It is normal to be nervous during a job interview. Even seasoned professionals feel a few butterflies before they meet with a Hiring Manager. The key to a successful interview is to keep your nerves from hurting your performance by staying positive. Luckily, there are some tips you can use to keep yourself thinking and feeling positive during the interview:

Visualize Your Success

Visualization is a trick that athletes use to stay positive and focused. Instead of worrying about the outcome, you visualize your success, whether it is winning a marathon, or sinking the winning basket. Much like a basketball player can imagine a three-pointer going in before the ball leaves their hands, you can visualize yourself walking out of a successful interview.

Trust in Your Prep

You have spent a significant amount of time prepping for your interview. You need to rely on what you learned and crafted during your prep. It can be tempting to try and come up with “better” answers on the fly, but those can leave out valuable points and those things that make you stand out to an employer (what we call  ”). Overthinking can also make you doubt yourself during the interview, which can affect your positivity, and your stress level. Just stick to what you have prepared and you will be fine!

Embrace Your Nerves

Hiring Managers expect you to show some nerves during your job interview (you are human after all)! Sweaty palms will not disqualify you from a job, but letting the nerves get the best of you can. Trying to actively fight your nerves during your interview is going to make them more noticeable, and ironically, make your nerves worse. Instead of trying to fight the nerves, embrace and accept them. Stay positive, stick to your prep, and just accept that it is okay to be nervous.

Keep the Conversation Positive

Hiring Managers may ask questions during the interview that can veer into some negative territory. They may ask about negative experiences you have had, or times in your professional career where you failed to meet goals. While you should answer their question, you should also nudge the conversation back to a more positive area. For example, “What is your greatest weakness” is a question that can seem negative, but you can turn it into a positive, while still staying on track:

“I have a tendency to get too focused on the task I’m working on to the exclusion of other tasks I need to accomplish. I find that by using a combination of To Do lists and effective prioritizing, I am able to get everything done and be very productive.”