Studies have shown that your body language communicates more to another person than what you say or the tone of your voice. This is even truer when you are interacting with a stranger, as one naturally sizes up someone new. For that reason, your body language during a job interview has a large effect on the hiring manager's perceptions of you and consequently, your likelihood of being hired.
Learn Good Body Language:
When preparing, you want to focus on what you should do and not what you shouldn't do. No one is perfect. If you slip into some kind of negative pose in the interview, you do not want to lose your cool and let a lot of chatter cloud your thinking. Over the course of in interview, everyone re-adjusts themselves a few times (it would be strange to be perfectly still). The thing is to teach your body to recognize good body language in your body (without a mirror). Noticing sensations will bring a greater mindfulness to what you are doing with your body when your mind is elsewhere, such as answering questions for an interview. Here are the basic elements of good body language:
Eye Contact: Maintain frequent though intermittent eye contact. Sense the comfort level of the manager and give them slightly more than equal eye contact.
Posture: Sit up right but in a relaxed way where your shoulders drop naturally and your back is straight but not flexed backwards.
Angles: Direct your shoulders so that you are facing the manager. You do not want to suggest avoidance but openness.
Leaning: You don't want to be a statute nor lean in aggressively. Lean in fluidly when appropriate but always return to a natural sitting position
Hands and Feet: Find a few comfortable poses before the interview that suggest you are engaged but not aggressive. The more relaxed they are the better, so feet should be flat on the floor (if possible) and hands should be in a neutral state unless speaking. When you do speak, your gesticulation should be natural and used sparingly
Staying in Your Chair and Not in Your Thoughts:
Remember an interview is only a conversation, and you have had thousands upon thousands of conversations in your life. If you think of it as a performance, you are likely not to relate the hiring manager and that will probably affect your body language. So develop a simple system to "check in" on your body. Stay positive every time you straighten yourself in your chair or refocus on the interviewer's eyes. With body language, things fall apart for everyone, what makes the difference is those who bring it back together naturally. That way you let your body language contribute to you getting your next job.
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