The Way of the Wall Street Warrior

CHAPTER 6Ace the Personal Bake-Off: Interviewing as Performance Art

I've said it before, but it bears repeating: Connect. Connect. Connect. It's all about connections: who you know, what you have in common with the interviewer, and how you can help make crates of cash for the company. That's your mission. Got it? Now prepare for your personal bake-off like your life depends on it.

Show Time!

Before you get a formal interview, try for a pre-meet. An informal opportunity allows you to continue gathering intelligence and learn about your audience. Although this may not seem like a lot of time, fifteen minutes can feel like fifteen hours if you're a bore.

The first-round interview is the most straightforward, but riskiest, stage. Typically, it's done with a single interviewer, so if someone peed in your interviewer's Cheerios, you're screwed. On the flipside, if their favorite NFL team won the night before, or if they closed a deal they've been working on for months, chances are they'll be in a great mood! Regardless, don't forget to strut like a peacock and stand out.

Your first interview will likely occur at your school. As an alumnus working at Jefferies, I was part of the Wharton team of about a half-dozen interrogators. We'd travel to Philadelphia and interview approximately 300 hopefuls on campus. After a few days of interviewing, we'd eliminate most of them immediately.

Imagine yourself in the place of your interviewer: in a windowless room listening to a succession of ...