principles or guidelines:

Know ahead of time
Trust and Honesty. Employment relationships, like all how you are going to
long‐term personal relationships, are built on trust and
deal with any issues
honesty. Most people can understand if you are honest
that may be bothering
you.
with them. If there is a chance they will find out about

the “sensitive past,” you may be well advised to be the


one who tells them. The issue of timing could be

critical. You may want to wait until you have had a

chance to get to know one another and then introduce

The timing and
the subject with a statement you feel would be
phrasing of the
appropriate, perhaps something like:
disclosure can be very
important.

“Ms. _____, I’ve really enjoyed meeting you and

learning about the opportunities at X company.

However, there’s something in my background


that I want you to know about. I don’t ordinarily

discuss this, but the last thing I want is to have

my background cause you any difficulty. To be


more specific, ….


“I’d like to emphasize that this is all behind me

now and this has not been any sort of a problem

Consider making the
for ….”
“sensitive past” an
For some problem areas, you may want to make
issue of strategic
importance in your job
dealing your “sensitive past” one of the primary
campaign.


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The Job Interview Workbook
strategic factors in planning your approach. For


example, someone with a felony may approach a
prospective employer by making contact through a
Try to find a setting
prison support group or a religious leader. That way, where an apparent
liability can be an
the prospective employer will have already been
asset.
informed about the potential problem prior to the

interview, indicating that he or she has is willing to


consider employing you. In these cases, it will be even
more important for you to be especially well prepared
in all areas of the interview process, and to be able to
point to specific examples or illustrations of behavior that would benefit the employer.
Practice: If you have some “sensitive past” issues, write out (a) how you would respond to a question about it early in an interview, and (b) how you would tell the interviewer later on in the interview.


A sharp pencil and a sharp mind.


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The Job Interview Workbook

Step 6: Stack the Interview Deck: Solitaire
By this point you’ve come a long way. You’ve thought


out responses to questions you’re almost sure to be

asked. You know what you want to ask. You’ve

considered some interview techniques to help you


avoid or postpone answering or get a more detailed

response to certain questions. You’re able to be

“conversational,” and you have an approach for dealing


with any especially sensitive issues.


So what?
The only way to get
more skilled at
If you can’t actually use this knowledge during the
interviewing is to get
interview, it will all have been for naught . The ONLY
more practice.
way we get more skilled is to practice. Step 6 involves


practicing saying things out loud to yourself by using

the
Interview
Card
Deck
found
at

www.careerclubsinternational.com Free Resources.
Use the Interview Card
(Note: for on‐line purposes there is a PowerPoint
Deck to practice
containing various questions to prepare for.)
answering and asking
questions out loud.
Scroll through the Interview Card Deck and perform

Write out ideas for
the actions indicated, either answering questions,
better answers,
asking questions, or using interview techniques. In
questions, techniques
doing this, you should go back to this workbook and
or illustrations.
write out new ideas that occur to you for dealing with
certain questions or issues, or other specific examples
of your unique talents and skills.

Remember to update the workbook as you come up with ideas for

better answers, questions, techniques, examples or illustrations.


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The Job Interview Workbook