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How to rock your interview

Author: Lauren Harris
Posting date: 6/28/2018 1:41 PM

From Faneuil Hall to Fenway Park, along the Freedom Trail, and in the halls of Harvard and MIT, Beantown boasts a cultural cornucopia of American history. Since Paul Revere’s Ride and the Boston Tea Party upset, Boston has been a leader in innovation seamlessly weaving its history into its future. 

With its historical beginnings steeped in dreams, desires, and innovative prowess, Boston has transcended the status quo of the quaint New England town. From music to sports to science, it has listened to its people, its visitors, and kept a pulse on technological advancements to improve lives. Knowing what people want can help you give them what they need.

“People think of innovation and heritage as opposed ideas but I disagree. If we are heritage brands, we stood the test of time because we have [a] tradition of successfully innovating. Innovative companies should aspire to become heritage brands.” – Alex Boren, CEO of Oscar de la Renta

Transcend the Status Quo Using Digital Analytics

Over the last few months, we’ve talked about how to put your best foot forward by boosting your resume with video, the importance of enhancing the basics with technology, and broadening your skillset as data recruitment ramps up its efforts to find top talent. This not only offers great insight to a recruiter, it can also help you gauge how you can grow into your next position. You are your own brand. Every day you innovate – whether you realize it or not – video, apps, search, and more. And you thought those apps were just for games!

Just by reading our blog, you’re learning, growing, as are we as we discover your passions, your interests, and your drives by transcending the status quo. We are, after all, a data and analytics recruitment firm, and therefore derive our own insights using digital analytics. But, just as it applies to retail, finance, media, and other industries, it applies also to you, the candidate.

The Interview

You’ve written your cover letter and tailored your resume. You went the extra mile and added video or showed off your design skills in the layout. You’ve been ramping up your skillsets to give yourself that extra oompf, and now, you’ve gotten the call – the interview. Whether your interview is on the phone or in person, there are few things you can do to rock your interview:

  • Dress professionally – even if it’s a phone interview. It’ll help get you in the right mindset.
  • Smile. 
  • Have an extra copy of your resume and cover letter to help keep you on track during the interview.
  • Be prepared and know the company and job. Have a few well thought out questions ready for the recruiter too.
  • Be specific. Think about how the answer to your question would help you make decisions now and in the role.
  • Ask for clarification. Make sure you understand the role and that you and the recruiter on the same page as to what it entails.
  • If you’ve thought of something you think will add value that’s not on your resume, in your cover letter, or you haven’t yet mentioned, circle back around to it and take this opportunity to speak about it. Think about articles you’ve read, classes you’ve taken, or field experience you’ve learned from for inspiration.

If you want to weave innovation and exceptional customer experience into the heritage brand of a household name in media entertainment, we may have a role for you. Harnham is looking for a Lead Marketing Scientist in the Greater Boston area. In this role, you’ll have the opportunity to take a deeper dive into customer analytics both on and offline to help the business gain understanding into their customer’s behaviors. You can also check out our current vacancies or contact us to learn more.

For the East Coast team please call 212-796-6070, or email newyorkinfo@harnham.com.

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Jumpstart Your Job Search Now and in the Years Ahead

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McElla Pappas

29. October 2020

The Surprising Collaboration of Ada Lovelace, Charles Babbage, and Alan Turing

What do you get when you combine Amelia Earhart with Ada Lovelace? A Data Visualization Engineer ready to work with an aviation industry partner. Reaching new heights and shattering the glass ceiling is the modus operandi for many women, and what better role models than the ladies listed. Creative, free-spirited, pioneering, and well before their time in thoughts and action. Ada Lovelace, now attributed as the first computer programmer saw beyond the automatons of her day. She saw beyond the Berullean language in front of her she was translating.  A poet father and a passion for numbers collided into her thoughts and as we marvel at AI making art, writing stories and music, and winning strategy games, we have one lady to thank. Ada. She might also be called the first Data Visualization Engineer. Don’t you think? Insightful Business Decisions are Key in Collaboration Data professionals are no longer siloed from other departments in business allowing for collaboration between teams. In partnership between both technical and non-technical employees, businesses can be sure they’re teams have a single vision to help realize business objectives and goals. The collaboration between Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage may not have been business-related, but the ideas are the same. He passed her the document and asked her to translate, she made notes, and those notes have made history. Together they created a vision for The Analytical Machine – it exists only on paper, but it’s design, layout, and potential implementation are realized in ways unimaginable to most 100 years ago.Ada’s mathematical prowess was such that she wrote her notes in easily explainable language.She worked closely with Charles Babbage and wrote in earnest to work with Michael Farraday – she reached out to others in her field, some accepted, others didn’t. How Data Helps Inform the Future Whether you use predictive modeling, machine learning, natural language processing, or some combination of each, the data you collect helps to inform the future. We may often lament the old adage that those who don’t know their history are doomed to repeat it, but history has a shining light as well. Collaboration across the ages. Consider this. Alan Turing, the man who worked in Bletchley Park with the Enigma machine, used the notes he found to help him solve the problem. Those notes belonged to Ada Lovelace. The information she set to paper informed every stage of computer programming leading to what we know today as Artificial Intelligence. Machines that could learn and ‘think,’ not just the automatons of her age which had been ‘programmed to perform.’ The Enchantress of Numbers Known as the Enchantress of Numbers, the pioneering Ada Lovelace shares the spotlight with other pioneering women in the sciences. Think Madame Curie, Joan Clarke, even Hedy Lamarr, and of course Amelia Earhart. They weren’t of the same eras, but each of their contributions have added to what we know as the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM). We have a name for it now, but it’s always been around. And the collaborative efforts of women everywhere are growing and increasing diversity and inclusion in many businesses across the world. And at the heart of it all, in the beginning, a surprising and time-defying collaboration began. It set in motion a spark of business intelligence and insight as men and women mentored and partnered for the sake of their vision of the future. Who will be remembered one hundred years from now?  If you’re interested in Big Data, Web Analytics, Marketing & Insight, Life Science Analytics, and more, check out our current vacancies or contact one of our recruitment consultants to learn more.   For our West Coast Team, contact us at (415) 614 - 4999 or send an email to sanfraninfo@harnham.com.   For our Mid-West and East Coast teams contact us at (212) 796-6070 or send an email to newyorkinfo@harnham.com.  

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