This article was originally posted on Career Rocketeer and was written by Tom Cairns.

Most job seekers are unprepared for a job interview.  They spend the majority of their time trying to land a job interview and once they do they believe the hard work is done.  The only thing remaining is to show up for the interview and impress the recruiter or hiring manager with their qualifications.  Sounds simple and since 80% of being successful is showing up how hard can the remaining 20% be?  Apparently not that hard because most job seekers put little or no effort into preparing for a job interview.

That’s okay because most hiring managers put little or no effort preparing as well.  So the playing field is level.  Before you relax, consider this, why would a hiring manager be unprepared to interview you?

For one, it takes time to prepare and who has time.  Second, they have been doing this for years and they have their favorite questions.  They instinctively know the right person when they see them.  However, the real reason is they have never been trained on how to conduct a job interview.  You may think this is a good thing but it is not.

The most important hiring decision that someone will make about you is being done by a person who does not know what they are doing.  As a job seeker your fate is in the hands of someone whose gut instinct is going to tell them whether you are qualified for the job and how you will fit into their organization.  HR handed them your resume.  They looked at it for 60 seconds (if you are lucky) and this will be the person determining your future.  There are exceptions but they are few.  Unprepared meets unprepared and let’s hope for the best.

It is amazing that somehow the right people get hired or do they?  Makes you wonder.  What if at least one person in this equation was prepared for the job interview, would the outcome be the same or different?  I would say the odds would be in favor of whoever was best prepared.

Consider a baseball metaphor.  Every baseball player steps into the batter’s box looking for a pitch they can hit.  Preferably a fast ball, a smart pitcher knows this so they throw sliders and off speed pitches hoping the batter will chase them.  When they do, they finish them off with a high fast ball.  However, this scenario changes if the batter is ready to hit whatever pitch is thrown.  That takes practice and preparing for a job interview is the equivalent of batting practice.  Once you are ready step into the batter’s box and:

1. Swing at the first pitch.  One question asked 99.9% of the time usually at the beginning of an interview is “tell me about yourself?”  This is the baseball equivalent of a soft ball.  However, most job candidates take a half-hearted swing.  A swing and a miss is still strike one.  While hitting it out of the ball park is unlikely it will set up the next pitch.
2. Make them throw strikes.  Know what the job requires and provide specific examples of how your qualifications best match their needs.
3. Be patient and aggressive.  While a job interview is a series of questions there are some questions you can really drive.  Make sure you do.  What are those questions?  If I told you would you prepare for them?  I told you one in Step 1 but most of you forgot about it.  Here is a hint.  Your accomplishments are great now tell me how you did it.
4. Be prepared for every type of question.  In baseball a great hitter is only great one-third of the time.  That means the pitcher wins two-thirds of the time.  The odds of you getting a hit at the right time improve when you can hit whatever pitch is thrown.

Most hiring managers are trying to strike you out.  You can be ready but it takes practice.

Tom Cairns has hired and promoted hundreds of executives and professionals. He is a career development and coaching specialist. He understands the job search process, knows how to create a compelling resume and build an effective network. He knows how to interview like a star and exploit internet resources. Tom is an Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Business Azusa Pacific University, former S VP HR NBC Universal and Presidential appointee as Chief Human Capital Office US Department Homeland Security. He has the ability to provide all you need to know to jump start or continue your career search. You may contact him via e-mail at tom@cairnsblaner.com. Follow him on Twitter. His website and blog is: http://www.cairnsblaner.com.

This article was written by Robert Galford, Managing Partner of the Center for Leading Organizations, is a Leadership Fellow in Executive Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. It was originally posted on HBR Blog Network.

While the holiday season may be behind us, the peak season for exchanging gifts and messages is not over. Not by a long shot. For many companies, it’s salary and performance review time. It’s bonus time. It’s profit-sharing time.These anxiety-provoking milestones are filling your organization’s calendar even as you read this, and they will continue to do so for at least the next few months. And there is plenty of anxiety to go around, affecting both providers and recipients of such tidings. What does this signify? What are they telling me here? What does it say about how I am valued?

For the feedback providers among us, there is ample available advice on how best to proffer messages and to ensure their effective delivery. However, there’s far less guidance to help us when we are on the receiving end of these “gifts” (after all, aren’t we always hearing how feedback is a gift?).

The purpose of this post is to start a conversation among us, to consider how best to take in the feedback messages we receive — not just at this time of year, but all the time.

Here are four ways to become better at receiving — and implementing — feedback:

1. Relax. Nervous going in? Even a little? Of course you are. There’s an imbalance of power, information and preparation from moment one. The providers of your feedback spent at least some time gathering data, synthesizing it, and formulating the message. Even if they prepared it all by themselves, it was probably part of a broader organizational effort involving multiple inputs from a number of people. And you? You’re going in with none of that information. Given that imbalance, why would you possibly expect not to be even a little nervous? Give yourself a break. Relax. Unless you’re already in trouble, there will be no trapdoor under your chair.

2. Prepare yourself to hear one or more unexpected “somethings”

a. Something you did or didn’t do, that you had no idea was even on the radar screen as a factor or an issue.
b. Something that was a bigger deal than you thought. Or a smaller one. And the consequences or impact in the feedback message seems disproportionate.
c. Something that could or should have been addressed with you weeks or months earlier.
d. Something that you thought had already been resolved or improved upon.

3. If you don’t agree with the feedback, don’t launch into a defense right away. As you listen, hold that thought and hold your tongue! Force yourself not to form a conclusion or communicate a response too quickly, and maybe not even in the course of the conversation. You’ve spent zero time on absorbing and interpreting the data at this point. Apply the following filters:

a. Put it in absolute context first. Even if you are disappointed that it’s not the biggest bonus ever, or you didn’t “Exceed Expectations” in every category, or you discover your nemesis received the equivalent of the Nobel Prize, what’s the summary message to you? Is it more valid than not? More positive than negative? Was it mostly on-target?
b. Figure out how to use what you have heard. As a result of this feedback, do you know what you can or should do the same or differently going forward?

While a few on-the-spot questions are OK, finding your own version of “I’m guessing it’s OK for me to come back to you if I have more questions” is a better approach.

4. When it’s over:

a. Thank them sincerely for their time and thoughts, regardless of whether you were thrilled with their message or their delivery. Unless they were bored or rude, it required some work on their part.
b. Reflect on the overall message, and what it conveyed. If you are contemplating a campaign to prove you were right on some specific point, consider that it might ultimately be more helpful to focus on the broader takeaway and what it will require to do as well or better next time.
c. Don’t just file it and forget it. Look at it again in a few months, and see how you’re doing.

Finally, remember this was but a single piece or episode of feedback. If you’re lucky, you’ll receive many more.

Now, what’s your feedback on receiving feedback?