Focus as much as possible on your skills, talents and strengths.  If an interviewer takes the discussion into areas about things you aren’t good at doing, gently bring it back to what you are good at.  Always focus on your strengths or positive actions you’d take to strengthen yourself in areas where you might be weak or less skilled.

A question you’ll like have to answer during an interview is “Where do you see yourself in five years?”  This is a tricky question for many people and difficult to answer.  The best response will always be related to the particular industry of the job you’re applying for.  Recruiters don’t want to hear about your aspirations to be a best-selling novelist in five years.  They want to know about your goals in their business, so be sure your answer reflects this.

Interviewer’s love to ask people “What do you think is your greatest weakness?”  So be ready for this question by thinking about what you believe to be a job-related weakness and then what you do or can do to compensate for it.  Always tell the interviewer not only what the weakness is but what you do to make up for it as well.

Phone interviews are becoming more popular than ever.  When you’re interviewing by phone, you want to make sure that your home will be quiet while.  Get someone to take care of the kids.  Turn off the television or radio.  And what ever you do, don’t make a trip to the bathroom or light a cigarette!  Remember that any noise in the background will be easily heard by your interviewer.

A favorite question that interviewer’s use is the standard “Tell me about yourself.”  At a glance, it seems simple enough to answer, but it isn’t—and it’s one of the questions that trip up more people than any other.  Why?  Because it’s so open-ended that people either stammer around and essentially say nothing of any import or they say too much that is also unimportant.  Prepare an answer ahead of time.  Keep it simple, to the point and as job-related as possible.

Turn off your cell phone.  Even better, leave your cell phone at home or in your car.  Few things turn off interviewers and recruiters than to be in the middle of an interview and have the interviewee’s cell phone ring.  Don’t risk forgetting to turn it off.  Leave it somewhere else for the duration of your interview.

If you’ve been fired, you need to have an explanation ready before you get to your interview.  As this is an uncomfortable subject to discuss, it’s a good idea to write out a brief answer to the question of why you were fired and then practice saying it in front of a mirror.  The more you practice, the more easily you’ll be able to discuss the issue with ease.