Dating for Jobs: a guide to locking that job down

I don’t have an official title at Expensify but on any given day, I work with the financials, recruiting efforts, hiring, onboarding, office management, relocation, etc. My favorite part of the job? Interviewing candidates. I take great pride in overseeing the hiring process at Expensify, ensuring that we grow our team to match the amazing talent we already have on site.

With that said, I wanted to pass along some advice for interviewing. First and foremost, treat interviewing like dating. Whether you are good or bad at dating, mastering a good interview comes with some basic steps. 

Introduce yourself

1. Introduce yourself

When you meet someone on a blind date (much like interviewing), you introduce yourself, right? You try talk about yourself a little bit to give your date a sense of who you are, what you are passionate about and why you might be interested in them. This allows your potential partner (or company…) the opportunity to see if it is a match. Résumés aren’t helpful for this, providing only a shallow overview of who you are and after a while, all CVs tend to look the same… which is why we ask our application questions. We want to give you the opportunity to introduce yourself, and put your best foot forward.

2. Make sure you actually put your best foot forward

When you meet your date for the first time, you shower right? You try to look presentable. You know that your date doesn’t have that much to judge you on and will be grasping at anything to make an assessment. Just like that first date, interviewing requires a bit of presentation. Take away anything that makes that might be a distraction from your best foot. Distractions can include (but are not limited) to spelling errors in your emails or on your CV or not following directions. Showering typically helps too but is not required.

Be yourself. Always.

3. Be yourself (don’t hold back)

This one is fairly simple for us. We are a laid back, close knit company. We backpack for a month every year as a team, and let me tell you, things get intimate. Keeping that in mind, we want to see who we are going to work with every day. The reality is you spend a crazy amount of your waking hours at work, so its beneficial for you to feel comfortable letting your hair down.

4. Don’t let your nerves get the best of you.

Remember we are trying to woo you too (say those last three words 10 times fast). We are as nervous as you are. Interviewing (and dating) is this back and forth of “does he like me? Do I like him?” If you are nervous, we might not be able to tell how much you actually like us.

Are you going to swipe right on Expensify?

5. Ask good questions

This one is more important than you might think. Whether its for dating or interviewing, we want to know how interested you are in us. The questions you ask are how we gauge that. It’s true, for Expensify at least, we have a ton of information on our site about the company, product, strategy etc. But we strongly believe in Albert Einstein’s saying “The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.”Our site doesn’t provide all the answers. Come on, we know you can think of something to ask us.

You are looking for a match in your job search. Interviewing is taking a chance, trying to find what role is going to fulfill your needs, provide satisfaction on a daily basis and help you grow into who you always hoped you would be. So are you gonna swipe right, or what?