As part of her continuing effort to expose students to as many opportunities to practice their interviewing skills as possible, Employment Specialist Jessica Corpuel has set up a Speed Interviewing event that takes place at the PIVOT JCC location once a month. Employer partners bring questions they would ask during a regular interview, but the times is compressed to just 20 minutes.

“Most interviews take longer than just 20 minutes,” explains Jessica. “But this format makes students think on their feet and put some thought in to how to answer different kinds of questions before they ever sit down.”

Students treat the rapid fire interview as if it were for a position with the organization. They come with copies of their resume, a list of questions they might want to ask a potential employer, and some ideas of examples they can use for situational questions. “Some of our students don’t have a lot of job experience,” Jessica continues. “I remind them that things that happen during their training can translate to the workplace and they can look to those as examples.”

While the main goals of the interviews are practice and learning more about career options available after they complete their training, some students are able to make an impression and gain leads on employment opportunities.

“We don’t take it for granted that students will come out with a job, but it has happened and that’s a great outcome,” Jessica explains.

PIVOT Job Corps Center is a satellite of Springdale JCC located in NW Portland. It is all female non-residential and offers training in Office Administration and Medical Office Support. PIVOT has immediate openings. If you’d like to learn more about the training offered at PIVOT, contact Breanna at 503.274.7343.