How to Decompress and Progress After a Bad Interview

Everyone has faced a not-so-great interview experience. You put all your time and effort into this interview only for it to not go in your favor. So how do you react and what’s the next step? In this article, we’ll go over a few tips to gaining your momentum post-interview.

Reflect

Before doing anything else, it’s important to take a moment to evaluate your situation and understand what actually went wrong in the interview. This does not mean stay up late obsessing over your flaws, but it means truly and honestly looking at both yours and the interviewers time together. If you are particularly upset about this interview, it might be necessary to take some time to cool off. Giving yourself a break to do something healthy and positive is a good way to do that.

If you notice major issues, write them down and try to understand why they matter, and how to identify them for next time. If you notice minor mishaps you’ve done, don’t stress out over them. Overall, be kind to yourself and understand that an interview is not the most comfortable situation for anyone, and it takes time, patience and support to help yourself get better.

Follow-Up

For any major issues that you’d like to clarify (if it means receiving an offer or not), it would be wise to consider how to go about contacting your interviewer. It’s important to be honest and open about this misunderstanding so you can avoid any more in the future. Perhaps using your follow-up ‘thank you’ message would be best. Keep it brief!

Determine the outcome you want from your words.
Avoid apologies unless necessary, so as to keep it short.
Worst Case: Ask for a second interview! Sometimes we’re not at our best, so asking for another shot might be worth it!

Remember: You never know unless you ask!

Allow Yourself to Learn and Adapt

After a less-than-stellar interview, it can be easy to dwell on your mistakes, but it’s certainly not doing you any favors! Make sure you set yourself up to learn from everything.

Analyze the issues. - Use a process! Find the mistakes you made, then determine how they happened. Maybe it’s because you were nervous or weren’t feeling well? Maybe you needed to take more time preparing something else?
Practice, Practice, Practice! - The only way you can get more comfortable with an interview is by putting in the work.
Be Fair. - When you find your mistakes, be fair about them. Beating yourself up about your mistakes is never going to help, so take the time to understand where you can improve.