[silvergray545]

I'm gonna have my first professional interview next week for an internship at an accounting firm. I know there are many professionals on this board and I was wondering if there are any tips you guys can provide me with.

[VinnieAces]

dont fart at the end for a very long and awkward time

[Blake]

Skittles is all growed up

[Pcemkr]

Why work when you can already afford a $60k car and Chipotle?

[EmmettBrown]

Originally Posted by Pcemkr

Why work when you can already afford a $60k car and Chipotle?

because paying for and having a $60k car means you're successful in life. OP just retire

[BTM]

Be able to talk about yourself and why you want the position, unprompted, for 20-30 seconds, providing a brief description touching on a few qualifications you have and reasons why you think you would fit well. Keep in mind that the employer wants a symbiotic relationship - they don't want to hire you for something you don't want to do, just because it's a job, or a resume builder, or whatever, even if you'd be great at it. I'm sure you're good at something you don't particularly like doing, same concept. You are interviewing them as well - it has to be a fit. Sorry if that's a little vague.

Depending on how formal the interview is, they're either going to ask you directly, or sort approach it through conversation, but in some way, you're going to have to explain overcoming an adverse situation. Don't necessarily make something up, but use this to focus on your problem solving abilities, pragmatism, logic, or whatever you wanna call it. Focus more on the "how" than the "what." The what is irrelevant, as long as the situation qualifies. Describe your thought process, and even branch out to include a few different situations you've applied it to, showing that you not only can overcome adversity, but are self aware of it, and how to apply it in different situations.

[da1nonly]

google 'interview questions' and try to compile a list of common interview questions, both general ones and ones that are specific to the industry....i always go over these question before an interview and answer them myself, this way after you do it once you start to come up with different stories that you can incorporate in the answer. Of course you don't want your answers to sound rehearsed but you also don't want to leave out any good information in your answers about yourself or about how you dealt with a situation in the past.

make sure you know your resume well and be able to go over the highlight in your resume in a few minutes, most times they're too lazy to go over it which surprises me

also if you don't know the answer to something don't lie. Since you mentioned accounting i'm sure there a few thousand questions he could ask you that you wouldn't know unless you had experience/studied that topic specifically. Nothing will kill an interview faster than the interviewer catching u bull$hitting him/her

and always have a few questions ready to ask at the end

an interview is basically you marketing yourself, so if the interviewer doesn't ask you questions that allow you to present yourself in the best possible light you got to try to steer the conversation towards what makes you stand out.

[Pcemkr]

Originally Posted by EmmettBrown

because paying for and having a $60k car means you're successful in life. OP just retire

Clearly sarcastic.

[E90SoFlo]

Talk about good things, stay away from the bad, dress to the hilt and give him a nice big firm handshake.

[Blake]

Originally Posted by Pcemkr

Clearly sarcastic.

Nothing, and I mean nothing, gets past you.

[MadDog]

Originally Posted by Blake

Skittles is all growed up

+1. Good Luck!!

[adobeee]

I've interviewed with a few investment banks and some of the most common questions (besides all the technicals) I got asked were:

1) Why investment banking? (For you: Why accounting?)
2) Tell me more about yourself (Don't talk about where you were born, what you like to do, etc. Focus on what drives your interest from high school/college)
3) Why you? Time to differentiate yourself! In my case, most people I was competing against with were just as hard working and just as motivated to get into the industry. I won my current offer by talking about my interest in business stemming from my dad's plastics business and relating it to personal and career development when I was at school.
4) Hobbies

[Seminole]

Originally Posted by silvergray545

I'm gonna have my first professional interview next week for an internship at an accounting firm. I know there are many professionals on this board and I was wondering if there are any tips you guys can provide me with.

Which firm?

I interviewed with the Big 4 when I was in school. My take aways from each:

EY: Interviewed with a Manager and it was a comfortable interview. They asked the normal type of questions (tell us about a time you did X) and questions based off stuff on my resume. We also just had some random chit chat about other topics.

PwC: Interviewed with a Partner. He seemed really uninterested in being there and actually asked me if I could hold on for a minute when his son called him during our interview. Just asked standard questions off a sheet that was provided to him.

Deloitte: Interviewed with a Partner. He told me within the first minute that due to the economy they were mostly only on campus to show face and the chances of getting an office visit were next to none so we talked about football the whole time. (I was interviewing in 2008 just after the collapse of Lehman and Bear Sterns so everything was going to shit).

KPMG: Interviewed with a Manager. He had a list of standard questions but said, "I hate these dumbass questions because all you guys do is bullshit me anyways. Let's talk about whatever you want". So we talked about cars and football.

The results were:
Office visit with KPMG, EY, and PwC. As the partner said, I got nothing from Deloitte. PwC suprised me the most considering the guy seemed like he couldn't give two shits that I was there.

So now for my advice... Most firms have some type of pre-interview get together the night before (at least at FSU they did). I would 110% go to this and find out who you are interviewing with and try to chat them up. It makes it a billion times easier to talk to them in the interview when you already know them, plus it will give you a chance to feel out if they will be a by the book interviewer type or more relaxed. Be prepared to answer questions about anything on your resume as far as job experience/activities/grades go. Make sure to have a few stories ready to go about how you've assumed a leadership role, preferably in some type of group project type invironment.

Structure your answers in the following format:
1) What the problem was, I.E. hard group project with tight deadline.
2) What you did to address the problem.
3) What the outcome was.

Have a few questions prepared to ask them as well. I always hated this part because my only real question was are you giving me a job and how much are you paying me. But for an internship ask things like "what type of work will be expected of me as an intern", "what types of jobs will I be working on", etc.

Also, go in relaxed and loose. It can be stressful, but just be yourself. If you think you can get away with it, find something you have in common with the interviewer and get them off topic and discuss that with them. The interview will be much more laid back and they will probably remember you a lot more than just some person who they asked standard questions to.

Good luck.

[solefald]

We interviewed some dude for a junior sysadmin position a few years back.
That dumbass took a phone call from his GF during the interview, turned his back to us and proceeded to have a 10 minute conversation with her.

A month later he send us an email calling us stupid motherfuckers for not giving him the job.

I shit you not.

[Uber V8]

Originally Posted by solefald

We interviewed some dude for a junior sysadmin position a few years back.
That dumbass took a phone call from his GF during the interview,looked at us straight in our faces and proceeded to have a 10 minute conversation with her.

A month later he send us an email calling us stupid motherfuckers for not giving him the job.

I shit you not.

like a BOSS.

[in5ane_3]

Originally Posted by Blake

Nothing, and I mean nothing, gets past you.

Easily the funniest post on this board in the past ~3 months.

[adobeee]

have you tried glassdoor.com?

[TMNT]

Originally Posted by FwdFtl

like a BOSS.

No...you mean like a bitch.

[Echo M3]

Practice, practice, practice. If you're on campus, take advantage of your school's resources and go to your career center, where they will often video tape mock interviews and critique you for free. Or, have a friend or a relative ask you mock questions. Think about how you will answer certain questions, but avoid rote memorization - don't sound like you are reading from your resume, for example.

Good luck!

[H2]

When I'm interviewing someone, one thing I try to find out is why they want to work for my organization. This is a different question than why they want the job. Generally, a person can get a similar position at multiple companies. But why my company? I also want someone who will stick around and stay awhile, and be able to grow with my organization.

[Oregano123]

if you have top notch solid credentials, you do not want to come off as a "flight risk." i learned that the hard way

[Bmoney2K4]

just act mature and give a smile here or there.