Replaying your worst interview answer on a loop? You're not alone and it probably says less about you than you think. In this episode of Inner Work, Dr Marianne Trent explores why we ruminate over interview mistakes, the difference between a poor answer and a poor candidate, and how to use post-interview embarrassment as information rather than punishment.

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© Dr Marianne Trent

Have you ever left a job interview and then immediately thought, why did I say that? I have. One awkward answer, sometimes more, can suddenly become the only thing you remember. But does that mean you've blown the whole interview and does it make you a bad fit for the job? I'm Dr. Marianne Trent and this is Inner Work. Hi, welcome along to Inner Work. I'm Dr. Marianne Trent, qualified clinical psychologist. Now believe me, I quite enjoy an interview these days. I've done them live on media, on TV. I've done them on the radio. I've done them as pre-records for the TV. I've done them obviously in person for jobs, jobs that I have got and jobs that I haven't. And whilst I enjoy them now, and I've always felt like I've done reasonably well at interviews, it doesn't mean that all of them have been astounding.

It certainly doesn't mean that I haven't dropped some utter clangers of an answer. In my main episode this week about stress, I gave you a little unique bit of insight into a cringe worthy thing that I said at interview. So do check that one out if you haven't already, but I'm going to give you another massive clanger as well. So stay tuned for that. So of course, when we've dropped these clangers, or even if we think we might have done reasonably well, our brains are going to focus in on that post-interview rumination, which is just like chewing the cud over and over again. And if you're anything like me, if you have dropped an interview clanger, your brain might well keep serving that up to you on replay as a little bit of added cringe. And I guess what it's trying to do there is it's trying to make sense of it.

It's trying to check out all the variables, trying to help you process it. But of course, we don't know what other people would've thought about that clanger. I mean, let me share another example of when it's gone really quite badly for me. So I was going to an interview as a qualified psychologist going for an interview in a service for what's called an 8A role. And all it kind of really said about the role was that it was in IPU 10 to 17. And I was already working in children family services in what was called a CAMS service at that time. And so I though, oh, it's an inpatient unit for 10 to 17 year olds. Okay, that sounds really pretty appealing actually. And I though that my job skill set would be transferable from working from community services to an inpatient service. And so I kind of didn't really think anything of it really other than to prepare some really nice kind of case study examples and obviously reference Children's Act and any kind of relevant legislation for children, young people and families.

And was doing this interview and I think at one point in the interview I even said, "Is it possible to see the inpatient units?" And they said, "Oh, well, they're not on site." And I though, "Well, that's an unusual service because I'd worked in forensic services and inpatient units before and the team would be on site where the patients are." And I though, "Well, that's odd. You'd have to get in your car and visit the inpatient units. That's going to make things tricky." Anyway, upshot was, I didn't get that job, but they liked me. And then I asked for feedback and they said, "We feel like you're ready for an 8A role, but we do think that you're maybe more suited to children and adolescent and families work." And I said, "Oh, but can I just check because I thought this was a children and adolescent and family role?" And they said, "What?" I said, "Well, it's IPU 10 to 17.

Isn't that an inpatient unit for 10 to 17 year old?" No. They said, "That means integrated practise unit 10 to 17." And I said, "Well, what does that mean?" And basically to cut a long story short, it was the care cluster model, but nowhere on the application form, nowhere on the job description, nowhere on the person specification did it explain what an IPU was or what the different IPUs were. And so I just assumed, I guess, saw what I wanted to see and thought it was that, but it wasn't. So my first advice for interviews is just make sure you know what the terms are, make sure you know what you're applying for, because then you're less likely to get these ruminative clangers come back to you. And they said, "Oh, that makes a lot of sense." So I offered the HR department feedback that they should be explaining what IPUs are, and that did then appear on their future recruitment information.

But you can't assume people know everything, especially if you don't already work for that trust. So I don't think that clanger was all my responsibility. But even though we might have that real cringe worthy moment, we are of course going to give the negativity bias means that we're going to pay more attention to that, but we might forget the really great 20 answers that you did give, but that one just makes you shudder. And so he's attracting that negativity bias. It might not mean that you're still not appointable, just that that was a cringe moment indeed. What we don't want to happen is that we become kind of catastrophizing about our own incompetence. Just because you've messed up a question or you've messed up an answer doesn't mean that you're not appropriate for this role or a similar role, that you're a horrendous person and should never apply to a job again or that your current company would shudder if they knew how bad you'd performed.

It doesn't mean any of those things. It just means that under pressure, you didn't have the answer in that moment. And that's all we can say about that. But of course we understand why that incompetent catastrophizing happens because we might be comparing ourselves to others, especially if we learn that they have been able to appoint from that interview. Sometimes you'll even get told, "Oh, you were our second choice." And you're like, "Oh, great. What feedback could I take to help make sure that I'm number one next time?" But believe me, I got told a number of times I was second choice, including an example where I did get a job, they'd said that I was second choice, but the good news was they'd been able to secure another role, so they were also offering me a role. So yeah, it's not always terrible to be second.

So it's not always as bad as you think it's going to be. Sometimes we keep our fingers crossed there might be more than one role. Of course, you don't really have that much control in an interview either. It's not a normalistic situation. And of course, if you are the centre of attention focus, you might then get in your own head a little bit. So this is not the best example of you at your most relaxed, perhaps in a meeting with a supervisor or manager that you feel comfortable with and able to be comfortable within your window of tolerance. We're always going to be probably a little bit up on the hyperarousal because of course we need a little bit of that. We can't be super laid back in interview because that might not help us to actually get to the level of attainment where we can give a good performance.

But sometimes we will fluster ourselves and realise that we're not breathing, we're speaking a million miles a minute, and that's never going to help you to be on your own side. So if you notice that that was the case, then you perhaps could use that for future feedback to be like, "Right, I'm going to take some breaths. I'm going to slow things down and just try and make sure I'm able to be conscious of which thoughts I am speaking aloud and how I'm coming to put together my answers for questions." So yeah, we really do want to solidify that idea that there is a difference between a candidate who gave a poor answer to a question versus a poor candidate, because the two things are not necessarily the same. And in fact, you can give a whole doozy of a whole interview where you just feel like it was horrendous, but it doesn't make you a bad candidate.

When I sat my driving test for the third time, I made a mistake a roundabout and instead of going on the second left, which was straight over, I went left. And so I though, oh, I've messed up now. I've failed another test. But when I got to the end of the test, I'd actually passed. And I said, "Well, how did I pass when I went the wrong way?" And the examiner said, "Because you indicated left and then went left." So even though you thought you'd not followed the route because you didn't, and it meant that we had to kind of adopt a slightly different route, you then drove really well. I think I only got a couple of minors. So because I'd taken the pressure off myself because I thought I hadn't done very well, that then allowed me to thrive and ultimately pass. And so it might be that if you've kind of given a little bit of an answer that's made you cringe, maybe that might help you to then think, well, how bad can this get?

And then optimise your performance throughout the rest of the interview. What can you do after an interview when you feel like it hasn't gone very well? Well, I will always, even whether I think an interview has gone well or not well, I will tend to jot it down as a bit of a reflection afterwards, the things that I thought went well, the things that I thought needed improvement, the bits where I felt I was really proud of myself and the areas for learning. I think this can be really helpful, especially when it comes to trauma processing because it allows you to go from A to B to C to D to E to F rather than A to P to S to V, through the highlights of the bits that felt really awful. So what we're doing when we write an account is we're kind of helping to process, knock the edges off, and it then can mean that we stop re-sitting the awful bits of the interview and we get things balanced up a little bit better.

What about that embarrassment? What about that cringe? I think it can be helpful to use that as information. That can show you that there was a knowledge gap or that you weren't able to retrieve the knowledge.Maybe like me, you got a bit of perimenopause or maybe you were just really tired or you were hungry or you were stressed because you couldn't find a parking space and you're worried you're going to be late. For whatever reason, you had an inability to get out an answer which might have scored more highly, and that can be information for the next time you have an interview. So maybe I'll make sure that maybe if it's a distance away, maybe I'll see if I can stay overnight nearby or I can make sure that I leave early enough so that I'm getting there in good time and I'm parked or make sure that I Google any of the complicated terms I'm not a hundred percent sure on so that every time over time, it minimises and reduces the chance that I won't be the best candidate for that interview next time.

So we're really using that embarrassment as information, not punishment. Similarly, we're going to employ some self-compassion. And if you'd like to learn more about self-compassion, who better to learn it from than Professor Paul Gilbert, who I was very lucky to speak to for two episodes of the podcast, episode 200 and episode 201. So do check those out when you have a chance. So self-compassion is a really, really important thing to adopt, especially if you are striving for any particular careers, because ultimately we'll need to stay on our own team. It's not going to be helpful if you're constantly tearing yourself down, criticising you, belittling yourself. Ultimately, that's not cool. That's not keeping on your own team. So compassionate reframe might be, I was under pressure and as a result, I answered imperfectly or not to the standards I usually would hope to strive for. And that doesn't make me an idiot, that just makes me a human.

And again, another compassionate reframe was like, had I known that IPU 10 to 17 wasn't an inpatient unit, then I would've done something differently. I would've done the interview differently, but also I do have that sense of what's for you won't pass you by. That's my own kind of personal sense. And I never really wanted to work in psychosis. I don't even know that I would've applied for a role in psychosis. So it ended up working out well because I ended up getting an interview in a different IPU, three to eight. I think I would've got a clue that that was maybe not three to eight because who has children as young as three in inpatient unit unless it's a maternal mental health unit or a family unit? But yeah, 10 to 17, I though, well, that's convincing, that's doable. But yeah, I did ultimately get that job in the other service that I actually was a really good fit for and really enjoyed.

So there was no harm done. And whilst it is cringey right now, sometimes it can be useful, right? If these things hadn't happened to me, I wouldn't be able to share them with you and then that wouldn't make you feel better about yourself, right? Validation is important. It matters. And one day you might be able to tell a story about your cringy interview moments and you might even get the job anyway. Will you let me know in the comments, whether you're watching on Spotify or YouTube, you can drop me episode specific comments. Let me know what your interview horrors were and what sense you made of it. They can't be any worse than mine, right? I've got another one too that I've remembered, but I'm trying to keep this video short. So maybe let me know if you'd like another video on interviews and I can cover that one there.

So you're absolutely able to have one or two bad interviews without it meaning that you're a bad person and that you're not a good fit for the role. And you're also allowed to learn from your experiences without turning it into evidence that you're not good enough. So stay on your own team and I'm here for you. If you are happening to watch or listen to this because you're an aspiring psychologist and you'd like to up your game in interviews, why not consider accessing the aspiring psychologist membership, which you can do from just 30 pounds a month with no minimum term. We have over four and a half years of replay content, including interview replay content, and that's at the time of recording. By the time this is live, it'll be even more. So dive in. Let me know if you've got any questions. Come and follow me wherever you are on social media.

I'm Dr. Marianne Trent. I think you'll really enjoy those episodes I did with Professor Paul Gilbert, which are episodes 200 and 201, details in the show notes. And I look forward to bringing you the next episode of Inner Work wherever you get your podcasts and on YouTube from Wednesday at 8:00 PM UK time. Stay kind to yourself. I'll see you soon. Take care.