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Career Storytelling for Job Interviews: Insights From Talent Acquisition Leaders
Career Storytelling for Job Interviews
A résumé tells an employer where you have worked and what you have done. Your career story helps the interviewer understand how those experiences have prepared you for what comes next.
Effective career storytelling for job interviews connects your experience, accomplishments and strengths to the opportunity you are pursuing. It helps you move beyond a list of responsibilities and communicate the judgment, adaptability and perspective you would bring to the role.
In this episode of What’s Your Story?, Hurst Williamson speaks with talent acquisition leaders Elisa Abner-Taschwer and Lauren Baksh about what makes candidates memorable, where interviews commonly go wrong and why preparation matters. They also explore how personal brand and storytelling influence the way an employer experiences a candidate.
Career storytelling for job interviews helps professionals communicate more than the roles listed on a résumé. A clear career narrative connects experience, accomplishments, and strengths to the opportunity ahead. In this episode of What’s Your Story, Hurst Williamson speaks with talent acquisition leaders Elisa Abner-Taschwer and Lauren Baksh about what makes candidates memorable, why interview preparation matters, and how personal brand shapes hiring decisions.
Why Career Storytelling Matters in Job Interviews
Disruption happens every day across the corporate world. As employees, we experience reorgs, layoffs and acquisitions, and as disrupters ourselves we move cross country, chase ideas and challenge norms. But amidst all the disruption we all experience, some of us seem to thrive in times of turmoil.
These are the communicators who have mastered the two secret arts hidden within corporate disruption: learning how to establish a compelling brand and build an intriguing career narrative. They are skills that take time to perfect, but they’re the differentiator factors between those who are cast adrift from disruption and those who prosper from it.
We believe in this strongly…and it’s why we wrote our latest book: Disrupted! How to Reset Your Brand & Your Career.
But don’t just take our word for it. On this episode, Hurst Williamson is joined by 2 Talent Acquisition specialists to share their perspectives on career storytelling, the trends they see every day and what makes a job candidate successful…or forgettable.
More About the Guests
Elisa Abner-Taschwer is the Talent Acquisition Manager at FORUM Credit Union in Fishers, Indiana. She has over 30 years of HR experience, primarily in Talent Acquisition. Elisa lives with her husband of 27 years and their Mini Golden Doodle, Max.
Lauren Baksh, M.Ed. is the Senior Manager of Talent Acquisition at Graphic Packaging International. She has over ten years of talent management experience in the manufacturing industry and currently supports her team with the design and execution of holistic recruiting experiences for US salaried positions. Lauren lives in Atlanta with her husband, two daughters, and two fur babies.
Career Storytelling Show Notes
- Careers are no longer on a straight and narrow path.
- People will change their job/career 7-10 times throughout their career.
- Interview determines if there will be a next change in a person’s career.
- What does it take to make a job a candidate memorable or forgettable?
- What percentage of people are good at interviewing?
- Less than 5%
- Not as many people are good at interviewing that think they are good at interviewing.
- Those that think they are good at interviewing usually lack authenticity.
- What goes wrong in an interview?
- Lack of prep – didn’t know much about the company or the interviewer.
- Lacked confidence – unaware of body language.
- Lacked impact – didn’t understand their experiences well.
- Prospective employee must be interviewing the company as well as being interviewed by the company.
- Preparation will help a candidate seal the deal.
- Good story tellers have better impact in an interview.
- Virtual vs. In-Person Interviews
- Same challenges exist in a virtual interview as an in person interview.
- Candidates see virtual as more informal and have a low awareness of their setting and background.
- Fewer people ghost virtual interviews.
- When prepping for a virtual interview, consider it the same as if you are going to meet with someone – dress professionally
- Potential employers encourage prospective employees to ask questions about the attire and the platform being used to the interview
- How many resumes for a potential position are reviewed?
- Far too many
- 20-30+ resumes for an open position
- 30-50 resumes
- What really makes a candidate stand out?
- Individuals who understand the organization and the culture
- Candidates with confidence in themselves and the ability to have a good vision as to what they want in their new position
- Candidates must be a good cultural fit
- Candidates must ask questions in the interview and understand the opportunity
- The most critical skills for a top candidate:
- Problem solving and thinking
- Collaboration and cooperation
- Communication and influence
- Advice to stand-out in interviews:
- Translate the experience you had with the job you want to do. Think about things that you’ve done that have given you that experience
- Update your resume annually and add accomplishments from the previous years.
- Highlight how you work on a team
- Candidates approach an interview very reactively
- Understand the resume is a list – make sure to drive the interview and conversation
- Have a reactive and proactive interview
- Be prepared to highlight your key aspects
- Be able to shape your narrative and asked questions about the company while staying authentic
- Come with questions to make it a conversation.
- Employers are looking for people that want to work for the company not the job
- Is there a war for talent? It’s a very favorable market for talent right now
- Companies are trying to be the company that people want to join and understand that not all candidates are going to have 100% of the skills that are being looked for in a candidate.
- Candidates must show up as their authentic self.
- Employees own their development and the company and their manager are there to support the individual. Take a risk and it might change!
Career Storytelling: How to Tell Your Career Story in an Interview
A strong career story is not a complete account of every role you have held. It is a focused explanation of the experiences that have shaped you and prepared you for the opportunity in front of you.
Before an interview, identify the qualities and capabilities the employer appears to value most. Then consider which experiences provide the clearest evidence that you have developed those strengths through career storytelling.
Your examples should help the interviewer understand:
- What challenge or opportunity you faced
- What role you played
- How you approached the situation
- What changed because of your contribution
- What the experience taught you
- How it relates to the position you want
The most effective stories are specific without becoming unnecessarily detailed. They give the interviewer enough context to understand the situation while keeping the focus on your decisions, actions and impact.
Career Storytelling: Connect Past Experience to the Role Ahead
Many candidates describe what they have done without explaining why it matters to the potential employer.
That connection is especially important when pursuing a promotion, changing industries or moving into a different type of role. The interviewer may not immediately recognize how experience in one setting translates to another. The candidate has to make that relevance clear.
Instead of simply describing a previous responsibility, explain the broader capability it demonstrates. Leading a cross-functional initiative might show collaboration, influence and problem-solving. Managing a difficult client relationship might demonstrate judgment, adaptability and composure.
Do not make the interviewer assemble the connection for you. Communicate it directly.
Career Storytelling: Preparation Creates a More Natural Conversation
Interview preparation should help a candidate become more focused, not more rehearsed.
Prepare several stories that demonstrate different dimensions of your experience. These might include solving a difficult problem, influencing a decision, learning from a setback, working through conflict or leading during change.
You do not need to memorize every sentence. Over-rehearsed answers can sound disconnected from the conversation. Instead, know the key points of each story well enough to adjust the emphasis based on the question and the interviewer’s interests.
Preparation also includes researching the organization, understanding the role and developing thoughtful questions. The best interviews feel like purposeful conversations in which both sides are evaluating the opportunity.
Career Storytelling: Personal Brand Shapes the Interview Experience
Personal brand is not a slogan or a carefully constructed image. It is the impression people form through the way you communicate, behave and respond.
An interviewer is listening to your answers, but also noticing how you organize information, whether you answer the question directly and how you respond when the conversation moves in an unexpected direction.
Your stories should reinforce a consistent picture of your strengths. If you want to be recognized as a collaborative problem-solver, your examples should demonstrate how you involve others, work through complexity and create results.
Consistency creates credibility. The words you use, the examples you share and the way you interact should support the same overall impression within career storytelling.
Career Storytelling: Build a Career Narrative That Communicates Your Value
Career transitions require more than an updated résumé. Professionals must be able to explain what they have learned, how they have created value and why their experience is relevant to the opportunity ahead.
SW&A helps professionals organize their experience into a clear career narrative, career storytelling, strengthen their personal brand and prepare for important interviews and career conversations.
Like what you hear? Hear more episodes about career storytelling and other hot topics on the What’s Your Story podcast page!