Interview tips

We understand that interviews can be a nerve-wracking experience. But remember, it’s a two-way street. We want your interview to be a positive experience, and for you to perform to the best of your abilities.

LPPA interviews consist of either a one or two stage process. They will be conducted online by Microsoft Teams, face-to-face in our Preston office, or a mixture of both.

There will normally be a panel of two interviewers and notes will be taken during the interview. Our interviews are competency based, so we will ask you questions that require STAR answers (see guidance below), to understand your specific skills. We will also ask some behavioural questions, which help us to gain insight into your personality and understand how you would fit into our organisation/Team. Depending on the role, we may also ask some technical questions too.

We will always ask if you need any reasonable adjustments to allow you to fully partake in the interview, please do let us know if this is the case.

As part of our recruitment process, we also use online psychometric assessments through our provider Saville.

Ensure you have done your research on the company. There is a lot of information on our website to help with this, as well as internet research.

Decide what you will wear to make a great 1st impression. Our dress code is smart casual and should be appropriate for an office-based role. For example, this could be a shirt. smart top or polo shirt, trousers, smart jeans or a dress or skirt.

Read the Job description carefully, including the personal specification – Pick out the key skills and competencies highlighted in here. These are the areas you should expect to be questioned on.

For each one, prepare an example of where you have displayed that attribute / element / behaviour – you will need to demonstrate examples of how you have dealt with situations using the STAR technique.

An example of a competency question could be… ‘Describe a time in which you had to adhere to a tight deadline.’

Your examples should be formatted in a STAR response:

Situation, Task, Action, Result

Formulate it into a short key point, making sure you include how you achieved the result and how your actions addressed the initial situation and task.

Make sure you emphasise what YOU did and not WE (the team)

Be prepared to talk about yourself! – A common interview opener can be ‘Tell us a little bit about yourself.’

This is your time to summarise who you are / what you like to do / what type of person you are. Don’t be negative about past/ present employers – if something didn’t work out, find a positive way of communicating that.

Make sure you have prepared questions to ask at the end of the interview – demonstrating that you have some excellent ones of your own that really starts to show your initiative and passion for the opportunity.

Its always good to take a notebook / have these questions written down so you can refer to them – if the interviewer has answered all your questions, it shows you did have some prepared and you can say this, and they can see you had prepared.

LPPA’s top tips

Use a variety of different examples from your experiences from previous roles

Be truthful and don’t exaggerate

Be prepared to talk about yourself and why you want this job

Prepare notes and questions for us – it’s great to have to refer to during your interview

Think about the tone and speed of your voice, body language and non-verbal communication – its not just what you say but how you communicate it.

For an online interview

Ensure you have the technology set up and you have your meeting invite to hand. Make sure you are in a quiet, well-lit space, where you won’t be interrupted, and that you are prepared with your notes and have a copy of the job description.

If you get chance, it’s a great idea to do a practice interview with a friend or family member to see how you appear on screen and get comfortable talking on Teams with 2 people to interact with, and to check that your IT works.

Please don’t log on more than a couple of minutes early – The interviewers will log on at the appointed time.

For face-to-face interviews

Ensure you know where you are going and allow plenty of time to get there allowing for delays in traffic / public transport.
It’s great to do a practice run to find our office if you do get the opportunity. Please do not arrive too early or be late and don’t forget your notebook.