Two days ago I wrote a blog post about a dilemma I had with a client. He was a highly intelligent job seeker who came to me for interview training – trouble was he’d done too much already, and was way too over prepared. The more I worked with him, the more I compounded the problem, as he seemed to want to memorise each tip I gave him. I thought I’d use social media to help me help him. I reached out to several people around the globe who write on careers and whose views I greatly respect. Here’s what they came up with….

I coach many people on interview skills. People come to me if they freeze up, lack structure, do not project confidence or are uncertain of how to answer questions – and that’s just the start. The other day, however, I came across a different kind of problem – one of my clients was way too over-prepared.

We started with a mock interview. He knew his stuff. He’d practiced his stuff. It rolled off his tongue seamlessly. After the first question he answered I said – “have you practiced that answer?” He said “how did you know?”