Last Sunday’s entry sparked a very interesting idea from Shawn Callahan. It’s in the comments to the Sunday entry, but I wanted to bring it to the forefront in hops of getting the thoughts of others. Here’s what he said:
Here’s an that I would love to hear your thoughts on. As a job candidate, in addition to telling your story and eliciting the story of the company and its people from the interviewer, should they also be trying to trigger stories about themselves by doing something remarkable (in that the interviewer tells that story) in the interview?
I was chatting to Terrence Gargiulo a few weeks ago and we were referring to this triumvirate as a leader’s narrative triple threat (sounds a bit threatening however) much like an actors triple threat is to dance, sing and act (al la fellow countryman Hugh Jackman).
Is this something a candidate would want to do or is it too dangerous?
And here’s how I responded:
Shawn [actually I misspelled his name in the comment … oops], I think you are onto something. I think that — within reason — you’ve suggested an excellent idea.
The question is: What is the appropriate “doing something remarkable?”
It could be giving an unexpected presentation in the interview. Or doing such comprehensive research on the employer that the candidate demonstrates extraordinary insight into meeting the employer’s challenges. Or telling the interviewer a story that makes a profound emotional connection.
I would love to hear other ideas for remarkable things candidates could do so the interviewer tells stories about them.
Shawn and I then exchanged a few e-mails privately in which he suggested trying to solicit examples of remarkable acts that have so impressed interviewers that they have told the story to others. I told him I would post the question on LinkedIn Answers, which I finally did yesterday (here).
But let me throw the question open here as well: Have you ever observed something a candidate did in an interview that was so remarkable that you told others the story? Or have you perhaps heard such a story told by an interviewer?