ENVIROlocity™

By: Neha Bhalla

It’s no secret that the past 18 months have caused an  upheaval in the hiring process, from Zoom interviews to increased turnover. With that, the questions that recruiters are asking have changed too.

In the environmental industry especially, recruiters not only care about your technical skills, but also your reaction to COVID-19, your personal opinions on climate change, and how much you value diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI); so don’t get caught off guard if you get asked a situational question about how to handle a workplace conflict or how COVID has affected your perspective on work-life balance. 

Here are some questions you might get about COVID or DEI at your next interview: 

1. Would you be willing to work in person for this role?

There are a few variations on this type of logistical question that you might receive, depending on if the company is working remotely, in person, or adopting a hybrid system. Answer this...

You’re excited — but also nervous. 

You got the interview, now it’s time to get ready.

13 quick tips to help you prepare for your upcoming job interview.

Before the Interview Tips:

1. Research the company

Awaken your inner stalker. Do some research into the company you’re interviewing for. 

Look at the company’s website, check out their LinkedIn, Google them, Bing them, read news articles, and keep researching until you have a thorough understanding of the company’s culture, mission, and values.

2. Dress for success

Making a good first impression is EVERYTHING.  

Research the company’s dress code and make sure you dress accordingly. You don’t wanna be wearing basketball shorts when everyone else is in suits. 

3. Prepare a few relevant short stories

Don’t just regurgitate what’s on your resume.  

Instead — highlight your skills with short stories explaining how you got them, why you...

Does anyone want to give me a job? Anybody? Hello?

Does asking for an informational interview feel a little like begging to you?  Experts keep saying that informational interviews are getting harder to get yet those same experts are encouraging career seekers to keep asking for them. Let’s put an end to the informational interview, shall we? Or, at least, let’s define them better.

The most difficult aspects of asking for an informational interview are:

• Being unsure who to invite
• Being unsure what to say in the invite
• It just feels awkward 

I believe a lot of that comes from the use of the term “interview”. My suggestion is that we stop calling these things informational interviews as they have come to be known - attempts to cheat the systems and get hired without waiting for a job to be posted. It is for that reason, people are becoming less and less likely to accept your invitation. 

Instead of asking the VP of the environmental firm...

You’ve got an interview coming up for an environmental position. How do you prepare? What will they ask you? How can you stand out?

90% of the mastering an interview is standard issue, meaning it would apply to any job in any industry.

Things like dressing appropriately, making eye contact, and following up. What you need to know is the kind of info you can’t just find by searching “how to prepare for an interview?” You need to know that other 10%, the 10% that relates directly to environmental positions.

Here are some environmental interview specific example cases and recommendations for how to handle them: 

Stop waiting for the experience to fall in your lap and go out and get it.

Past experience

It’s common to think your college didn’t prepare you for that first job because the reality is that they didn’t. You know what permitting is but you haven’t done it. You understand the concept of water monitoring and sampling but you...