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A few simple tips for a video interview
More and more of us are having interviews on line. Even as Covid-19 related restrictions begin to ease, video interviewing is likely to remain the norm for many for the foreseeable future. So as the Internet loves a list, here’s a list of tips for maximising your chances of success on a video interview.
1) Do a camera test and make note of your surroundings
It amazes me how many people seem to be starting video calls without having checked the angle of their camera first, that they are fully in frame, that the light is adequate and the background not distracting. There are plenty of applications on line that will allow you to test a webcam (or often you can do this within the calling app itself). Poor preparation in this area could give the impression that you are ill-prepared in general. If you can, aim for a simple backdrop and environment that will allow you to sit up and look alert (at say, a kitchen table).
2) Make sure everything works
Not only test your camera but also test your microphone, your headphones/speakers and probably run another test shortly before the call to make sure everything is still working (I didn’t heed this the other day and commenced a call only to discover my camera wasn’t working, fortunately it was a simple fix of disconnecting and reconnecting but it was a little embarrassing). If it’s an important call, not assuming that everything is working okay is a good policy.
3) Have a backup plan
Your Internet drops out half way through, there’s a power cut, your PC crashes… there are numerous reasons that a video call can go awry, so make sure you have a phone number for the interviewer so you can call them in those circumstances. Make sure your phone has enough charge and it makes sense if possible, to install the video calling app on your phone as well so you have an alternative to a PC/Tablet if necessary. If you are using your phone for the video call, have a landline back up if you can.
4) Don’t be afraid to speak up if the technology isn’t working well enough
If you can’t hear the interviewer very well, or the signal keeps dropping make sure you let them know. If not, you could appear to be disengaged or may mishear a question and answer incorrectly. People are understanding of technical issues particularly if they are beyond your control and it is better to reschedule or switch to a phone call than not representing yourself well through no fault of your own.
5) Use a PC and high-quality webcam in a static position if you can
Moving your device for a better angle is fine once in a while but holding your phone, balancing it or constantly changing the view can be off putting. In order to get the best widescreen view you may need to sit further away from your phone, which then presents issues with the microphone picking up your voice. Therefore, if at all possible, use a decent webcam and a PC. Good webcams are relatively inexpensive and can make a huge difference.
6) Use the medium to your advantage, notes, screen share etc.
You would not take or refer to notes in a conventional face to face interview but in a video interview you can! You can keep some key reminders of points out of view of the camera and in your eye-line to make sure you raise everything you feel you need to, as well as some bullet points on how to handle tricky questions. But also, you can demonstrate engagement by having information at your fingertips that you can screenshare. Statistics, example work, reference letters and I’m sure many other resources could be shared with an interviewer. Having documents ready to share and being confident to do so, shows a level of research and preparedness that will impress most interviewers. If you are going to do this then make sure that any applications you have open are ones that you are comfortable with an interviewer seeing, just in case, and that your desktop background is inoffensive. This is also another argument for using a PC instead of a phone as screen sharing is likely to be easier.
7) Consider using a headset
Yes, they might impact your immaculate hair styling but they do minimise the risk of sound feedback. A headset will ensure that you are able to hear the interviewer well in most circumstances and that you can be heard well over its built in microphone.
8) Dress appropriately
You almost certainly don’t need to be as sharply dressed as you might for an interview in person but it’s best to not be too casual either. Video interviewers (or recruiters) certainly will not mind you clarifying dress code prior to a call although I think in most cases this really is not necessary. Just pick something simple and relatively formal and you’ll be fine.
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What reassurances could employers give to potential candidates during the pandemic to encourage them to move?
There is very limited recruitment happening at the moment. For many sectors of the economy a reduction in headcount growth may continue for months and possibly years. However, there are professions where the impact of Covid-19 has been limited and companies may be in position to recruit new people while the pandemic continues around us. Whilst much recruitment has been put on hold even for companies that have experienced minimal financial impact, there is a tipping point where the need for new staff overbalances the cautiousness in respect to hiring. This could present an issue.
There is an expectation within the broader recruitment industry that once companies start recruiting again, finding candidates for those positions will be easier than it has been before. And of course, in certain sectors that will be true, particularly where there have been significant volumes of redundancies. But industries where redundancies become common are not what I am considering here. In sectors where people have generally hung on to their jobs there is likely to be much more reticence for potential candidates to move positions and no newly redundant people to fill new vacancies.
A contact of mine raised the following question recently and given that he made an excellent point (he usually does) I thought I would try and address it. What reassurances could employers in historically candidate short sectors; largely financially unimpeded by Covid-19, do to entice reluctant potential candidates to move? I have a few suggestions.
1) Get rid of probation periods entirely
As employment rights are very limited for the first two years of an employment contract, even in normal circumstances probation periods are largely unnecessary. They can have a psychological advantage – that both parties can test the water for the first few months but in practice they do not really change a great deal except where particular additional benefits are awarded after a probation period. But even in those circumstances the cost to the employer of these benefits tends to be fairly minimal so the value is more symbolic.
Employers can still rid themselves of ineffective employees for very little due cause in the first two years of employment irrespective of a probation period. The only likely significant impact a jettisoning of probation period might be is in respect to a notice period i.e. that a new employee is on a one week or one month notice period during probation then an extended notice period after this. It’s pretty rare that candidates leave a position during probation so one could offer the same extended notice period from day one that typically applies after probation. An employer could allow a week or two ‘bedding in’ period when someone first starts in case someone leaves immediately (but don’t call it probation).
2) Don’t have benefits offered based on timed served.
Offering the same holiday allowance, life insurance, pension etc. from day one that long termers receive would give reassurance that a firm is fully invested in new hires. It would also likely not have a significant financial impact with the exception of possibly corporate non-performance related bonus schemes.
3) Bonus guarantees
If an employer pays a monthly, quarterly or annual bonus particularly if it has a performance related pay element then guaranteeing some of it until a new employee can realistically earn it could be advantageous i.e. a pro rata annual bonus for the number of months worked in a financial year and based on the average bonus paid to other fee earners.
4) Fixed term contracts
Another possibility, not without risks would be to offer a candidate a fixed term contract instead of a permanent one with the proviso that it will revert once the contract is up. It mitigates the risk from both sides but also means you would be liable to pay a salary for the entire contract if a position ended early. The same could also be achieved with a little less risk with a permanent employment contract with a long notice period, such as six months from day one.
5) Unequal Notice Periods
This would be a real show of commitment where you offer a potential employee less notice if they decide to leave than you would give them if you ended the job. I am not a contract or employment lawyer but as far as I am aware unequal notice periods are lawful but uncommon. This is largely because they are more at risk of being deemed to be unfair but if it favours the employee then I would imagine they would be okay.
6) Joining bonuses
Because they’re a one-off measure they are sometimes not as successful as people might think but a significant bonus for starting a new position might help. In my experience joining bonuses are usually most effective when someone is choosing between two offers and not when you are trying to persuade someone to leave their current firm as people rarely consider moving positions entirely for financial reasons. I would suggest that a joining bonus should not be the key piece of ammunition but may help as part of a range of measures.
7) Strong flexible and part time working policies
In a post-covid world, an employer’s attitude to flexibility is going to be crucial. If you’re strong on this you will have a significant advantage. Having enjoyed the flexibility, if not the lack of social activity, of home working for months, many employees will be reluctant to go back to working in an office every day or having a rigid working day. This will likely be a reason why people look at leaving employers - the prospect of losing, post lockdown, the flexibility they now have. Clear and active facilitation of home-working could be great signal of intent such as providing a phone, laptop and broadband subscription as part of a job offer and having incredibly flexible working practices.
8) Short-term increased holiday allowances or sabbaticals
Given that going on holiday will be difficult for most, if not all, of 2020 then adding, for example, an additional ten days’ holiday allowance to be used over 2 years could be a method of enticing people, allowing them to catch up on vacations lost. Likewise, an unpaid sabbatical of 4-6 weeks could be offered for one-two years of service which would be much earlier than is currently usual but could be particularly attractive for people whose plans were cancelled this year. It is a policy that could aid staff retention as well if it is extended to the entire workforce.
And that’s it. It’s not an exhaustive list by any means there are, I’m sure, plenty of other measures that would help. It makes sense to think about this now before there are pressures on recruitment so you are ready to persuade people to join your organisation when you need to.
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The Lockdown has ended. Now what?
Alright it hasn’t yet but what will happen when it does? I have a few thoughts on the job market. I’ve done no research on this, so the article is entirely anecdotal but built on a great deal of experience of societal economic issues. I work across the financial and intellectual property law sectors as the owner of a recruitment company and I will make reference to both whilst at the same time hopefully keeping this fairly general. Points are not in order of importance, more just in the order I have thought of them.
The government has completely underestimated the value of small businesses in my opinion.
This is critical. At the moment, support for small business is lacking. Government loans (from many sources I’ve read and anecdotal evidence) seem to be hard to get as many of the banks are adding obstacles which arguably shouldn’t be there for businesses to receive money. And, even when applications for loans are successful the money can take a long time to come through. The furlough scheme and small business grants are a welcome stop gap but if, for example, the director(s) of a small business who are paid by dividend cannot make a similar claim to 80% of personal income then they are likely to have to make employees redundant when furlough ends to financially survive. There are numerous very small firms of patent attorneys and accountancy practices who may struggle and many small businesses support these firms with revenue that will likely reduce. Or, worse, these otherwise viable business will fail due to a lack of government support that will have a consequential impact on any business they buy from.
What happens when the furlough scheme ends?
Assuming that restrictions end at the same point as the furlough scheme ends (currently the end of June), on day one companies will be faced with a substantial cost to the bottom line in respect to returning employees who have, whilst being furloughed, not been generating any income to compensate. This will of course apply to wide a range of sectors but particularly I imagine any sales environment, especially those with a medium lead time such as automotive sales, property and recruitment. I would expect a huge second wave of redundancies in June or July when the furlough scheme ends. This would be further compounded by only a partial end of lockdown with no extension to the scheme.
A much wider pool of sectors will take a considerable time to recover than is currently envisaged.
There are obvious casualties, hospitality, theatres, cinemas, airlines but there are so many other sectors that will be impacted significantly that are often unaccounted for. Marketing spend will continue to decrease, sales of equipment may be put off, non-essential office repairs held, revisions to IT systems postponed as well as web design, so many sectors will be affected by companies cutting back. And sectors that serve these industries will be equally impacted (such as recruitment consultancies for marketing professionals).
Multi-sector businesses will have a better chance of survival.
IP firms and accountancy firms are likely to be okay for the most part, or at least as a collective the sectors will be fine even though there will be corporate casualties. If firms are too reliant on a particular client or a particular sector, they may be vulnerable but a typical firm of patent attorneys works across a wide range of industries so what they may lose in engineering they will gain in biotechnology. Likewise, an accountancy firm with a strong insolvency practice is a very solid proposition. But there may be specific areas where jobs are still at risk as the cost of them cannot be carried by a firm, trade mark attorney departments may be more vulnerable (albeit there could be some positive impact in work as a result of Brexit that may mitigate) as would the more consultative practices within accountancy firms.
Jobs in industry in central services will be lost.
Massively increased volumes of work will be outsourced, I think this is more of a risk for IP than finance as companies will look to outsource much more patent work but finance departments will likely be reduced too. Finding a job in industry will be increasingly difficult. In general terms this would include all other shared service departments as well – marketing, HR/Recruitment, I.T. etc. After the economic difficulties caused by 9/11 I remember many of my friends who worked as in-house recruiters losing their jobs and I would expect something very similar now.
It will be a great deal more difficult to find a job but it may also be very difficult to find people for jobs.
There will be an initial period where more candidates are on the job market as a result of redundancy. But this pool of candidates will quickly dissipate. Some will leave their sector entirely and pursue other careers, some will find a new job and some may be out of work for a long time. Moving at a senior level will be difficult as from a hiring company’s perspective the additional expense may not be worth the risk but that may mean that competition for less experienced staff will increase significantly. For patent attorneys that will mean newly/recently qualified attorneys, where work has grown but a firm doesn’t wish to risk the additional cost of a more experienced hire, likewise for newly qualified accountants for private practices. This surge will be further complicated by many potential candidates taking the ‘better the devil you know’ approach and being cautious about moving positions.
Therefore, dependent on what a requirement is, it may be extremely challenging to source people. Acting quickly could be crucial when you are in a position to assess the impact of lockdown on overall business turnover. Waiting to hire could set back growth for years if it becomes increasingly difficult to persuade people to move. This could also have a consequent impact on salaries – in 2010/11 as the IP sector was coming out of the impact of the economic downturn there was a short term bidding war for patent attorneys with an electronics background at newly/recently qualified level with some receiving as much as 50% above what was average market rate at the time. At the same time, it was very difficult to place salaried partners with similar technical expertise as firms saw this as too risky.
Graduate/Entry Level Jobs will reduce.
Certainly, in the IP sector, firms have learnt from the 2008 financial crisis in the sense that the dramatic cutback in trainees back then created demographic gaps that the sector is still suffering from now but there will still be lower graduate intake. In more general terms, it will be extremely difficult being a graduate in 2020 or from 2019 and quite likely into 2021 too. Graduate schemes will be paired back, they will be financially easy to cut and redundancies inexpensive, so many who joined in the last year or so may find that they lose their jobs. For 2020 graduates, notwithstanding the issues of degree scoring, the competition for positions will be intense and remuneration may well decrease. Graduates will have to be far more flexible in what they require of a position and those prepared to relocate will be at a distinct advantage.
Is there hope for the future?
The article has been cathartic for me but I appreciate also pretty depressing. I don’t want to end with platitudes or false reassurances - life may well not go in the direction you anticipated. That might be a bad thing, you might be chasing what you could have had if not for this disaster and that is a perfectly reasonable response. Your life might have been better in different circumstances. But, we can’t change it. That doesn’t mean you have to accept what you have now, for many of you there will be a route to better and if you can think in terms of improving your circumstances and not trying to capture what was lost then that might be helpful. People can give you choices, keep an open mind, keep making connections and opportunities will present themselves. These will not be the opportunities you expected, not the ones you wanted or hoped for but better than what you have and that has to be worth something, hopefully a great deal.
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