Job interview tips
Giving a good greeting isn’t the hardest thing to do in terms of choreography, but emotionally it’s more challenging than you think.
It’s unnatural for animals to go padding off to perform affectionate or passive rituals with other, strange animals. If they did, they’d be dog meat.
So your leakage – that is, body language that gives away what you’re really thinking – is likely to involve signals of fear, which in turn will emerge as embarrassment.
Your denial signs are likely to include:
Looking away as you kiss, hug or say hello
This is called distracted kissing and it looks terrible. Always give the person you’re greeting your undivided attention, even if it’s only for a short space of time. Looking around signals you’ve got other, more important people in your sights.
Dithering
This is the kiss of death to your charisma rating. Put simply, charismatic people don’t do dithering. Once you dither during a greeting you’re dead in the water. You’ll put your hand up then drop it and they’ll do the same, and then you’ll both be waving out-of-sync, floppy arms at one another for the next century or so. Go for your greeting with confidence and be definite about how it’s going to look.
Leaping away after your greeting
Jumping like a scalded cat or even doing a little hand-wipe after shaking will signal rejection.
Bringing your hands up as a semi-barrier
This is a knee-jerk defence signal after the openness of your greeting. Avoid any barrier gestures after you’ve finished your ritual. It’s easy to fold arms, raise a glass higher up your torso or clutch at your bag after doing a greeting.
Careering
This has nothing to do with job-enhancement. I mean careering as in rushing off clumsily after you greet someone. It’s a classic mistake, but it causes disaster. You do your greetings, your brain goes into embarrassment overdrive, you go to walk your visitor to the lift and you forget to take note of your surroundings, crashing into another employee or the reception coffee table or chair. From there, it’s downhill all the way. Move off with dignity; don’t rush, leap or do a mid-air leap, twist and twizzle.
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