Tips for Work Interviews: 10 Evidence-Based Coaching Practices

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Tips for Work Interviews, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Practices that may help

1. Prepare questions you genuinely don’t know the answer to
   Ask about the unwritten realities of the role — the things no job posting reveals.
   Informational Interviews: Career Research That Builds Your Network
2. Listen for what isn’t in the job description
   Focus on the texture of day-to-day work, not the official narrative.
   Informational Interviews: Career Research That Builds Your Network
3. Close every informational interview with one forward step
   End by asking: "Is there someone else you think I should talk to?"
   Informational Interviews: Career Research That Builds Your Network
4. Request the conversation the right way
   A short, specific, no-pressure request gets far more responses than a vague networking ask.
   Informational Interviews: Career Research That Builds Your Network
5. Read assertiveness and responsiveness quickly
   Observe whether someone talks more than they listen (assertiveness) and whether they show emotion openly (responsiveness).
   Social Style Matrix: Adapting to How People Communicate
6. Practise your story before you need it
   Have a clear, genuine two-minute narrative about who you are and where you’re headed.
   Informational Interviews: Career Research That Builds Your Network
7. Informational Interviews: Career Research That Builds Your Network
   An informational interview is a low-stakes conversation with someone in a role or field you’re curious about — you ask questions, they share experience, and no job is on the table. Richard Bolles’s What Color Is Your Parachute? popularised this as a career research tool; the evidence is largely observational and practitioner, but it consistently shows that direct conversation with insiders produces better career decisions and unexpected referrals.
8. Listen far more than you talk
   Aim to talk a fraction of the time; your silence is what makes space for the real issues.
   Effective One-on-Ones, Made Practical
9. Build and work a target list of roles and organisations
   Replace passive job board browsing with active research into specific organisations you want to understand.
   Informational Interviews: Career Research That Builds Your Network
10. Send a meaningful thank-you note
    Write a follow-up that references something specific and reports back on how you used their advice.
    Informational Interviews: Career Research That Builds Your Network

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• I’ve got the conversation booked but I’m staring at a blank page of questions, worried I’ll waste their time asking things I could’ve Googled→
• When I talk to people in the field they give me the polished official version, and I walk away no clearer on what the day-to-day actually feels like→
• The conversation goes great and then it just...→
• I want to message someone in a field I’m curious about, but I freeze on what to even say→
• I’m about to meet someone important for the first time and I have no read on them yet→

Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.