When you are face-to-face in an interview, confidence may be the ultimate relationship builder because of the way it so smoothly puts the other person at ease, often without them even knowing it.
From a psychological perspective, when confidence is perceived in another person, it is rarely because the other person is projecting confidence deliberately by drawing attention to themselves. Gloating is usually perceived as being arrogant, not confident. Whereas a confident person doesn’t feel the need to assert themselves unnecessarily.
This is the impression that we are going for in the next four steps on how to project confidence during your interview.
Step 1
Dress For Success
This goes beyond simply looking well put together and dressing nicely. Take the necessary steps to make sure that you look and feel your absolute best for the interview. Don’t leave any room for feeling self conscious about anything. Even if it’s the slightest body odor or how your breath smells.
Situations that call for you to project confidence are rarely the occasions to take chances with how you look. Confidence does not overtly draw attention to itself, but this is precisely what would happen if you gamble on your appearance.
Step 2
Keep Your Hands Below The Line
You can’t project confidence if you’re fidgety. To help you keep fidgeting to a minimum, establish an invisible line somewhere around your torso and keep your hands below it.
Be careful not to become too preoccupied with remaining vigilant about this line. The point is to appear relaxed and unaffected, not rigid or self-conscious. If you typically have problems with fidgeting, practice your “line exercise” in situations that don’t require you to project confidence, like around your friends.
Step 3.
Establish a Focal Point
Looking someone in the eyes may be a way of projecting confidence, but after a while that might make them uncomfortable, and it could be downright creepy. When you are responding to questions or listening to what your interviewer is saying, choose a spot on their face to focus on, somewhere near their eyes. You want to mimic looking in their eyes and appear to do it with consistency, without actually doing so.
Step 4.
Stand By What You Say
As soon as you make a statement, make it a point (internally) to stand behind what ever point you’ve just made. In other words, when the period appears at the end of your statement, cut yourself off from making any additions, amendments, corrections, or qualifying conditions. Self-assured people project confidence when their statements are said with conviction.
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Career