Interviewing Tips, Quips

This past week I attended the North American International Auto Show in Detroit as the guest of General Motors. While at the show, I had the opportunity to interview several executives and designers, some in a group interview format with the rest one-to-one. Although I have interviewed people in the past, this was the first time that I had multiple interviews in such a short span of time — two days to be exact.

Before I left for Detroit, I did not know that I would have the chance to do interviews at the show. It was the first auto show I attended with press credentials, therefore I only brought along a camera and pen/pad for the event. Both worked fine, but in retrospect I would have done a few things a bit differently.

Getting A Clear Shot — My Fuji 5.1 meg digital camera is fine for simple photo shooting, but not for show shooting. I noticed too much glare feedback with some cars and blurry shots when someone moved which made it difficult to secure a clean, crisp picture. I’m not likely to invest in a traditional film camera, but finding a digital camera that shoots pictures fast and with clarity seems like a worthy investment. Fortunately, I can secure media photographs in many cases.

Recording v. Writing — I believe that I do a good job writing down the words spoken in an interview. Still, I noticed that several of my colleagues had digital voice recorders with them, a device which makes it easier to pick up everything being said verbatim. A few of my interviewers spoke very fast, making it difficult to write fast. I’m not adept at shorthand, so I was left with reading my chicken scratch later on.

Prep Those Interview Questions — Spending more time on crafting interview questions can be a timesaver and relax the person being interviewed as well as the person asking the questions (me). There were a few times after walking away from the interview that another question popped into my mind or I thought of a way to rephrase something that I had asked.

To Write It Up Or Not — All but one of the interviews have been written up and added to my The Auto Writer blog. One interview I am not planning to include simply because the information is better suited for a future article. My first two interviews I listed in Q&A format, but I believe that with pen and pad a general format would have been better and probably more accurate.

One thing that interviewing has done for me is this: it has given me a lot of fresh ideas on how to interview people in the future along with the confidence to just go ahead and do it.

Interview anyone?

Sometimes I Even Surprise Myself

In Business For 5 Years!

It has been five years since I started working for myself (November 9, 2002 to be precise) and I have learned a few things about being self employed along the way. My first website was built on the back of an awful GoDaddy template, looking every bit the amateur work that it was. I remember trying to FTP pages via dial-up too — what a time waster that was!

Microsoft FrontPage 2002 – Let’s Build A Web Page!

In 2003, I got a hold of a copy of Microsoft FrontPage and began developing several sites with that substandard HTML program. By 2004, I felt confident enough to no longer depend on FrontPage deciding to try developing freshly marked up pages myself. At the very least I learned how to take an existing theme (thank you, open source templates) and port it for my own needs.

An Aborted Attempt At Blogging, Followed By Success

My first attempt at blogging took place in 2004, but I didn’t stick with it as my interest flagged. However, in December 2005 I launched this blog and have followed up with at least one dozen more blogs over the course of two years. Blogger was my initial blogging platform, but when I started The Article Writer I decided to go with WordPress.

WordPress 1.5 to WordPress 2.3.1

I believe I started off with WordPress 1.5, a comparatively ancient version of what I consider to be the best blogging platform available. Untold numbers of updates later and I’m keeping pace with every update including v.2.3.1, which was released within the past two weeks.

Mistakes, I Made My Share

In the earlier days of blogging I made some huge mistakes, including deleting my configsys file more than once or botching an update. This morning I surprised myself by easily handling a problem taking place with this blog as it wasn’t showing the advanced tool option. Somewhere along the line of making WordPress updates, a file or two wasn’t uploaded which caused the problem.

Delete and Start Over Again

I decided this morning to back up the blog, save the configsys file, keep a copy of the plugins and themes handy, and delete the blog. I downloaded a fresh copy of WordPress, uploaded all of the files, and moved over all of the other files I had saved. Everything has worked out so smoothly.

I’m still not the wizard that some people are when it comes to managing their sites and blogs, but I hold my own. I’ve also gotten better at writing, so much so, that my work is now showing up in magazines including Sam’s Club Auto, GAL Magazine, and 435 South Magazine. I’m talking with two other editors about getting publishd with them and am casting my eyes on a very big publication for 2008.

Taking on Fresh Challenges

What’s my point? It is this: if you stick with what you’re doing and remain open to learning new things and tacking fresh challenges, the pay off will eventually come in the form of better jobs and nicer looking websites and blogs. The road traveled hasn’t been easy, but it has had its rewarding moments too.

In some ways the past five years have been a blur, but I’ve come through thick and thin to get to this point.

I thank God for His strength through the ups and downs of it all and for a patient wife and children who sometimes have a difficult time wrapping their minds around the work that I do.