Common English Interview Questions and How to Answer Them Well

welcome back to our weekly live stream my name is Alisha and today we're going to talk about English for job and school interviews today's lesson is going to focus on some very common questions you hear in job interviews and school interviews and I'm going to talk about some sample responses and give you some ideas for how to respond with your information so I hope you can find a lot of useful stuff I'll talk about some important vocabulary words you'll hear in job and school interviews too so we'll begin in a couple of minutes as you join please don't forget to hit the like button and share the video too so other people can find today's lesson hello hi Lee I see a few people in the chat as it's loading lots of people on Facebook hi everybody Christian merabh Pierre Jamison Messiah hello everybody neroli new Aldi hi hi everybody okay as we wait to announcements as usual first one as always don't forget to check the link below the video for these free PDFs that we always have for you for many different topics I'll show you the job and business and school ones a little bit later but as always these are free so please check the link below the video on youtube or above the video on Facebook if you're watching on Instagram please check YouTube or Facebook and sorry I cannot see your comments in real time that's announcement number one announcement number two is as usual this week please don't forget if you have some little questions about English or about your studies please send them to me this is a picture a screenshot from a recent episode of our weekly question and answer series on English class 101 this is called ask Alicia so you can send me your questions and I will choose maybe I would choose maybe your question and answer it like and this is one sample question from one of our viewers so if you have a question please send it to me at English class 101 dot-com / ask - Alicia you can find a link on the YouTube channel if you want to send it as well so please make sure to send a few questions along there we are making new videos all the time so I hope that we can answer your question okay lots of people are here now I see an Erika I see Emilio hi there and Vishal Sinise Madurese de Andre pradyumna and Barbara's and Amin hello hi everybody and more people on Facebook Raina and Julia and Maria Julieta sorc was fast mone hello hi everybody thanks for joining I'm going to share the video now and then I'm going to begin so today we're going to kind of have the same pattern for each part of the lesson I'm going to introduce the question and some points about your answer and while I'm preparing please send in the chat please send your sample answers to the question I will try to check I will try to check your answers there are lots of points there are lots of things to check in the chat though so if I miss yours I'm sorry but please send your example sentences in the chat and I will try to check them alive if I can't have really sorry so let's begin I have shared the video so I want to start with this question this is maybe the most common first question in a job interview and you'll hear something similar so it will be very close to the same in a school interview the question actually it's not a question it's like a command so this is tell me tell me a bit about yourself tell me a bit about yourself and at native speed this question sounds like tell a bit about yourself tell me a bit about yourself so this is something the interviewer I am asking you the question the interviewer asks you this question so tell me means please talk to me a bit a bit means a little about yourself so this command is actually a request a command it means please give a short so a little please give a short introduction so this does not mean you should tell your life story so don't share just a lot of information like where you were born where you grew up all of this when you answer this question give a short introduction so you should share your focus if you're a student or if you want to go to a university or a college what is your study focus if you are applying for a job what is your work focus or what is your career focus so share your focus share like your goals what things do you want to do in the future or maybe what were your past goals and share important accomplishments important accomplishments so this means in your study experience or your life experience or your work experience what are maybe like two or three really important points for you important points for your studies or for your career so for example like did you win an award or did you have a really great success at work so what's something that was really key really really important for your career so this should be a very quick introduction so some examples are coming in I'll use your examples from the YouTube chat Aman says my name is Aman I finished my Gretsch I graduated maybe I graduated from such-and-such University I am such such years old okay I come from a family okay so there that's very focused on your personal life that example is very personal information focused keep it focused on your studies so what did you study what are your career goals so try not to share a lot about like personal personal stuff but share about your goals your goal so it should be career or study minded so for example if I wanted to talk about mine like I could say for example like I studied communication in college and I wanted past tense I wanted to work in media so I did an internship with ABC company and now I want to create my own project so that gives some key information what is my study focus what is my experience a key experience where did I work what do I want to do next so that's a very very short example but those are the kinds of points you should be sharing okay oh nice one I just there's one on YouTube if you're in the YouTube chat you can check out Christians comment he says I'm a software developer and I've been working in the in the field for around three years I've worked in different teams projects and programming languages I'd love to be a tech lead so that's a very short next one very very short introduction you could in a real interview you could give some more details but that's a nice example okay so the second question you may hear second or another very common introduction or base question is this one why do you want to work at this company why do you want to work at this company or for schools why do you want to attend this school so attend means that go to this school like become a student at this school why do you want to work at this company why do you want to attend this school so be specific specific means you give detailed reasons for something so don't say all your company seems interesting or oh this school seems nice like specifically give detailed information why do you like that company or why are you interested in this company this job specifically so don't say also money this is generally not a good answer so show that you understand the values or sorry the schools or the company's values and goals so values and goals means what is important for the company is the company really interested in like environment or like social responsibilities is the school really like focused on technology is there a specific department that's interesting for you about this school so why that school or why that company explains specifically why and how do the companies or the schools values match your values so in other words like they want to see like does this person's like values or does this person's goal match our goals are they the same so be specific to prepare for this question read the website of course read the website what is the company about what is the school's focus so you need to understand that and you need to think about your own focus so how do those two match how do those things match okay let's see so send some examples if you can I'll try to check there's some good examples coming in here for this question I'll come back to that in a moment so please make sure to be specific specific here and generally it's not a good idea don't mention salary don't mention money this question so the company wants to know the school wants to know do we have similar values and similar goals okay some examples so okay Daniel on Facebook says I want to work in your company because your company is the best okay so the best what so your company is like the top company in this field or your company is the best with like social responsibility so the best what so give some more detail share something specific about why you're interested in that school or that company ok knock Lorne on Facebook has made me a better example I want to study MBA and ID a business school because I want to start my own business ok nice start then then this business school has a great program to learn how to do that so match your goal to the school you want to attend so put a connection in there when you answer this question what's your connection to the school or the company ok let's continue to the third question here this is another very typical question maybe you need some explanation though so the last one for this part where do you see yourself in five years where do you see yourself in five years this see yourself means imagine yourself so in five years means five years from this day so from the interviewer from today as well imagine yourself imagine you in five years so what's like what's your vision for yourself so what are your goals what are your goals what do you want to do and again how do your goals match the company's goals or the school's goals so again you're making a connection this one is about a future connection so the company wants to see is this person going to continue working with us in a positive way or will they contribute something positively so again it's about matching matching okay let's see if there's a lot of good examples coming in uh let's see I don't know where to see myself next week says Leah okay I'm looking for a couple of and specific answers to these questions I see some very general questions about where you've been working but you need to think about how to answer these questions specifically so in five years this is a future question I'm seeing some past tense and past tense questions this is a future or some past tense answers this is a future question in the future so like you can think over the next few years in the year 2020 in 2021 and 2022 what do you imagine for yourself what do you want to do professionally or for your studies so not like maybe your personal goals necessarily but what are your career goals again tie it to connect it to your career kay Lao has a nice example on YouTube in the YouTube chat I want to join your company because your company provides free services to disabled people which matches my goal my life goal to help people I would like to develop empathy towards those in need nice nice great so that's a great way to connect your goals to the company's values okay sounds good let's take one quick break then and then we'll continue to kind of the middle the middle part questions so today is very focused on school and work English so I want to share with you these PDFs you can find it from the file year where is it we have a couple I think new ones that I haven't shown you in a while there's a business PDF which I have lost just a moment here it is there's the business this excuse of it to that I wanted to show you for those of you for those of you for tho okay those for those of you who are studying force for work we have a business English PDF this has vocabulary words for the office yes but on the back I've shown this before are phrases you can use in a meeting so these are business and work-related expressions from meetings and there's some other stuff here job titles so how to express your job title or how to talk about the job you want so check this out you can download this for for business for work the other one if you're studying for school is this this is back-to-school I know but on the back again these are expressions to use in your class so how to speak to your instructor or how to speak to your classmates these are some phrases to use in class and some other vocabulary words too so you can get this and you can get the other one I just showed you can get both of these for free from the link below the video on youtube or above the video if you're watching on facebook if you're watching on instagram please check on YouTube or Facebook and again I cannot see your comments live I'm very sorry okay so with that let's continue to part two for today these are the kind of like middle part of the interview questions so if you have not already please make sure to like and share the videos or other learners can find today's lesson alright I see some examples coming in by the way let's see mmm I saw a couple mm-hmm some Oh move without Milla I think on YouTube says I'm from Malaysia making doing my own business and I'd like to improve my English to make sentences okay so maybe that's like a school goal or something like that so try to try to make it specific specific to the place that you're applying to okay let's go to this part I'll stand over here so these two are very similar questions they're very simple questions really but they're hard to answer they're difficult to answer for some people so first is what are your weaknesses what are your weaknesses so weaknesses plural weaknesses means this question means what are you not good at doing what are you not good at doing so the interviewer asks this to understand like because nobody is perfect right nobody's perfect so the interviewer asks this to understand like your personality a little bit so you should be honest you should be honest you know exactly you should be honest when you answer this question don't say I have no weaknesses it's not a good idea so be honest with the interviewer so try to be honest but you should explain that you know how to manage your weaknesses so for example you could say like it's difficult for me to speak in front of big groups it's difficult for me to speak in front of big groups so maybe like meetings are scary for you so you could say mmm this is this is something that's difficult for me it's scary for me and but I practice a lot so I take a lot of time to practice before a presentation and that helps me a lot so this is maybe a very common weakness speaking in front of lots and lots of people maybe like now so so this is difficult for lots of people so explain the problem explain the weak point that's okay honestly and explain how you fix the problem too so don't just say like I am not good at being organised explain give some information how do you fix that problem how do you fix that problem okay then the other half of this question may be the opposite type of this question is what are your strengths what are your strengths so strength your strengths means what are you good at what are you good at so again be honest yes but don't be overconfident overconfident means you have too much confidence you sound arrogant arrogant is a bad thing you sound like you like yourself too much that's not good so be confident so you know I can do this I can't do that so but just be honest about it too okay hang on YouTube says why did you add es because this is the plural form weakness is the singular form weaknesses is the plural form so usually people have more than one weak point es is the plural form so weakness ends in an S we make the plural form here by adding yes so what are your strengths what are your strengths so maybe you can say ah I'm good I'm good at planning events hmm you could say I'm good at planning events and I'm really good at sharing the information so maybe company events or maybe planning meetings and so on maybe you're really good at that so you can share specifically your point and maybe give an example of that strength that can be really helpful a couple of points here then one I'm good at your present are you president your preposition should be up here I'm good at this thing I'm good at noun phrase here your preposition it's difficult for me to verb it's difficult for me to plan it's difficult for me to stay organized it's difficult for me to speak in front of big groups it's difficult for me to something to something okay let's see other examples ah me at on Facebook has a very common weakness yeah my weakness is I want to do everything alone I am weak on teamwork so you can say maybe teamwork is difficult for me teamwork is difficult for me teamwork is difficult for me great example then you can explain like how do you fix that problem how do you fix that problem of teamwork so that's another very common one I think okay let's go to the next question the next interview question is for jobs this isn't this is a job specific question maybe you don't really hear this one in schools so much so for jobs why are you leaving why are you leaving your current job why are you leaving your current job current job your current job means your job now so why are you leaving why are you quitting why are you going to stop working at your company now so again be honest in this question don't try to change the information don't try to create some story be honest but be positive be positive so don't disrespect your job your previous job don't disrespect your co-workers don't disrespect the people you worked with your bosses it's going to sound very negative so don't be disrespectful when you answer this question so for example you could say maybe my contract my contract is going to finish soon and I want new challenges so you could explain like now is a nice time and you don't want to get a new contract because you want to find something new and challenging to do so you could say something like this my contract is going to finish soon I'd like to explore some new challenges so again be honest but be positive also if you were fired so fired means your boss let you go so you lost your job you did not choose to leave you were removed from your job in that case explain why you were fired why you were fired so maybe you had a medical issue or something like that but now it's solved or there is some other situation but it's good to be honest it's good to be honest and positive okay some examples are coming in ah 0 1 on YouTube has a really nice example I'm leaving because my job duties are my responsibilities I've been reduced so I have fewer things to do and I felt that the job was not using my abilities to the fullest or challenging me enough nice answer really nice answer great great great Chris why always positive why so if you if you come to your interview and you talk negatively about your co-workers or your company your the impression is that you are a negative person and you might be difficult to work with so you want to make it clear that you can communicate with other people you can solve problems and you can like get over issues so of course no workplace is perfect of course but you need to show that you can you can resolve issues and work forward not just staying like a negative mindset so yes if a negative thing happened that's okay but you should show that you learned from that thing so I don't mean you have to only say good things I mean you're thinking you should be thinking in a positive way okay some other examples I missed one on Facebook but but Nick knack or Nick or sorry again has another example I have worked for the same company for many years so I want to try some new things good good good Oh Sharif on YouTube has a good question what if I am fired because of disciplinary issues should I tell them about that yes but you should make it clear what happened like you or maybe late like two hours late every day or I don't know what it was but you should talk about how you fix the problem so maybe the problem was because of maybe personal issues and now you fixed that and now you're ready to start again you made the change necessary so again show how did you learn how did you grow because your interviewer might contact your previous job so you need to make sure you're telling the truth okay let's go to the last section the last section is very brief because it's very open this is up to you but this is a very important thing to prepare for this is the question from the interviewer do you have any questions for me do you have any questions for me so yes in a job interview or in a school interview you get many many questions sure but you should be prepared to ask the interviewer some questions so this is your chance to learn about the company or to learn about the school so for example some things you can ask are like if you want to ask the interviewer directly like what do you like what do you like about working here what do you like about working here what do you like about working here means why do you like this place Eric says when am i starting what do you like about working here so Eric controlled us because has sent a joke response when am i starting but if you want to be a little direct you could say another question is if I if I start working here or rather if I started working here or maybe let's simplify it even what what would be my first project what would be my first project so here we're using what would be unreal situation yes for grandpa there what would be my first project so this makes the interviewer think it makes the interviewer imagine you in the job like okay if this person joins my team his or her first project be this thing so the interviewer can tell you probably this project or these would be your team mates so what would be my first project what would be my first project what do you like about working here and you can ask some specific questions to the interviewer about their experience other questions I don't see any other ones ah someone says is it okay to ask about perks and benefits yeah you can um you kind of have to feel a little bit during the interview what's the feeling of of this part of the first group of questions of these questions if you've made like a nice relationship and you can kind of talk naturally it's a little easier to ask that question but you can ask things like just the company provide health insurance for its employees or maybe what are what's the calendar like for employees is there a lot of overtime you can ask those sorts of things so yeah I'll add those is there a lot of overtime or does sorry it's noisy does the company does the company offer health insurance okay does the company offer health insurance something like that you can ask if you ask too many questions about like paid holidays though it can sound a little not good so try to try to have a little bit of balance there and so generally a good idea yeah so so so gong says should we ask about benefits you can a little bit a little bit maybe you can ask like I said here about health care and maybe other for maybe facilities that the company he has so generally you'll you'll get a little more detail after after the interview like and depending on the case sometimes okay ah oh man I just lost my comments okay that's right all right I have to end anyway uh so I have to wrap up I have to finish up today's lesson there but I hope that you found some good vocabulary and some good many ideas for how to answer these questions I know that interviews are kind of a scary experience whether you're giving the interview or you know asking people questions so we'll end there for today but if you missed today's lesson don't worry it has been recorded so you can check this lesson on youtube or on facebook on instagram please check YouTube or Facebook the Instagram live video is only 24 hours so please check it out elsewhere uh let's see next week we will be back next week's topic is how to report speech how to report speech so how to report speech means using the verbs like say and tell and talk and speak and ask and those verbs that like so many people ask questions about I've gotten a lot of questions about about this topic so next week we're going to talk about reporting speech he said or she said or what did he tell you or I spoke to that person we're going to focus on those speech reporting verbs next week so please join us next week 10 p.m. Eastern Standard Time that is a New York City time please google your local time if you don't know or just set a notification on youtube or on Facebook so please join us again next week to practice those speech reporting verbs that'll be a really good one where we talk about verb differences and don't forget to get your free stuff I showed you the business and school PDFs today yes but we have many more I still have showing you all the new months there are lots and lots of new ones here I have not shown today please check the link below the video on YouTube or above the video on Facebook to see all of the free things you can download from English class 101 dot-com alright so we'll finish there today thank you so much for liking the video and sharing the video we really appreciate it so enjoy the rest of your week enjoy your weekend and we'll see you again next time bye you

Channel: Learn English with EnglishClass101.com

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Keywords: englishclass101.com, englishclass101, learn english, easy, fast, longplay, compilation, fun, simple, learn while you sleep, english exposure, english immersion, get better at english, live, livestream, tv, english tv, american english, british english

Id: yuUfV_HCwSw

Length: 33min 55sec (2035 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 18 2019