Think about the kind of impression you want to convey to your interviewer or hiring manager: experience, ability, and confidence. If you’ve been paying attention to me, you’ve got the experience and ability portions down: a winning resume, a brag book, a 30/60/90-day plan, and high-quality references. Your confidence comes out in your physical presentation, your body language, and what you say and how you say it.
Good communication skills are essential. Sounding even remotely uncertain of your ability to do the job you’re interviewing for (and do it well) is an interview killer. No employer is going to hire someone who isn’t even sure himself if he is capable, or who promises to bring inferior communication skills to the job–especially in any kind of sales. What phrases convey uncertainty?
I think
I hope
I would hope that…
Hopefully,
If
Try
Maybe
Sometime
With luck
If possible
Possibly
You don’t want to “hope” to handle this job, and you don’t want to “try” it. You want to do it.
There is no try, only do or do not. – Yoda
Confident speaking is an interview skill that I coach candidates on all the time. It's a great idea for you to either tape yourself so that you can see where you might be going wrong, or get some feedback from either a career coach or a friend. (The same goes for space fillers such as "um," "uh," "like," or "you know.") Phrases that convey uncertainty often sneak into your everyday conversation, but you don’t want them in your job interview.
Peggy McKee is the owner and founder of PHC Consulting, a medical sales recruiting firm well known for providing top candidates for sales, management, marketing, and technical support positions in the biotech, life science, laboratory, and diagnostics industries for the last 10 years. In addition to placing candidates in some of the most prominent healthcare companies in the country, Peggy also provides custom career coaching to jobseekers in all areas of sales. Her website is at http://www.phcconsulting.com.