So, finally, the day for the long-awaited interview for a Web Designer job at Oxford Brookes has come. I applied for this job at the back-end of July, whilst still on on jobsworth seekers allowance, but it wasn’t for another month before I heard I had the interview for another month away. Kind of understandably, I forgot quite alot about it, but this week I dusted down the application notes and got myself ready. That said, for some reason, this morning I was really nervous.
In the end, it seemed to go really well, and I was pretty articulate most of the time. I don’t know whether this was as a result of me, in response to the HR request for ‘any special arrangements we need to make’ I provided them with a Bill-provided declaration of my aspergers:
As regards my interview I would like to notify you that I have received coaching for Aspergers Syndrome.
Aspergerâs Syndrome has a slight influence on the way I behave, and interviews are naturally a little stressful, so these notes may be helpful to us all:-
– I may need a little extra time to process questions, so moments of silence may be helpful to me, although that does not mean I am not understanding -l just taking a little more time to arrive a response.
– Multiple questions, or confusing comments may be a little difficult for me to untangle â one thing at a time helps me no end.
– I may sometimes seem as though I go off at a tangent â it makes sense to me at the time and the most helpful thing an interviewer can do is to bring me back by re-stating the question
– I am a little bit likely to miss social cues, so if the atmosphere feels uncomfortable to you, or if I seem to be unsure of what is expected, just tell me what you expect me to do. This can feel a little odd, but I will grateful!
Nothing was said about this, and I didn’t feel that I needed to reiterate it, as I actually got the feeling that the message had, probably, got through from HR (it should have done), but I do wonder whether me knowing that they know something subconciously made me perform better? I don’t know. There are five other candidates who have been shortlisted, so we shall see what we shall see. Hopefully it won’t be too long.
