Lessons learnt from an interview

The title of an analyst is arguably the oft-debatable job scope in the commercial arm, which brought an interesting twist to a chat I had a few days ago with an interviewer who called me.

Let me share with you my small setback this week.

To set the tone for the rest of my article, let me first clarify that I never claimed to handle anything related to FP&A (financial planning & analysis). My resume is attached in my profile for your reading pleasure - constructive criticisms are welcome! However, for some reasons, the interviewer narrowed down to these five questions:

1. How do you do cash flow management with cost phasing analysis?
2. What sort of financial and non-financial data you prepare for your shareholder updates?
3. What information do you include in your pitch decks for fund-raising series?
4. How did you do your business case while you were in The Association?
5. How did you do financial analysis as an auditor to identify the changes in trends in the financial statements?

He isn't wrong in asking these questions at all, but considering that I spent a bulk of my time in creating and maintaining a single source of truth and creating dashboards (data visualisations), I panicked as my mind rummages through the stack of "books" in my so-called mind palace, only to find my morale plummeted from Mount Everest moments later. So I am writing this article to share with you and I hope that we don't encounter this in future!

Lesson 1: Be prepared to answer "how do you do this" questions for every single point you've written in your CV

Yes, I wrote these points in my CV, although I don't spend a bulk of my time doing them, I should still be able to express myself clearly when asked (aka pressured) during interviews. I have taken it for granted that I have answers to everything I have written. Very wrong, was I. Here's something I discovered: If I cannot answer that when I read my own CV, I need to rewrite those points.

Lesson 2: Be prepared and make your stand if the questions are out of your "bound"

After discussing with my colleagues back at work, we laughed about our experiences and I learnt to make my stand for my future interviews when I couldn't answer the questions. One of which I learnt is, "I have spent most of my time writing codes and creating a single source of truth in my company, which has been a huge challenge in the past. I'm sorry that I am unable to explain more to what I have done pertaining to this task you're asking me."

Lesson 3: Be assertive, and understand that some questions may be out of your expectation

At least, it shouldn't be out of the scope of your "question paper" (aka job dossier for the position you're being interviewed). Here's a response I learnt from another friend, "I'm sorry. I am a bit confused with the questions you're asking me. It sounds to me that your questions are very FP&A centric, but it isn't what I understand from the job description given to me. Can you please clarify how are my experience dealing with those tasks related to the role I'm being called for interview?"

Lesson 4: Keep your cool and view your interviewer as your student; explain to the best of your knowledge

In the heat of interview, at least for me, it is often easy for me to falter when I did not expect the question from the interviewer. I've learnt to view this as how a student asks me a question. There may be times I have a perfect answer, and there may be times I don't have a clue at all. A good policy to have is, "Seek first to understand, and be understood later."

Later, the interviewer told me that there is a difference between reporting and analytics; where analytics would mean to have action points whereas reporting is a mere show & tell (hinting that has been what I've been doing for my company). I actually agree with him on that premise. After discussing this over with some fellow analysts, I realised that if the reports created are self-sufficient and are analytical in nature, the action points should ultimately be owned by the business unit leaders.

So, if in future, sometimes like this comes up to me, I should be able to answer them better, by providing examples and highlighting how his questions are not entirely applicable to my current experience.

Lesson 5: Remember the painful and embarrassing moments in your interview(s); improve from there!

Yes, I know, it is easier to forget or at least avoid these moments by burrowing your head under the sand. But you gotta remember, we all make mistakes every single day in our lives, some are big and mostly small. A mentor taught me in the past that mistakes are meant to be life's teachers to us. By listening to what they are meant to teach us, we will surely rise up stronger!

So, back to the interview...

Needless to say I panicked and faltered. I don't think there would be a third round as I find our objectives aren't complimenting each other. But I am thankful for that eye-opening experience! If there is anyone here who is willing to advise me on my CV, or to chat about data model set-up (Excel or Power BI), I am all ears!