [insert career here] where I have done [insert key accomplishments here]. I’m looking forward to [insert future goals here] and I feel this position would be a great step in that direction.”

2. What are you looking for in your next position? Design your answer to reflect the position for which you are being interviewed. Be genuine, but highlight what you find most attractive about this role and how it fits into your overall career goals.

3. Why are you interested in this position? This is a great opportunity to talk about why you are a match for the position. Use examples from your job history and tie those to the value you would be able to offer if you served in this role.

4. Why did you leave each of your previous positions? Be honest, but remain positive and succinct in your answer. Hiring managers want to understand a job seeker’s career decisions and motivations. The job history should make sense, otherwise there is room to interpret it as a red flag and potential problem.

5. What is your greatest weakness? Job seekers who answer this appropriately can make a positive impression by taking responsibility and explaining their commitment to improve. Select a weakness that allows you to demonstrate what you’ve done to address it. Use a past, present and future statement to explain it.

Example: “In the past, I used to have a problem with time management, so I asked my supervisor how I should be prioritizing my work and took a class to learn how to use my calendar and task lists more effectively. Since then, my time management skills have improved and I’m confident they will continue to do so. For example. …”

Here are five additional strategies that successful job seekers use to prepare for tough interview questions:

1. Before they begin interviewing, they analyze their résumé and job history to identify areas that will be difficult for them to explain. They take the time to develop strong, succinct answers to address each issue so they can be confident in the interview.

2. They know how to use past, present and future statements. They take responsibility for any past mistakes, emphasize what they learned, and state what they should have done or how they would handle things differently now.

3. They remain calm and focus on appearing confident. Rambling answers distract from a job seeker’s achievements and give the impression of nervousness. Speak with a low tone at a measured pace.

4. They are positive and professional. They stay away from comments that blame others, sound defensive or could be perceived as negative. Hiring managers are looking for people who are mature enough to take responsibility for their actions.

5. Their answers incorporate positive examples from their work history. They know that interviewers are more convinced by brief, relevant stories that demonstrate skills, as opposed to someone simply “telling” them they can do the job.Keep these tips in mind and your performance in an interview will stand out over your competition.

Becoming comfortable with your ability to answer tough questions is half the battle. Confident candidates get hired. Employers aren’t looking for perfection. If you effectively convey confidence in your skills and experience during your interview, they will be confident in you.

Our team of experts fields real-life everyday questions from HR managers and gives practical answers that can be applied by any HR pro in the same situation. Today’s question: We got a report about an employee’s drug-related arrest. What action should we take?

Question:
We learned through a local newspaper that one of our employees was arrested recently for DUI and drug possession. We’re concerned about workplace safety and other issues — his manager said there were suspicions that the employee had used drugs on the job.

What do we do now?

Answer:
Conduct an independent investigation, recommends employment-law attorney Roy Ginsburg.

First, talk to the employee about what happened. If you want to verify his version of the events, you could also get a copy of the police report.

Once you have the facts straight, speak with the employee and let him know you think he has a problem and that you want to help.

If he’s defensive, noncommittal or defiant, those are red flags. You might want to go to the next step, such as requiring that he take a drug test.

Often, when an employer gets sued, the first thing a company’s lawyer says is, “Let’s see your employee handbook.” If it’s old and unrevised, the next thing the lawyer often says is, “We have a problem.”

Outdated policies or the failure to properly inform employees about new policies can be a big black mark against employers defending themselves against a bias charge. So there’s no better way to kick off the New Year — in a business sense — than by making sure your handbook is up to date. The top-priority items to check:

• New FMLA regulations. The U.S.  Department of Labor has revised the Family and Medical Leave Act regulations a couple of times in the last year. Further, the DOL requires employers provide each employee a notice of their updated FMLA rights in a handbook or a handout at the time of hire. Failure to do so will be the first area attacked in a lawsuit over FMLA leave.
• Genetic Discrimination. The recently passed Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of an employee’s genetic information. What follows is that your employee handbook should include genetic information among the “protected” traits that have EEO status.
• Privacy and electronic devices. Employees may have privacy expectations in their use of company computers and other devices, such as PDAs. Still, courts have ruled generally that employers can monitor and limit computer and electronic-device usage for improper activities such as accessing “adult” materials, inappropriate e-mails, or outside business use, as well as strains on bandwidth. The handbook is one effective way to serve notice about company  monitoring policies and employee restrictions on use.
• Social Networking. Facebook, Twitter and similar sites have become part of our culture — and our workplaces. More and more companies are instituting policies regarding limits to access of such sites during work time and what employees may disclose about their workplace. Such policies should be part of your handbook.

E-mails are more often being viewed by judges as evidence in employment law cases. Managers should change their e-mailing habits accordingly.

In addition to the official performance review, a court may look at e-mails related to a fired employee’s performance. That could be both good and bad for companies.

If the content of the e-mails is consistent with the company’s decision to fire the employee, a court might look at that favorable. But if a manager repeatedly praised the employee through e-mail, that’s a different story.

The best bet? Managers should understand that e-mail creates a permanent record and that they shouldn’t write anything they wouldn’t want to print out and keep in the employee’s personnel file.

One way to improve employees’ understanding of the benefits you provide them with:

Plan to meet with them one-on-one a few more times than usual this year.

Nearly 90% of company execs think one-on-one meetings between a benefits counselor and each employee would significantly improve workers’ understanding of their benefits, found a recent Colonial Life survey.

In addition, 92% of employers feel it’s very important to their business for employees to understand and appreciate their benefits.

Only 1 in 4 to increase efforts

But what’s surprising is that only 27% of businesses plan to increase benefits communication, found a separate Watson Wyatt study.

So conducting more face-to-face meetings between Benefits and individual employees could be a great way to set your company apart.

Does your company provide employees with cell phones or smartphones to use for business calls? If so, you may need to watch out for a big security concern.

A recent UK survey of companies and institutions revealed that 79% of employees conduct confidential conversations by cell phone, and 51% do so on a daily basis. However, only 18% of companies had security software in place on their phones.

Even businesses that carefully secure other communications may be unaware of the issue. Most people are used to making calls from standard, wired telephones, where security isn’t that big of an issue (unless the police or the FBI are wiretapping you). But cell phone signals can be picked up far more easily.

Cell phone service providers do provide some encryption with their services, but it is highly vulnerable.

What this means for your business is that such critical details as sales discounts, planned bids and sales leads, which are often discussed via cell phone, might fall into your rivals’ hands.

Problems could stem from a lack of communication between IT and management. If IT isn’t aware of what sort of calls are being made on the company-owned equipment, they may neglect to take proper security measures.

It’s important for IT to know what company-issued phones are being used for. That way, they can increase protection on the phone, if necessary.

When HR manager Theresa Lane wanted to find out what employees liked and didn’t like about HR’s policies, she decided to do a survey. Problem: People weren’t responding — until she figured out an irresistible, and inexpensive, hook.

Her story:

Whenever we made changes in benefits and HR policies, we liked to get employee feedback to ensure everyone was on board with our ideas.

The typical way of doing that was to send out an employee survey and then tally and analyze the responses.

Problem: Before you can tally and analyze the responses, you have to have some responses. People either just weren’t filling out the surveys or were taking forever to get them back to us.

It was frustrating, but we understood that employees were busy and kept putting the surveys on the back burner. We had to give them a good reason to respond.

Let’s do a good deed
We got an idea when one of our employees talked about taking up a workplace collection for a local charity.

Our suggestion: The company will make a small donation to the charity for every completed employee survey.

That gave us a champion for the cause – the person who was collecting for the charity and would “talk up” taking part in the surveys – and gave employees another reason to complete and return their surveys to us.

And it worked. We got back more surveys than we’d ever gotten before, giving us valuable info on which to base decisions. Plus, we did a good deed by donating to the charity.

(Theresa Lane, HR manager, Cutler, ME)

Employers shouldn’t wait around to see what happens with the Employee Free Choice Act. 

Even if Congress makes it easier to form unions, improving benefits communication today will help make sure your staff is satisfied with what you’re offering — and keep organizers at bay.

Here are three things worth giving to employees now to keep them happy and let them know exactly how much they’re getting from their benefits:

Total comp statements

These statements let employees know that you have much more invested in them than salaries.

Despite the effectiveness of this tool, only 43% of employers provide total comp statements, according to the 2009 Metlife Study of Employee Benefit Trends.

Key: Make sure the statements are personalized and clear to all employees. For example, break statements down into short, easy to understand sections (e.g., salary, health care and retirement).

Decision-support tools

Employees love to have tools (like Web-based calculators) to help them make decisions about their benefits.

These tools also boost employee satisfaction with their benefits.

One worth trying: MetLife’s free Employee Benefits Simplifier. It helps employees decide which benefits are right for “them” and even suggests coverage levels.

Off-season education

Outside of enrollment season, meet with employees and explain each part of your benefits package individually. Example: One month hold a meeting that explains your dental plan. The next month meet to discuss the vision benefits you offer.

This info will boost employees’ satisfaction and confidence in their enrollment decisions and increase participation when enrollment rolls around.

What are some things you do to educate employees about their benefits? Let us know in the Comments Box below.

If employees send text messages on the company’s dime, the company should be able to monitor them, right? Maybe not, according to recent court decisions.

An employer gave cell phones to a group of employees so they could communicate via text messages. The contract with the wireless provider said the company would be charged an overage fee if any phone sent more than a certain number of words in a given month. Employees had to reimburse the company for those charges.

After one employee went over his limit four times, the company obtained copies of his messages from the wireless provider. The transcripts revealed the employee was sending a lot of personal messages — in fact, many of them were sexually explicit.

The employee was disciplined, but sued, claiming his privacy was violated when the vendor provided — and the company read — his personal messages.

A jury ruled in favor of the company, before an appeals court reversed the decision. The reason: The messages weren’t the company’s property because they were stored by a third-party vendor (unlike company e-mail, which is often held on the company’s own network).

Now, the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case. We’ll keep you posted on the outcome.

Cite: Quon v. Arch Wireless

You know the saying about looking a gift horse in the mouth. Just be careful you don’t end up looking like the other end of the horse.

This comes from the folks at the Emily Post Institute. As you might imagine, they specialize in, among other things, the etiquette of gift-giving at work — what’s appropriate, inappropriate and disastrous. So, here’s a test to see if you’re up on the latest from the Institute (answers at the bottom):

1. Which of the following is considered an inappropriate gift to someone at work?

a. Perfume

b. Jewelry.

c. Lingerie

d. Alcohol

e. All of the above

2. You’re invited to an after-work holiday party at your boss’ home. An inappropriate gift to bring would be –

a. Chocolates

b. Wine

c. A poinsettia plant

d. All of the above are appropriate.

3. True or false: Giving your boss a gift in the workplace is appropriate.

4. You’re a man in a workplace in which everyone exchanges gifts. It’s OK to give a woman a gift certificate to Victoria’s Secret. True or false.

5. In a workplace in which everyone exchanges gifts, it’s inappropriate to give a dictionary to a new employee whose first language is not English. True or false.

Answers

1. e. Just about any gift of that type is considered too personal for someone who’s a work colleague.

2. b. Generally, alcohol is considered an inappropriate gift, especially for the boss.

3. False. Workplace gifts for the boss, given individually, are considered inappropriate, since such gift-giving can appear to be an attempt to curry favoritism. However, it’s OK for a group to chip in for a gift for the boss.

4. False. Again, gifts that are of a personal nature generally are out of bounds. Plus, they might send the wrong message.

5. True. Any gift that potentially serves to underscore a worker’s fault or shortcoming is inappropriate — even if given in the spirit of trying to help.