Tips From Interim Executives on How to Use Body Language to Positively Impact Your Interview

When communicating with someone, it’s not just the words that are important. The listener also pays attention to your gestures, tone, and body language.

By portraying things such as your body language in a negative way, then important conversations, such as an interview may not go your way, even though your answers were perfect. Today we will go over some body language tips you can use to positively impact your interviews.

Seating Posture

Normally when people sit on chairs, they either slouch or sit slanted to the left or right. This portrays poor confidence. Instead, you should stick your back all the way to the back of the seat, and sit straight. By doing this, you are portraying confidence to the interviewer, as your body is now open. Once in this posture, its important not to change your seating position every few minutes, as this is a sign of nervousness. If you do need to change your position, try to scoot up from the back of the seat, and sit straight as well.

Eye Contact is also an Aspect of Body Language

Proper eye contact is important to be confident. Now you don’t want to stare at the speaker the whole time, but essentially keep your eyes on their face whenever they are speaking at least. When you speak, then you may look around, as it shows that you are genuinely answering the questions, as you are actively thinking by looking away for a few seconds.

Don’t Fidget

Avoid touching your face, rubbing your hands, or fixing your hair. These are all a sign of nervousness, as it shows you aren’t confident about yourself. Some people like to use  a hand gesture whenever they feel the need to fidget. It sounds strange, but it actually works, as you are trying to block/ignore that unconfident response from your brain by doing something else.

There you have it, 3 simple tips you can use not only in interviews, but in general conversations with people. The key takeaway from these tips is to be confident. Confidence is shown mainly through body language, so using these tips on body language will help you portray your confidence.

To learn about how Cerius Interim Management can help you and for more information on interim executives, please visit our home page by clicking here.