Update.
Sadly, I failed the partner interview for Kingston Smith. Apparently my answers weren’t concise enough.
It’s a bit of a tricky one as like I said, he brought up my poor grades and the fact I re-did a year a fair bit during the interview. Naturally I explained about the fact that I had to redo the year due to a medical condition but he was clearly a little worried, asking if this was ‘still a problem now’ and so on. Obviously if they decided against hiring me on that basis then it wouldn’t be something they’d say in the feedback, so its difficult to know how much of that was my fault. I’m also unable to know whether it was a case of them still having several applicants for the position and going with a ‘safer’ option, or if I really did come off badly to the point where I was just a complete no-no.
Nevertheless, I’ll take his point on board and try and improve the length of my answers in future. I am a little unsure where I’m going wrong though - as like I say, I’ve passed every single phone/video interview since I started posting here so it does seem to be an issue thats unique to the face-to-face part. I may well invest in some interview coaching moving forward.
I suppose one clue lies in the fact that when I went on the first date with my girlfriend, she said I came off as really nervous (this used to be a source of banter but she was dead serious!) yet at the time I honestly didn’t feel like I did too bad a job of hiding my nerves and thought I’d covered them up pretty well! so I guess it goes to show that you can’t always be sure about these things.
Maybe I just need a female interviewer I can charm!
No denying I’m disappointed. I’ve gotta hold my hand up on that one. I honestly thought I’d done enough to get the job.
I like to be fairly pessimistic (expect nothing/get nothing/pessimist never disappointed etc.) but its a bit of an England/Iceland defeat where there’s just no escaping the fact that you obviously expected to get a result.
Anyway, got a fair few apps where I’m still alive so I’ll do my best to press on.
EY: Phone interview on Wednesday 7th
National Audit Office: Phone interview Weds 14th
Lloyds: AC on the 15th
RSM: Have passed all the stages up until the AC but apparently they’re very crowded so I haven’t been given an AC date.
BDO: Still waiting to be put through to the video interview
HMRC tax: Waiting for test results - didn’t think I did a great job of those though. They were weirdly short as well (like 7 questions for numerical/verbal).
Nationwide: Through to AC - will hear about that around January or so apparently.
