Many years ago, before I had children and then started my own online/offline business, the Tallent Agency as an office services provider,
I worked for a temporary office help agency called Kelly Girl.

I purposely took short term assignments to get the most broad range of experience possible.

One of my duties was with an employment agency. I started as a receptionist but soon climbed up the ladder in that department and was the Human Resources assistant.

Both as a receptionist and later as an assistant, people had to get past me to even GET to the interview stage. These tips below can help ease some of your possible nerves on this venture and pave the way to a successful interview.

Preparing for a job interview can be stressful. You need to make a good impression
and you want the job. Don’t despair. Instead, spend some time and energy preparing yourself as fully as possible.

Here are six easy, yet very important ways to prepare for a job interview:

1. Learn about the company you’re interviewing with. Do as much research as possible.
You can find information from the Internet, the company’s website, periodicals that have published articles about the company and people you know that work for or in association with the company.

2. Understand the company’s market, its products and services and its mission.

3. Practice interviewing. If you’re asked to interview for a job, even if you have no intention of taking the job, go to the interview and get practice!

4. Develop a list of questions that you can ask during your interview. Questions could be regarding company philosophy and goals, enrichment and education programs for employees, outlook and future projects, or anything else that you can think of that is pertinent and intelligent.

5. Dress the part. If you can, go to the location of your interview and see what employees are wearing. Then dress in a similar fashion, but one step up. If you don’t have a way to do some pre-interview reconnaissance, opt for a simple suit with clean lines, highlighted by subtle accessories.

6. Prepare the night before by making sure your clothes are ready. Get any information you’ll be taking with you, such as a copy of your resume, ready. Practice your smile, eye contact and handshake (first impressions are important).

To prepare for a job interview, the key is to be knowledgeable, neat and not nervous.
When you use the six steps outlined here, you’ll have gone a long way to ensure
that you’ll do well in your interview.

Before your interview, if you have a case of the nerves, take three deep, belly breaths to calm yourself down. Stop in the restroom before you announce yourself and check your look in the mirror.

Make sure your hair and clothes are neat and that your makeup is in place and not on your teeth. Stand up straight and smile. Walk in confidently to announce yourself.

During your interview, ask questions about the company (without interrupting), and use positive body language – sit up straight, use good eye contact and lean slightly forward to show interest. If you don’t have a ready answer for a question, don’t panic. Take a moment to think, and then give your best answer.

After your interview, be sure to thank each person you have met, including the receptionist. Wish each a nice day. Job interviews can be nerve-racking, but with some preparation, you can ace the interview and feel confident about the results. If you don’t get the job, keep looking and move on to prepare for a job interview with another company.

Do you have any other tips to share? Please let us hear from you in the comments section. Have a happy or horror story about your interview? Share those here too!

Jan Tallent is a Virtual Assistant who LOVES to do editing, proofreading
and transcription assignments along with research, blog posts,
article submissions and social media maintenance!

This article by by Mark Nichol for my favorite writing tips ezine, DailyWritingTips.com , says it all. I am using this great document
with permission from the webmaster.

The Problem with Grammar Check

A couple of years ago, a visitor to this site posted a comment asking
for help. In a Word document, this person had written the sentence

“The nouns and verbs are the main content words in this poem and without emphasis
on them, this poem has little to no meaning.”

Word’s grammar check admonished the writer to insert a semicolon in place of the comma following them.

What?

Errant nonsense, and puzzling advice, at that. One respondent erroneously agreed with Bill Gates, while two people associated with this site validated the original writer’s reluctance to follow Word’s word. But they didn’t explain why the grammar check had recommended this faulty course of action. I didn’t understand it, either, but then I looked a little closer.

As another poster remarked, a human editor trumps a computer-generated one.
Computers may be able to defeat humans at chess, but I doubt they’ll ever beat people
at editing.

Why? They can compute, but they can’t think.

Here’s where Word went wrong:

Read the rest of this article HERE …

The moral of the story? Word’s grammar check, like its spell-check function, can be helpful, but it can also misinterpret your intent as a writer. As the sage says, “Trust, but verify.”

I love the tips I get from this ezine, file all issues and often refer to the ones in my files.

I have noticed in doing my own editing assignments that Word spell and grammar check
and even my Thunderbird email spell checker DO, indeed, occasionally mis-read the intent
of the written document. I am learning when to go by the softwares’ suggestions
and when to go with my “gut” as a former straight A English and Spelling student.

Remember, I am a Virtual Assistant who LOVES to do editing, proofreading
and transcription assignments along with research, blog posts, article submissions
and social media maintenance!

Why not Schedule a Project now?

As an avid reader and a professional proofreader / editor, the thing
that bothers me the most, even more than spelling errors,
is the wrong usage OF a word.

Here are the three I have to correct for clients the most often
and wish were corrected on other web sites, blogs and in books, etc.

The most common one I see is mixing up your and you’re.

As I tell my clients and others I converse with, YOUR is possessive; it belongs to YOU. YOU’RE is a contraction for YOU ARE.

If in doubt, don’t use a contraction – if you are meaning you’re but use your,
people might at least think you just forgot the “e”.

The next one is mixing up they’re and their and there.

If you are shortening up THEY ARE, use THEY’RE.

If you are talking about a place, it is THERE.

If you are talking about something that belongs to THEM, use THEIR.

Frankly, the one that bugs ME the most is using THEY for one person!

It is a very common error and I see it more than anything.
If you are writing about SOMEONE or SOMEBODY, use he or she or at least the general HE.
Do NOT ever use THEM when talking about someone or somebody.

In summation, if YOU’RE not sure about YOUR word usage, have a proofreader / editor check
for you. Spellcheck is great but does not catch these errors.

If several writers are putting THEIR heads together and THEY’RE all getting together at that desk over THERE, THEY will be brainstorming with each giving his or her opinion and input.

Again, if you are in doubt, run your gems of wisdom past a proofreader.

Jan Tallent is a Virtual Assistant who LOVES to do editing and proofreading .

Why not Schedule a Project now?