Episode 18 - Preparing for Virtual Interviews

Items mentioned:

- Camera: Logitech C920x HD Pro Webcam, Full HD 1080p/30fps

- Camera Cover: Web Cam Cover Slide

- Microphone: Blue Yeti Microphone

- USB Hub: Anker 4-Port USB 3.0 Hub, Ultra-Slim Data USB Hub with 2 ft Extended Cable

- Ring Light: NEEWER 18" SMD LED Ring Light Dimmable Lighting Kit with 78.7-inch Light Stand

- Ethernet Cord

[00:00:15.670]

Hello and welcome back to another episode of Emotional Millennial. My name is Annie, and I am very grateful that you are here hanging out with me today. I really cannot believe it's that time of year again where eras applications have been turned in. You m4 medical students who are applying to residency programs right now. All your applications are going to be visible to programs in, like, two days.

[00:00:42.170]

Absolutely absurd that it's that time of year again. Well, lucky for you, I've already been through this twice. Good times. So, yeah, I have a lot of tips and tricks and I just kind of wanted to talk through how I prepared for my virtual interviews. In general, I'm sure this could be applicable to other specialties business people.

[00:01:08.130]

I don't know, whatever. I'm going to be talking more specifically about applying to residency programs as, like, a medical student. But if you're not medical school, I'm sure there's going to be some useful stuff that you can take away as well. So in this episode, I'm just going to kind of talk about, like, how I prepared leading up to interview days, but I think I'm going to make a different episode that talks about preparing for each specific program and, like, day of interview stuff. There's actually a lot more that I want to talk about than I initially realized.

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So I'm going to split this up into two episodes for sure. I also want to say that these have just been my experiences. What I'm going to talk about today is obviously just my opinion. I'm sure other people will think differently, and that's fine if you don't know me very well yet, hopefully you'll stick around and get to know me a little bit more. But something about me is I am very bougie.

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Like, I'm always doing the most. And so when I talk about my set up and kind of what I did, I'm sure a lot of people would be like, holy crap, you're insane. And yeah, I know I am insane and that's fine. However, my perspective is like, I'm only going to get one shot at doing this. I'm only going to be applying to residency and doing these interviews once.

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And so you really have to make a good impression, especially because all of these interviews are now virtual. So to stand out among other applicants, you got to look good on camera. You got to sound good. Like, this is just the reality. As much as people are like, oh, it's okay, just get a private space, like sit on the ground and whatever, it's fine.

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It's still going to look better. If you're that person who has beautiful lighting and a great setup and your background is spotless, subconsciously, there has to be some type of bias or some type of pull towards someone who is more visually appealing to look at. I'm not saying you have to be like, super pretty or goodlooking or something. But just generally speaking, having a high quality video, a high quality sound, and good lighting, I think all those things are very important. So with that all being said, let's get into it.

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First, I want to talk about a few purchases that I made to enhance my setup. Number one, I bought an Ethernet cord, a long ethernet cord, depending on in your house, where your WiFi router is, I don't know, whatever. I made sure that I had an Ethernet cord that was long enough so when I was living at my parents house, it could literally go down two flights of stairs into the basement because that's where I did my interviews the first time around. Second time around, I didn't need as long of a cord, but I think it's better to get a longer one than to have one that's too short and not reach. Basically, you need your Ethernet cord to be able to go from your WiFi router and then into your computer.

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What this is going to do is it's going to allow you to have a much more stable internet connection and so you will not have any glitches or any problems when you're on zoom, when you're on teams. Trust me, this worked very well for me. Also, my boyfriend, when he was going through interviews at the time, I never had any glitching. Everything was great and dandy, and I think that is very important during your interviews. So step one, ethernet cord.

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You can get out on Amazon. That's where I bought mine. I'm sure there's other places you can go to. Step two, camera. I use the same camera for both rounds of interviews.

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I bought an old detect camera. I think it's like 108 pixels. I'll definitely put all of this, like, on my website, everything that I purchased and just kind of like the title of it. I'm not going to give you like a link because this is not sponsored. Like, this is just literally me trying to give you advice.

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But I'll definitely put that all on my website for you guys. I think the camera was under 150, but over 100. And I use that camera for both years. Beautiful quality, really loved it. Highly recommend.

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I know that there are other people that just use like, their laptop or, I don't know, their phone. I heard some people do that. This is my personal preference. My camera quality was always looking fantastic. And you can also see yourself with a bunch of other applicants on the screen, especially like when you first enter interviews, there's like a big zoom waiting room and whatever.

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Let me tell you that my camera quality was significantly better every single time. And that was something that I took a little bit of pride in. I was like, oh yeah, going off of that, if you do end up buying a camera to go on top of your laptop or however you want to do it. I would also recommend buying one of those camera covers because in the event that your camera is not working or it's not like hooked up properly, it will start showing out of your normal camera on your computer. And sometimes the quality is bad.

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It can just look really bad. I don't know. These are things that I think about so high quality camera and then the camera cover that you can just place like a black thing. I'm sure you could use a piece of tape or a sticky note or something too, but I just had one of those black things that slid over and I thought that was really helpful. Alright, next I bought a microphone.

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I purchased a Blue Yeti microphone which was I think around $100. Once again, once again, I am bougie and I always am doing the most. But I will say that my audio quality was always very high and it was always really good. And I felt very confident during my interviews that it was good quality. And for me, having that reassurance was really important to me.

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Once again, not necessary, but do I recommend it? Yes. Would I do it again also? Yes. So if you do end up purchasing a microphone and a camera or either or these are both going to most likely have like a USB connection that needs to be connected to your computer.

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So what I did was I have a MacBook and if you hear stuff in the background, my cats are like aggressively chewing on cardboard for God knows why. So I apologize for that. Anyway, you'll have multiple USB butts that you have to plug into a larger host type thing. So I got something that it's like a USB and then it hooks up and then it allows you to have five more USB plugins. And so I just always kept that hooked up to my computer so I could easily plug in my microphone and my camera just to that every time and it was like very seamless.

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You also might have to do that for your ethernet cord depending on if you actually have a direct ethernet like set up to your computer or if you need like ethernet to USB to go into your computer. All right, the last thing for visuals, I bought a gigantic ring light. And I love that thing. It's so perfect. It is huge, it is obnoxious.

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But honestly, I think that's okay. A lot of other people I know purchase like a smaller ring light. I think it's just important that you have something that sits kind of like above you. So the angle that you should be putting your camera at should be above you, always looking down. Never have your camera looking straight on or up at you.

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You are always going to look better with your camera a little bit above. Like I think mine was just above my head and then I had it tilted down a little bit, and then I can look up and it just looks better. I don't know why. Just trust me. So with that, my ring light was behind my computer.

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And then I had it elevated up even more so that my computer wasn't, like, blocking the light, if that makes sense. When you have the set up, at the end of the day, it's so funny. It looks very obnoxious, if you know. But my ring light was huge, and I'll also give the link to it, whatever. I think it was Nee W-E-R.

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That's the brand of the ring light. I got it off of Amazon. I think it's like 18 inches in diameter is the ring itself. And my ring light also came with different settings. So you can turn it on.

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You can turn it on super, super bright, which is insanely obnoxious and totally unnecessary. I would have it, like, at a lower ISS setting. So it wasn't super obvious that I was being illuminated by this light, but I could break off the white parts of it, and instead there was like an orange filter I could put on there so the lighting looked more warm and not as, like, professional white light, if that makes sense. So I'm a warm light gal. I like the homey feeling that warm light provides.

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And so I switched out. I think there were four pieces on it total. I kept two of the pieces as the white light original, and then two of them I changed to warm lighting. So I have a good little mixture going on there. And that ring light just plugged into the wall so separate from the computer completely.

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It can go up and down. I could bend it forward and backward. It has a bunch of movement capabilities, and it was really easy to work with and easy to use. Next thing to think about is having a space that is quiet enough where you are able to go and do these interviews as you please. And I use my office where my computer is, and I would always just make sure to communicate with my partner, like, hey, my interview is here.

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Don't even open a door. Just kidding. I'm not that crazy. But just he would know when I would be having interviews, and so he would, like, respect that and keep it down, which I appreciate. So I would have a room to myself, close the door, and I would angle my computer so that directly behind me, I was, like, against a wall, if that makes sense.

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I was kind of like, in a corner, and so I limited what you could see in my background. I really tried to control that as much as possible. So directly behind me was like a blank tope colored wall, I suppose. And the only other thing you could really see was I had an L shaped desk, so you could see, like, the other part of the L shape in my background. And then in, like, the back corner, I had this little vase.

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And in the vase, I just bought some fake flowers from Michael, Joanne's, whatever, and I made, like, a little bouquet. Basically, I am not great with floral arrangements. Like, please don't get me wrong here. I have no idea what I'm doing. I think I actually bought a preselected one, and then I just popped it in the vase.

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And so many people were like, oh, I love your flowers. And I'm like, thanks. Just a random little topic of conversation. I think it's nice to have something in the background that looks good, but something that doesn't take up the entire space, if that makes sense, and something that could possibly be a topic of conversation. I'm a visual person, so I don't know, maybe you can tell by how much effort I put into my space and preparing this for my interviews, but I really actively tried to make sure there was nothing in the background that was clashing with my head.

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Like, just my head was against the clear wall, like, behind me. If I chose to have a photo in there with me, it would be completely above my head, like, not intersecting with my head. So pretty simple. Straightforward background, minimal decor. I don't know.

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Get a painting. You, like, something professional. These are people who could possibly be hiring you. All right. Last thing I think that's important is having a chair that is stable.

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This sounds very silly, but people tend to twist. If your chair is, like, mobile, you'll tend to twist back and forth without even realizing it. Like, out of nerves or out of just, like, I don't know, boredom. And so I would always switch out my computer chair with, like, a kitchen chair from downstairs so that I was forced to sit and not move, because that movement can be very distracting, and it looks unprofessional. It's the details, people.

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I'm telling you. And I feel like that is everything. If I think of anything else, I will definitely add it or include it. But right now, I think that's everything for the setup. We're not done yet, but just with the set up, and if anything didn't make sense, just please email me.

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I'm available. I'm here to help. Next thing that I think is important to start thinking about is you're about to start getting interview invites. Knock on wood, crossing my fingers for you. But you need to be organized.

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And it is so challenging. Like, this is hard, and this coming from an organized person. Like, I'm typically very organized. There are so many dates and things that they're sending you. Like, you'll have a meet and greet ahead of time.

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You'll have the interview the next day. You're in different time zones. It's overwhelming. And so what I did was I actually printed out a hard copy of all the months that I would possibly be interviewing. So November, December, January, February I think, honestly, maybe I even did.

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March? I don't know. October, I think I actually had my first interview in October. Whatever, all those months I printed them off, I think online. Like you can just search, calendar, print off and you'll be able to find it.

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And I stapled those together and I tried to keep that with me at all times. Granted, I was off that year because this was my year where I didn't match, at least last year. And so I was kind of available most of the time. So if that's not you, try to keep it organized on your phone. Just find something that works for you and make sure that you're double checking and triple checking this because it is so easy to like, miss something or to write something down wrong.

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Like, you're going to have a million emails from a million different programs, hopefully cross my fingers for you. And it's important to stay organized because you do not want to miss some type of event or your interview day. Obviously, that's very unprofessional. So what I did was I had my Gmail account that was brand new. I just made it for eras, and I created folders for every single program that contacted me.

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So as soon as they contacted me, I would star it. And then I gave them all their own color. And this is just how crazy I was because this was my second round of doing this and I was being very anal about everything. I actually was printing out all of the communication I had with any other program. And I actually created a binder, which I'll get into the binder more on my next episode.

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But this allowed me to see physically and be like, okay, yes, this is what they said to me, because otherwise it feels disorganized and chaotic to me if it's just all electronic. And I'm like, wait, was it this program? Was it that program? I just prefer to have it out in front of my face and be like, okay, this is what's happening. So I guess my best advice is be prepared.

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Organize yourself as much as you can ahead of time and stay on top of your emails like crazy, like you never have before. Okay? Respond to emails quickly, promptly, and professionally. And at the bottom of your email, you need to set a signature that has your AAMC ID at the bottom. So I had like Andrea Has phone number beneath that, and then beneath that I had AA two A's M-C-I-D so that every single time I sent an email, it was just automatically on there.

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You are helping the coordinator. You are doing the work for them so they know exactly who you are and able to find you quickly. Very professional, makes a good impression. Now, expanding on the whole email situation, there are a lot of problems that have developed now that we are completely virtual in the way that we're doing interviews, it is very easy for applicants to hoard interviews to take them all. You can do multiple interviews a day.

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So we're no longer limited by time, by finances, because we don't have to travel. You don't have to pay for a flight. You don't have to buy a hotel. You literally can just sit in the same chair and do all of your interviews. Lots of pros to this, but there are also a lot of cons, and I think one of the major con is that it's harder to stand out.

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And so with this, unfortunately, I think it's very important to consider sending letters of interest to programs that you are genuinely interested in. Maybe I can make an episode just about letters of interest in general because that's kind of its whole own situation. And trust me when I say I have a lot of experience with them because my first year around, I only had four interviews and so I sent so many letters of interest and I actually was cold calling programs asking for interviews. So maybe that's a good thing to talk about in the future. If you want to hear more about that, like, letters of interest, email me and let me know, because I'm not sure if that's something that would actually be helpful for you guys.

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There's two ways to approach it. You can do it either now or wait like two weeks. And once you see that they've sent out some interviews, then email them and be like, hey, I just want to let you know I'm super interested in your program and I would love for the opportunity to interview with you guys, but do not wait more than two months. That's my best advice. If you wait until January, it's done.

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It's too late. Do it before December, let's say 15th, just because the last thing that I will say today is practice your interviews, practice your setup, get it all set up. Like, call a friend on FaceTime, I don't know, but just do not wait until like, a week before and realize like, oh crap, I need this. Oh, crap, I need that. Because this is going to be so new to you, like this whole virtual setup that you need to do it in advance and make sure that it's going to work out.

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If you guys have any other questions, please reach out to me. I will always love to hear from you. I love hearing from you guys. Literally means the world to me. My email is theemotionillennial@gmail.com th eemotionmillennial@gmail.com transcripts will be available on my website and also on my website for this episode transcripts, I will put at the top the names of the products that I purchased for my virtual interview season.

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You guys got this. You're amazing. You're going to be great at interviewing. Be yourself. And yeah, you got this confidence is key.

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Fake it till you make it. I wish you all the best. Thanks for hanging out with me today. And I will see you next time. Bye.