Even if English isn’t Your First Language, You Absolutely Can Still Ace Your Interviews!
Interviews are not language exams. You don’t need perfect English to excel in a job interview.
🏎️💨 MISTAKES WON’T SLOW YOU DOWN
Native speakers make mistakes all the time in real conversation and certainly in interviews, so don’t focus on speaking “perfect” English. It’s not the purpose of the interview.
Some of the best interviews I’ve conducted have been with non-native speakers. Despite many grammatical errors and imperfect or sometimes confusing mispronunciation, I was very impressed with the candidate.
They articulated with good detail about their experiences, responsibilities, and processes
They spoke confidently and with a sense of ownership over their role
They were enjoyable to converse with
A number of my clients are not native English speakers, so when we work together, I advise them to spend time really thinking through their work anecdotes and getting very familiar with them. Read on! ⬇️
📚 PREP YOUR STORY BEATS*
If you’re nervous about your language skills and being able to communicate effectively on the fly, I’d strongly recommend doing more prep work and practice rather than leaving it to improvisation and chance on the day of.
🈸 Words are hard. However, you don’t have to come up with everything yourself. Choose words from the job description to help ensure alignment with what they’re looking for.
💻 Use technology. If you’re not quite sure how to phrase something in a native or natural-sounding way, ask ChatGPT how they would answer a question to get some inspiration.
You cannot use this response word-for-word because it’ll be too generic.
You MUST swap out any examples for your own, use words that you’re more comfortable with, and make it your own.
✍️ Write them down. Bring them to life on paper or the screen.
*👉 If you’re wondering what I mean by story beat, check out this article here on ‘How to expertly prepare to impress during your next interview.’
🎻 PRACTICING YOUR STORY BEATS
Now that you know what you want to say, you have to be able to say it during the interview. To an extent, you’ll want to memorize it—not so you can deliver lines like an actor, but enough that you’re familiar and comfortable with what you want to say how you want to say it. An interview is a real conversation, so it can be unpredictable. Memorizing a bunch of lines may backfire on you if things deviate from the questions/responses you’ve planned out.
🔊 Say key lines out loud. “Key lines” would be things that include numbers/stats/accomplishments you want to highlight or any particular phrasing that you really like and want to deliver as is.
🔁 Say them again. And again. Getting back on a bike after many years is possible thanks to muscle memory, right? That’s what you’ll build by repeatedly saying your key lines.
🙈 Now without looking/reading. Reading something repeatedly best exercises your reading skills, not your recalling skills. You need to be able to recall your key lines.
Although I’m a native English speaker, I practice what I preach above, and as a result, I’ve been told more than once that I’m the best interviewee they’ve ever met. Then I got an offer. (Not always though.)
IN THE EVENT THEY ACTUALLY DO NEED STRONG LANGUAGE SKILLS
Generally speaking, most jobs don’t require fluent language skills. However, certain ones do require a higher proficiency in order to perform the role well. Those roles include interpreters, customer service, emergency responders, etc.
If that’s the case, you will want to invest more time to honing your language skills in order to thrive in that role.