Why You Are Not Getting Call Backs?  

If your interviews are falling apart at the phone interview level, you should take some time to try to figure out why this is occurring.  One of the best ways to do this is to review the following areas to see if you could improve your performance in each of these areas:

1.  Failure to prepare for your interview questions properly. 

During the phone interview, you still need to be ready to answer all kinds of informational and behavioral interview questions.  Although the level of scrutiny is not usually as high as other types of later interviews, it is still important that you have done your homework and prepared for these questions before the interview. 

2.  Failure to create a setting for optimum success. 

One mistake that people often make is choosing to take the interview at a time or environment where they can be distracted.  This essentially means that you should screen your calls and allow yourself time to set an appropriate place where you can call back the person without fear of being interrupted or disturbed.  For example, try to find a quiet room, talk in your car, or go talk on a cell phone in the park.  The key is to find a place where background noise will be at a minimum and you can hear the call very well.  In addition, if you are using a cell phone, be sure your battery is near full so it will be unlikely the phone call will go out while on the call.   

3.  Failure to be in the right mindset during the phone interview. 

One advantage of screening your calls is that you can prepare yourself for the return call.  This can be very helpful particularly if you are initially called during a very stressful day.  By delaying the call back and interview until you have time to get the right mindset, can help your performance in the interview.  It will also give you a chance to go back over the job descriptions and requirements for the job and make it less likely that you will forget to ask a relevant question you may have. 

4.  Lack the sought after qualifications. 

In a lot of ways, the phone interview is very much like an order taker where they are trying to find out if you have a certain kind of experience of skill set.  In these cases, if you do not have that qualification, it does not matter how you actually do in the interview.  This is why you can assume a certain percentage of your interviews will end at the phone interview level. 

Regardless of the specific reason for your difficulties, the key is to find ways to address this issue and try to increase your opportunities to getting to later interviews.  This is ultimately the only way you can get to the point of getting the job.