For the Interview, Your Motto Is 'Be Prepared'

Be prepared to ask your own questions. "One of the worst things you can say at the end of the interview is that you don't have any [questions]," Karsh said. These queries can be business-related, about the employer's long-term goals, or they can be personal, about workplace culture or how the interviewer came to work there.

Strayer said you should always practice your responses. She encourages people to tape themselves to see whether they are engaging in any unconscious behaviors that could hurt them, such as excessively using filler words like, well, "like." You know?

However, please don't try to memorize specific answers to any of the likely questions. At best you'll sound wooden; at worst you will forget all your best lines just when you need them most.

Instead, bring along a notebook, with a few key points you want to remember jotted down.

You can even create a list with brief descriptions of your accomplishments, said Katy Piotrowski, author of "The Career Coward's Guide to Interviewing" and a career counselor in Fort Collins, Colo. "Write it down. Take it to the interview. It's like a security blanket."

Strayer said the secret to interviewing is to create a library of stories that indicate the point that you want to get across. "That way when you're in the interview, you're just recalling a story," she said. "When you give examples, then you bring life to it."

All this preparation may sound like a lot of work, but it can pay off when hiring managers are trying to decide between two otherwise equally qualified candidates, Strayer said. "When decision makers sit around a table . . . they recall stories. They don't just recall words."

Bait and Switch?

Have you ever taken a job that turned out to be different from what you applied for? How did you handle it? If you're willing to share your story for a column on the subject, e-mail me at slayterme@washpost.com. Include your full name and daytime phone number. No attachments.