8 Mind Games Interviewers Play in the Job Interview

1. They will stop their conversation for a while just to hear you talking: 

 

Many times during the job interview it is seen that Interviewers suddenly pause for an awkward silence creating some discomfort for the interviewee, this is because they want you to be in a high stress situation and plead for things in order to feel normal. Mark suggests the interviewers, that in such kind of a scenario where the interviewee feels uncomfortable, he/she is most likely to reveal the facts which you are looking for.2. To get you in the honesty mode, they will ask you questions about your preceding boss: 

 

Keep in mind that if the hiring manager is asking questions specifically about your ex boss, suggests that he/she is trying to psychologically turn you to honesty mode. Moreover, they can ask you to spell your boss’ name at the beginning of the interview to check your honesty. Mark in his book advises the recruiter that asking about the former boss make the interviewee more alert as they tend to think that their former boss will be contacted by the hiring manager so they are most likely to be in a position to spell out the truth.

3. To see that how you will finish the answers they will leave out parts of questions

 
Remember that if the job interviewer asks you to describe a difficult situation which you have faced in your lifetime without specifically asking you what you did in order to fix it, means that they are trying to find out from your answer that whether you are a problem solver or a problem bringer. This kind of question is generally framed to judge the candidate’s real attitude, so if you are a problem solver you will definitely answer the things that you have done to fix the problem, without the interviewers asking. Whereas, on the other hand if you are a problem bringer you will answer the question as it is.

4. Your pronoun usage is judged by the interviewer

 
Most interviewers today evaluate a candidate with his/her pronoun usage.  According to the survey conducted by leadership IQ, good performers in the interview answered in the first person which is 60 percent more than the candidates who declined to perform well.  The survey results demonstrates that low performers answered in the second person using you, your, which is 400 percent more than the high performers.

5. Interviewers tend to check the candidates adverb usage

 

Based on the survey it is seen that low performers are more likely to use adverbs, which is 40 percent more than the high performers. According to Mark the answers that are usually delivered by the high performers are direct, personal, and factual and in the past tense. Whereas, low performers might use adverbs to rise up their answers as the facts do not speak well enough on their own. Moreover, low performers answer the questions 90 percent with negative emotions than higher performers.

6. When you answer a question they will listen to your past tense:

 
The survey highlights that high performers respond more often in the past tense which is 40 percent more than the low performers. Whereas, on the other hand, low performers used the present tense 120 percent more frequently than high performers.

7. They will carefully observe whether you converse in active voice or not

 
People trying to sound smarter often use passive voice , which in turn sound more awkward  than the active voice. So job interviewers prefer hiring people who are more likely to use active voice in their sentences.

8. Usage of words like “ always” and “never” are observed by the interviewers

 
Job interviewers see that how often a candidate use words like “ always” and “never” in his/her sentences as this kind of words are generally used by low performers, which is 100 percent more often than high performers.