Using Informational Interviews To Help Reach Your Full Potential
My father helped me discover the power of informational interviews. When I was in high school and showed interest in any sort of career path, my dad pushed me to set up meetings with people who were doing those jobs and interview them to learn how they got to where they were. By the time I was in law school and fixated on a baseball operations career with a Major League team, I was conducting numerous informational interviews throughout the academic year. That process of interviewing executives to learn about their career paths and requesting advice helped lead me to a spring training internship with the New York Yankees that changed my life. Informational interviews can be used at any stage in your professional development to explore different careers, add to your professional network and get influential advice from experts in your field of interest.
Start by making informational interviews a regular part of your professional development and career exploration strategy. Make it a goal to conduct several interviews in the next few months, and identify a list of possible interviewees. If you want to work in sports law, for example, search the internet and collect the names and contact information of attorneys working in team front offices, at law firms representing sports clients and at other organizations, such as professional player unions or the NCAA. Create a reasonable schedule for contacting and interviewing the people on your list, and begin chipping away at it.
When I was in law school, I mailed a letter of introduction and resume to baseball operations executives at every Major League team. I sent two or three letters per week in order to spread my interviews out over a manageable schedule. About 10 days after sending each letter (if I had not yet received a response) I followed up with a phone call – emails would also be acceptable now. In each letter and follow-up call, the theme was that I was a law student with baseball internship experience, and I was simply interested in scheduling 10 or 15 minutes to ask them about their career path and for any advice.
It was intimidating at times as a young person to call executives that I admired, but I knew it was an important step to take in achieving my career objectives. What I discovered then and know to be true after working in the industry for many years is the vast majority of sport executives are happy to help mentor people who respectfully approach them for advice and not for a job or internship. Today’s top executives were once in the position of an outsider longing to break into the sport industry, and most of them are happy to help encourage the next generation of job seekers. Moreover, most executives are flattered that someone is interested in the career that they have put so much time and effort into. So do not let fear hold you back from taking action and scheduling your first interview.
One piece of advice concerning emails: Write professional email correspondence that is grammatically correct and includes a professional salutation, such as “Dear Mr. Matheson.” I see far too many students treating professional email correspondence like text messages to their friends, and it can make them appear immature and unprofessional to the recipient.
Whether you are conducting an interview by phone or in person, begin by researching your interviewee. Study their Linkedin profile and any biographical or other useful information you can find about them, such as news stories where they have been quoted or written about. The information you gather will help you ask more informed questions and make your interview more productive. Asking about basic information that is easily accessible online will send the message that you did not prepare and waste the valuable time of your interviewee. For example, if you can determine through someone’s Linkedin profile that they studied economics at the University of Iowa, do not ask where they went to college, but ask whether their economics education has helped them in their career and how they went from a student at Iowa to their first job in sports.
Research not only helps prepare you to ask better questions, it can also help set up small talk. Be prepared to have a conversation. Do not plow through a list of questions in such a mechanical way that you are unable to connect with your interviewee on a personal level. Once you know something about a person’s background, you will be able to bring up their alma mater’s football team or a city they used to work in that you enjoyed visiting or any other number of things to help make your visit more of a friendly conversation than an uncomfortable interview.
The questions you prepare before the interview will depend on what stage you are at and what sort of advice you are seeking. If you are a college sophomore who is still figuring out what you want to do after graduation, your questions will probably be much different than those asked by someone in an entry-level job who wants to learn about steps to take to help advance their career. Either way, a possible partial list of questions to help get you started could include some of the following:
Would graduate school be a good idea if I want to pursue a career in this field?
What is your advice for someone in my position who is interested in having a career like yours?
What is your favorite/least favorite part of your job?
Is there much travel involved in your job?
What can a college graduate expect to earn in their first job in this profession, and what are reasonable long-term salary expectations?
What sort of internships or experiences should I try to get now before I hit the job market?
Can you describe a typical day in your job?
Dress professionally if you are conducting an in-person interview. It is better to show up overdressed than underdressed. If conducting the interview by phone, select a time and location that will be free from distraction and background noise that could disrupt your conversation. Whether the interview is in-person or on the phone, be on time!
Once you have scheduled the time to talk, performed the research and prepared your questions, the interview will practically take care of itself. At that point there is nothing left to do but have an interesting conversation with an expert at something you are interested in learning more about – what could be better than that?
Immediately after the interview, handwrite a brief thank-you note and put it in the mail. A simple note letting your interviewee know how appreciative you are for their time and how eager you are to apply their advice is not only the right thing to do because of their generosity, but it will also leave a great impression and keep the door open for possibly growing the professional relationship over time. Handwritten notes help you stand out in a world of digital communication.
If you want to nurture a professional or mentoring relationship with your interviewee (why not?) make a point of following up with them at least two times per year. A professional email or handwritten note that reminds them of who you are and provides a brief update on an internship you recently got or some other life announcement will help maintain the connection. Even if they never respond to you, it will be much easier for you to ask them for more advice or assistance in the future if you have shown a sincere interest in staying connected over time and done so in a professional manner.
In some cases informational interviews can even lead to jobs. I have two (of many) informational interview success stories to share as inspiration. The first example is from a few years ago when I was leading my students in an experiential-learning course with a Major League Baseball team. In the middle of the course, one of the team’s sales managers presented to the group. After the presentation, I suggested to one of my graduating seniors that she ask the sales manager if she could buy him a coffee and conduct an informational interview with him before our group left town. She took my advice, and that cup of coffee led to an interview which led to her first job in Major League Baseball. Three years later, she is a rising young talent in the business.
My second example demonstrates that informational interviews can be valuable at any stage of your career. During my time as an Associate Director of NCAA Enforcement, I was contacted by an attorney in Chicago who asked me for an informational interview. He was exploring a career transition to college athletics and was interested in my advice on making that leap. We had a good phone conversation, and he eventually applied for and got a job on our staff, and I became his first official mentor in the department. He has since gone on to become an Executive Director for Athletics Compliance at a school in a Power 5 conference.
If you apply my advice and start making informational interviews a strategic part of your professional development plan, I will be surprised if you do not have positive career results over time. And when you do have an informational interview success story to share, please contact me – I would love to hear about it!