The One to One job interview is the most common interview where only the interviewer and the interviewee is present. The format of the interview is conversational with the interviewer driving the agenda in the beginning and the interviewee asking questions towards the end.
The interviewer attempts to establish if the candidate is a fit for the position while at the same time selling the company. The candidate attempts to sell himself while determining at the same time if the company is a good company to work for. First impressions, body language & other non-verbal signs as well as dress are very important.
The interviewer will normally interview more than one person and you will be compared to those candidates. So the applicants will create context for the interviewer in terms of one candidate is better than other. Depending on the type of interview the questions would be a combination of general, technical, skill and behavioural questions.
General questions focus on your behavioural characteristics, problem solving abilities, how they deal with authority and your ability to work in a team as well as independently. Especially with behavioural questions the interviewer would like the interviewee to use real life situations and experiences in answering the question. The interviewee should illustrate their knowledge through the experiences they describe. The interviewer would also like to know what the candidate has achieved in previous employment.
Preparation for such interviews is very important and before the interview the candidate should go through the job requirements in detail and anticipate questions and start formulating answers to those questions.
Employers often prefer multiple rounds of one to one interviews to get a better feeling for a candidate and to make sure they are making a good employment decision. Each interview needs to be approached with preparation – try and find out who is doing the next interview and what their title is as this will guide you in your preparation.
