I have come across this important hack when I was preparing for interviews. We are definitely very good at answering questions which we already know the answer for. But at times there may be some questions for which you may not know the right answer.

Whatever the technical background the person who is attending the interview is coming from , they definitely face this situation when they are in an interview.

Say suppose you are interviewing for a programmer role or testing role and everything is going well in the interview. The conversation between the interviewer and you is incredibly smooth and you feel like you almost got it. All of a sudden the interviewer asks you a question which you have no idea about.

”Do you have experience with (so and so skill) ?”

If you don’t have experience with the particular skill asked for , you may think you have two options. Either say yes or say no.

Option 1 : Lying that you know and you are experienced at the skill asked .

This is a very bad idea for numerous reasons. 

First interviewers are trained and they know to read candidates and understand if they are saying truth or not. The moment they feel you are not a person whom they can trust upon , you will pave a path for rejection. All the correct answers you were telling before won’t be worthy enough to save you here. You are just earning a way to rejection.

Second if the interviewer is not a trained person and he didn’t catch you telling lies and you are hired, you will soon be exposed when you are not able to do the work assigned. This is not a good decision. It creates a bad remark on you. You are spoiling your career here.

Telling lies that you know a skill which you don’t know is a very bad choice/option.

Option 2 : Frankly telling “no” and admitting the truth.

This is bad as option 1. The interviewer is not expecting you to tell lies and say yes but he/she is also not expecting you to tell a flat “no”. It creates a weird ending to the conversation. Don’t just say no. It is also a bad idea.

There is a good third option which will leave a good impression on you.

Option 3: Use the word “No, but…”

This powerful technique is worth it. It communicates many things. 

1. It shows your honesty. It is not necessary that a person have experience in every skills. Nobody does. Being honest makes you trustworthy.

2. It also shows that even though you are not an expert at that particular topic it is not a problem. It is a message conveyed that at present you don’t have that skill but you will be learning that skill .

3. It also shows your confidence to learn new skills. The ability to learn new things is more important nowadays.

You will become a great candidate in an interview when you figure out this skill. The ability to use “No,but…” focuses your confidence levels. This will lead to a great interview. 
So always remember don’t say yes and don’t say no. Instead say “No,but…”.

Spend 10 minutes in a day to learn new hacks which can help you to attend an interview successfully. 

Thanks for reading. Hope you learn this new hack reading this new blog.