How Breathing Could Land You Your Next Job
“It’s a shame they were so nervous.”
“I think we should give them another chance...Their nerves just took over!”
“For this role they need to manage their stress better.”
Having been in talent acquisition for the past 8 years, I've interviewed thousands of people. I would roughly guess that approximately 30% of candidates don’t perform to their maximum potential during high pressure interview settings. Not because of competence, skill or qualifications… but because of NERVES.
I recently conducted a poll on Linkedin about being nervous during interviews. From these results we can see that out of 682 people, 79% admitted they get nervous during interviews.
These results aren’t very surprising; interviews can be a very stressful experience, and some people do get affected more than others.
“States of high anxiety, fear states, high-pressure environments such as job interviews will affect your performance” (Andree Huberman, Neurobiology at the Stanford University School of Medicine).
Picture this!
You have a job interview for that dream job you’ve been working hard towards.
You arrive in the interview room or video conference room (hoping your internet connection doesn’t fail).
You start over-thinking, second-guessing, projecting yourself.
Subconsciously, you start breathing shallow breaths.
You breathe into your chest.
This automatically sends a distress message to your brain.
Your heart rate increases.
You start sweating.
Your blood pressure rises.
Your interviewer arrives.
You shake hands or wave at the screen.
Your palms are sweaty, your voice is shaky and your brain is fuzzy.
The interview begins.
At this stage, you are not functioning at your fully focused capacity.
All the answers you were practicing the night before have gone.
Your mind goes blank.
Ok, I know, this depicts the worst case scenario. But what can we learn from this?
According to Yale researchers, moderate amounts of stress will actually increase performance. “Increasing awareness of feelings is a goal of emotion regulation and mindfulness-based stress reduction. Thus, there is a need to understand how feelings of stress arise and the brain networks that underlie this core human experience.”
In order to perform better in nervous situations, you have to lean in and actively put yourself in a high level of focus and engagement in order to perform at your maximum potential.
How Can We Manage These Nerves Better?
The usual advice you will get from people is “You’ll do just fine...just remember to breathe!”
That advice is half correct. I would rephrase the advice as: “You’ll do just fine...just remember to breathe from your diaphragm, not your chest!”
Dr. Sheldon Cooper, you might be a Theoretical Physics genius, but your medical knowledge is wrong! Leonard Hofstadter was right, you’re not a real doctor ;) Opposite to popular belief, breathing into a paper bag can cause more harm than good.
Let’s get medical! First we need to understand what happens to our physical bodies in response to stressful interviews, and why we tend to get nervous.
Next time you’re in this stressful situation, try this simple diaphragmatic breathing (also known as Belly Breathing) exercise. This technique means you are consciously breathing through the belly or abdomen, instead of the chest.
Simply put, Belly Breathing is extremely simple and will help you :
- Reduce stress by lowering the effect of the stress-induced cortisol levels (also known as the “stress hormone”
- Lower your heart rate and blood pressure
- Bring your levels of alertness and brain function up
Basic 7 step-by-step exercise
Step 1: Sit or lie flat in a comfortable position.
Step 2: Put one hand on your belly just below your ribs and the other hand on your chest.
Step 3: Take a deep breath in through your nose, and let your belly push your hand out. Your chest should not move.
Step 4: Breathe out through pursed lips as if you were whistling. Feel the hand on your belly go in, and use it to push all the air out.
Step 5: Do this breathing 10 times. Take your time with each breath.
Step 6: Continue to breathe in repetition as long as you want.
Step 7: Notice how you feel at the end of the exercise.
Daily Routines
I practice these breathing exercises as often as I can (or need), but I am not a breathwork teacher. So for more professional daily breathing guided sessions, I highly recommend following: Stuart Sandeman @breathpod Instagram. He performs live, daily morning sessions on IGTV and it’s all free! The community is very active and happy to answer any questions.
This recorded session by Breathpod called “Find your centre & focus” is very relevant to this blog post and a perfect place to start if you have an upcoming interview.
More Advanced Methods
If these are having results and you enjoy it, you can then go into more advanced, daily breathing and meditation routines which will train your nervous system or resilience over the long run. After all, according to this Yale study, the accumulation of stressful life events could cause your brain to shrink ??.
I would recommend researching the famous Wim Hof method. These are more intense psychotropic breathing techniques.
Alternatively, try sudo sleep like states and letting the mind drift exercises, as experienced in activities such as meditation which can be restorative. They will reset our ability to perform better in very taxing brain functions. Headspace or Calm apps being the most popular options.
Let me know if you have any other tips or tricks on how you stay calm and perform to your maximum potential during stressful situations!
I look forward to your thoughts below.
Good luck with your interviews!
--
Aurelien Arnoux is a Senior Technical Recruiter at MessageBird based in the Netherlands. Aurelien has extensive experience building global end-to-end talent acquisition solutions for tech giants, scale-ups, startups and consultancies.