Interview Insights: Does Talking More Make You Seem Smarter to Interviewers?

Dear seniors, I have a question about the perspective of interviewers: Is a candidate who talks a lot (more than just answering the question) considered really intelligent, or is a candidate who gives concise answers considered less intelligent? Please suggest!

Thanks & Regards,
Sachin Katpale

Hi Sachin, it totally depends on the kind of answers the candidate is giving. If the answers make sense, why would an interviewer perceive the candidate as dumb? Sometimes the interviewer is not in the right mindset to listen to a long conversation, so they may categorize the candidate as dumb.

If you can elaborate on the question and the respective answer, it would be easier to compare whether the answer is dumb or intelligent.

Unless your answers are not digestible or understood by the interviewer, despite your good intention to reply in a better way, it would not help you. Most of the bigger companies expect you to have command over the English language. So, try to have command over English so that the person at the receiving end can understand your reply with reference to your intention.

In small companies, English is not a mandatory language. So, in that interview, if you answer honestly and confidently in any language, then you would feel that you are on the positive side. Trust this will help you to grow!

I hope this helps you improve your communication skills for interviews.

Best regards,

When we conduct interviews, the candidate should speak for 80-90% of the time, while the interviewer speaks for 10-20%. What truly matters is whether the candidate's speech is relevant. In meaningful conversations, one should speak less. However, please assess the following in the candidate's responses:

- Whether the candidate includes numbers in their replies.
- Whether the candidate references any subject knowledge, such as business dailies, periodicals, journals, etc.
- Whether the candidate shares past instances of their actions rather than focusing on hypotheticals.
- Whether the candidate cites famous sayings or proverbs.

I recently participated in a similar discussion on behavioral interviewing. You can find my response here: #post1519803.

Thanks,

Dinesh V Divekar