<p>I just graduated college with a engineering and physics degree and am still looking for employment. I recently had an initial interview with siemens and now I am invited for a second interview. THe position is clinical consulting associate and I would love to have this job because the company is large scale, excellent pay and the position is related to IT which I am planning to do my grad studies on.</p>
<p>But I am still not sure what exactly clinical consulting associates to (lmao). Are they like sales people visiting customers, or do they work at an office improving a product. Can someone help me before my interview next week.</p>
<p>As a consultant, I can tell you with confidence that we have no idea what we do! … we will steal your watch and then bill you when you ask us the time.</p>
<p>But seriously, consulting is a huge industry that can be all sorts of things. If the job you’re looking at is related to IT, you will probably be implementing computer systems… for those who don’t know, enterprise system implementation is a hell of a lot different than installing iTunes! You spend weeks gathering information about clients’ business practices and rules, and then you spend more weeks (or months, or even years) designing, developing and testing a system before training your clients on how to use it.</p>
<p>Many consultancies believe in “face time,” which means that you can expect to travel. Fortunately, I work at a company that places a little less value on face time, so I travel probably ten times a year (which sure beats the road warriors who are away 40+ times a year). Realistically, expect travel at least monthly, if not more often.</p>
<p>To tell you the truth, though, companies realize that people have no clue what jobs they apply for, and that’s OK. When you go to your in person interview, you will interview with someone in HR, someone at the director level, and likely someone at the manager level (i.e. a couple steps above associate and a couple steps below director). Try to find out certain information about your daily life - how much travel is required, what kind of responsibilities you will have, etc. “Consultant” means a LOT of different things!</p>
<p>thank you so much for the detailed reply chrisw. THe interview is tomorrow and I am very nervous. I have one more question. What is your travelling like? is it in-state, out of state, or international?</p>
<p>Travel varies wildly. Most of consulting is client work, so it all depends on the clients that sign with your particular company. Distance is a factor, but not a big one … you can really go anywhere. Now, some people are going to be traveling weekly - this means that a realistic expectation is to be on the road Monday to Thursday nearly every week - while others travel almost never.</p>
<p>For me particularly, I’ve only been with my company for a couple years, and I don’t have to travel very much; when I do, it’s all over… so far I’ve been to clients in Massachusetts, Indiana, Texas, and Pennsylvania (I’m based outside of Philadelphia), and my coworkers have been to clients all over the world.</p>
<p>Make sure you get the business cards of everyone you talk to today, and make sure you follow up at some point between 6 and 30 hours after you interview. Good luck … feel free to PM me if you would like any post-interview advice (believe it or not, your actions post-interview can have almost as much to do with your hiring decision as the interview itself!).</p>
<p>Yes, exactly. I have harped on post-interview actions for a long time because they are much more important than people think. Everybody writes a follow up email or letter after a serious interview (i.e. for a career job, as opposed to a short-term, wage job, like being a waiter, bank teller, store clerk, etc), but most people half-ass their follow ups.</p>
<p>When I was interviewing senior year, here are a few things that I did…</p>
<ul>
<li>During the interview, I withheld at least one question I wanted to ask, and I included it in my follow up email. It was never a general question that I asked to everyone - it was very specific, based on the conversations I had with each interviewer.</li>
<li>I sent a follow up to everyone I spoke to, including the receptionist at the front desk - you never know who the “important” people are, and sometimes the front desk is asked about their first impressions of an applicant, so it never hurts to say hello to everybody.</li>
<li>If I didn’t hear from a company for more than a week, I followed up with a phone call, obviously to ask if a decision had been made but also to reiterate my interest in the company and the job.</li>
</ul>
<p>The whole point of post-interview actions is to make those with power to hire remember who you are. You don’t act as formally as you did during the interview - while spelling and grammar is crucial, your tone can be more informal.</p>
<p>When I got my first offer of full time employment, the hiring manager who extended the offer actually told me that I was less qualified than several of my peers who had applied but that my follow up emails and phone calls showed enough soft skills that they were willing to work with me on the hard skills and that they had no qualms selecting me over more qualified applicants.</p>
<p>I was just curious because I recently got rejected for a job. I thought I did well enough to get to the next round but I think it may have something to do with my thank you letters and what I wrote inside them. People will tell you that no one really reads those things but I wonder if it was the thank you letters that got me rejected. </p>
<p>The process went like this:
I interviewed in person with 2 people
I sent thank you emails to both that night
Got a “thanks we’ll be in touch” type response from the main hiring manager
I waited for about 2 weeks with no update and I sent an email to find out about the status of the position and to reiterate my interest.
Got a rejection email saying that they went with other candidates</p>
<p>Did your interviewers respond to your questions in the thank you emails?</p>
<p>You’re not going to be overlooked because of your thank you letters unless they are hilariously bad. Many people will tell you that nobody reads thank you emails, but that isn’t necessarily true.</p>
<p>If you are doing your job right, you will read all of your emails unless you know that they are not important. When you are interviewing applicants, you want to invest some time in them because you don’t want to get crappy new hires, which will waste your time in a more serious fashion. So when you get a thank you note, you’ll probably glance at it and that’ll be that, since there is no useful information in the note. With that said, when a thank you note has a question in it, you may be inclined to respond.</p>
<p>In my experience, a little more than half of the people I wrote emails to gave me a response, and it was always a response to the question that I asked. If it does nothing else, it means that regardless of when I was interviewed with respect to when hiring decisions were made, that interviewer had to think about me again just by reading the email, and by putting more effort than a simple “thanks for your time,” I was able to give some additional information about myself.</p>
<p>HI chrisw, thanks for the replies but unfortunately I saw them after sending my thank you letters etc. </p>
<p>I had my interview last Thursday and although I was a nervous wreck I thought I did ok (not excellent but ok). They said they will give me feedback either on the same day or on Friday since they are interviewing more people on Friday. However, I didn’t get a call or an email on Friday so I was wondering if I should call them back tomorrow.</p>
<p>Also, do companies contact candidates that they reject first or hire first?</p>
<p>I prepared so much for this interview and don’t know what would happen if I didn’t get this job because right now my life is kind of hanging on me getting this job. So thank you so much for all the input and help.</p>
<p>If companies are interviewing multiple candidates with the intent of filling a specific number of slots, then they are definitely going to contact the people they want to hire first - if they don’t get their top choices, they don’t want to turn away a perfectly good second choice. And if their top choice has multiple offers or is waiting to hear from another company, expect that person to take their time in giving a response; this means that people who are borderline will need to wait, potentially quite a while.</p>
<p>As for your situation, don’t worry about it yet. Companies often tell you they’ll get back to you within 48 hours, and they rarely do. Wait another few days, and follow up with them.</p>
<p>It is slightly worrisome that you would see this job as make-or-break. You should be applying left and right, especially in the consulting space. Continue to apply to new jobs until you accept an offer.</p>