Win Skype prizes by watching our disastrous video job interview

What you are about to see is a dramatization! Jason Cochran -- er, "Mason Mockran" -- is trying to screw up his job interview, but in a plausible way, so that you can benefit from his career-halting gaffes.

An increasing number of companies are using Skype video conferencing for their job interviews, including Zappos. It's tough enough putting on your best clothes and sitting down for a face-to-face meeting that could determine the direction of the rest of your life. Now, you also have to know how to come across well on camera, too.

So we asked a career coach from 360JobInterview.com to help us conduct a bogus job interview that could best show you what not to do if you're asked to interview for a job by Skype. Our coach was Maria White, a high-powered human resources consultant for Lehman Brothers and the aerospace industry, and she laced our computer-to-computer job interview with a few classic booby traps.




Even though the interviewee seems, on the surface, to be confident and relaxed, in fact, "Mason" does a bunch of things that will likely torpedo his chances at getting this unspecified job. There are some definite wrong answers to these typical job interview questions, and "Mason," who is often vague and unprepared, gives every one of them:

Question: "Do you know much about this position?"
Don't say what "Mason" says: "No. Tell me about it." Do some prep work, and if you don't know specifics, at least be able to talk about the goals of the company itself.