How to prepare for a CIO job interview.

If yCIO job interview adviceou've done a good job defining your professional brand, updating your resume, and taking yourself to market, before long you will be invited to interview for a job you really want. But interviewing—like skiing or speaking French—is a skill that gets rusty when you don't use it. You need to prepare.

Obviously, you want to know everything you possibly can about the company and the people who will be interviewing you. For a public company, there's plenty of information online. For a private company, you have to work harder, but you can usually find their core values on the company website. In either case, your contacts who have worked at the company, and vendors may be able to provide you with information about the company’s technology portfolio, it’s approach to IT investment, and the business challenges it is facing. Armed with this information, you can prepare for your interview by thinking about the connection you want to draw between those values and your own experiences. Here are some approaches to keep in mind:

1. Turn the interview into a conversation

Your goal is to convey to the interviewer that you understand the company, but you don’t want to seem as though you are delivering a presentation. When you're interviewing, there's a metaphorical microphone at the center of the table, and you want to hold that microphone about 60 percent of the time.

Some interviewers talk so much that you don't get a word in edgewise, and then penalize you for not getting into details. In those interviews, you have to assert yourself by saying something like, "I’d like to spend a minute on how I have addressed that issue in the past," or “Great point. May I take a moment to respond?”  But when you have the microphone, don't hold it forever. Through eye contact, you can determine whether the interviewer thinks your answer is on the right track or whether you've said enough, and that it's time to move the discussion along.

You'll be more likely to keep your answers focused, and be sure to share the air-time, if you think of your responses as structured. They should have a beginning, a middle and an end, or be delivered as itemized lists. Interviewers hate candidates who talk too much. It’s a standard complaint they make to their recruiters when giving interview feedback.

2. Be judicious about how much knowledge you impart

You are being tested about your knowledge of the hiring company, but you need to be careful about how you demonstrate that knowledge. Hiring managers don't want to hear you spouting a bunch of facts and figures about their business that anyone can memorize. You'll be most successful when you can apply your knowledge of the company in a context that showcases your understanding of the business and the challenges it faces.

One approach is to treat the interview as if you already have the job, and you're having your first set of meetings. Ask the questions you would if you were starting to build an IT strategy for this company. But don't start solving the company’s problems. As much as you might know about the company, you'll appear arrogant if you suggest concrete solutions. There is too much you still don’t know, and your solutions might miss the mark. CEOs know that the ability to listen, before acting, is a critical CIO skill. Be sure you demonstrate it.

3. Details matter

You're interviewing for a role as an executive leader, so you want to showcase your achievements as one. If you prepare a few success stories in advance, with three bullet points each, you will have a premeditated, clear and structured way to articulate your accomplishments in leadership, strategy, execution, and transformation.

When you're asked to discuss your own experience--say with a performance problem-- resist the urge to give a generic, consultative answer, like, “You should always start with communication.”  Instead, stick with the first person and provide real details to support your response. “When I ran a major transformation program, here is what I did,” is the better way to go.

CIOs are so often called upon to be advisers or consultants that they have trouble talking about their own experiences. However, the interviewer wants to assess how you have handled the challenges of your jobs, not whether you can rattle off generic best practices.

4. Make sure you know why you're there

Prepare a specific and substantive answer to why you want the job. Interviewers want to hear that a particular job is extremely attractive to you for some very concrete reasons, not just because it’s different from the job you already have. Too many candidates focus on location and compensation when they should express passion for the values, culture, or challenges of the hiring company.

And when the interviewer asks why you want to leave your current job, or why you're currently unemployed, keep it short and sweet. A job interview isn't the appropriate time for a soliloquy on the injustices visited upon you at your previous employer or the incompetence of your current colleagues. One or two sentences will do. Then turn the conversation back to why you want the new job.

5. Don’t try to close the deal

Some recruiters recommend that at the end of the interview you use some probing questions to learn the status of your candidacy.  In my opinion, it is better to resist that temptation. By all means, express strong interest in the role and your confidence that you’re the right person for it, but don’t ask for an evaluation of your performance. You want to end the interview by demonstrating your belief in your candidacy, not expressing anxiety over how you performed.

And--though you should know this by now—never bring up money. There will be plenty of time to discuss compensation as you move closer to an offer.

Subscribe to The Heller Report

Roles We Recruit


 

Read our weekly e-newsletter packed with career advice and resources for the strategic technology leader, and information about active searches.

The Heller Report

Add a Comment

Ask These Revealing Leadership Questions When Recruiting Digital Trailblazers

Mar 27, 2024

Mark Sander of Azurity Pharmaceuticals on Leading in Times of Dynamic Growth and Change

Mar 27, 2024