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Introvert personality a big disadvantage during interview?
- Thread starter HelicopterBen
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I can be introverted from time to time as well. Some of the best advice I got was to look at your fellow classmates and residents you work with. Find the person who is the most extraverted without being obnoxious and try to emulate them. Not BE them, but rather absorb some of the qualities you feel you lack.
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Most people like to talk about him/herself. Get a few good questions ready and ask them. People will think more of you if you ask thoughtful questions.
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I am going to play devil's advocate and say it doesn't need to be a disadvantage! As long as you are not cripplingly shy, or severely autistic or schizoid, it could even be an advantage! Being introverted could allow you to present yourself as thoughtful, reflective, assiduous, a follower, and agreeable. Above all else residency programs are looking for people who are hard working, easy to get along with and will do what they are told (such is the hierarchical nature of medicine). If someone were particularly extravert they may come across as too autonomous, overbearing, difficult to work with, having problems with authority etc.
You don't need to come across as someone who everyone would want to be best friends with. You do need to come across as someone who people could imagine working with for 3+ years.
Especially if you look good on paper, the less said the better!
Make it work for you. I hope this means you have applied to a field where it could be a strength (psych, neuro, patho, rads) and not a weakness (EM, general surgery), though that said there are plenty of excellent introverted general surgeons or extravert psychiatrists.
It is important to stay memorable which is where post-interview communication comes in handy. Especially at places where the residents have a say in the match process, keeping in touch with some of the residents could be useful.
You don't need to come across as someone who everyone would want to be best friends with. You do need to come across as someone who people could imagine working with for 3+ years.
Especially if you look good on paper, the less said the better!
Make it work for you. I hope this means you have applied to a field where it could be a strength (psych, neuro, patho, rads) and not a weakness (EM, general surgery), though that said there are plenty of excellent introverted general surgeons or extravert psychiatrists.
It is important to stay memorable which is where post-interview communication comes in handy. Especially at places where the residents have a say in the match process, keeping in touch with some of the residents could be useful.
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I disagree with this. Being introverted is not good, unless you're a jerk. If you're one of 400 applicants and you just are quiet and say nothing, when it comes time to rank, people will say they have no specific memories of you and will stick you in the middle or wherever just based on your scores. You don't have to be super outgoing, but saying virtually nothing on your interview day during the group setting is not going to help you. Think of some reasonable questions, and just ask them and listen to the answers.
Suggestions for introverts:
a) Resolve to have a positive attitude about the process. Know in advance that it will take a lot of energy and a little bit of acting to exude the friendly and confident demeanor expected for the situation. Chances are good that you really are friendly and confident and a whole host of other positive modifiers...you just need some time when you're around new people in order to let that part of your personality shine. Unfortunately, you don't have that time during the interview process.
b) Make eye contact and smile.
c) During the resident social function, mingle. I know it's hard, but don't wait for people to come to you.
d) Look at the residency website before you go to the interview to generate some program-specific questions to ask the residents.
e) Practice!
a) Resolve to have a positive attitude about the process. Know in advance that it will take a lot of energy and a little bit of acting to exude the friendly and confident demeanor expected for the situation. Chances are good that you really are friendly and confident and a whole host of other positive modifiers...you just need some time when you're around new people in order to let that part of your personality shine. Unfortunately, you don't have that time during the interview process.
b) Make eye contact and smile.
c) During the resident social function, mingle. I know it's hard, but don't wait for people to come to you.
d) Look at the residency website before you go to the interview to generate some program-specific questions to ask the residents.
e) Practice!
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Okay this is really bothering me - being a true introvert does NOT mean you are necessarily quiet, non-communicative, shy, antisocial, or whatever other things people on this site misinterpret it as. An introvert is someone who draws their energy from being alone, from self-reflection or meditation or whatever.
An extrovert does NOT always mean you are talkative, friendly, life-of-the party type. It means you draw your energy from being around other people. For example, I am an introvert but I love talking to people, meeting new people, putting myself out there. But, it does make me more tired and so I need a break from others to recover my energy. An extrovert would not need that break, but rather would have more energy from a full day in clinic (for example - a full clinic day wipes me out for an hour or two at night).
Please stop using "introvert" in place of "quiet, shy, awkward" or whatever.
So, if you are an introvert, no problem! Just make sure you have enough down time, to yourself, to recover between interviews. And make that extra effort to put yourself out there. Being an introvert is a good thing (and don't listen to any uneducated, unworldly individual who says it's bad!), but it does mean you have to make more of an effort than the extroverted out there.
/rant off
An extrovert does NOT always mean you are talkative, friendly, life-of-the party type. It means you draw your energy from being around other people. For example, I am an introvert but I love talking to people, meeting new people, putting myself out there. But, it does make me more tired and so I need a break from others to recover my energy. An extrovert would not need that break, but rather would have more energy from a full day in clinic (for example - a full clinic day wipes me out for an hour or two at night).
Please stop using "introvert" in place of "quiet, shy, awkward" or whatever.
So, if you are an introvert, no problem! Just make sure you have enough down time, to yourself, to recover between interviews. And make that extra effort to put yourself out there. Being an introvert is a good thing (and don't listen to any uneducated, unworldly individual who says it's bad!), but it does mean you have to make more of an effort than the extroverted out there.
/rant off
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Are you going into psychiatry?
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Being an introvert is a definite disadvantage because of the shyness, quietness and awkwardness.
On the other claw, being introspective means you are someone who 'draws their energy from being alone, from self-reflection or meditation or whatever.' You can still be an extrovert while being introspective.
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Was literally about to post this same thing when I saw your post.
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It just repeats what I said? You wanna know why? Cause I just edited it...lol. Only an introvert would use wikipedia citation...lol
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lol, touche
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actually you are the one who is out of step with the more common usage of the term introvert.
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absolutely. An interview is basically in a lot of ways a sales pitch. You are trying to sell a product, you. You have to outsell the competition. And it's a process where you make your sales pitch in November through January and the consumer doesn't make a decision until February, so your pitch has to be memorable. Now that doesn't mean you have to be a fast talking used car salesman in a plaid blazer, but it does mean that a few months from the interview you have to in some way be memorable in a positive way. Introverts (or for people who object to that term "shy people", "quiet people", "wallflowers") simply don't tend to be adequately memorable. So you need to put your best foot forward in some way, even if you need to bust out of your comfort zone.
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I'm learning more and more that being an introvert is a big disadvantage in medicine in general. Medicine is a job where you're meeting lots of new people every day, have to communicate with them effectively, and often have to manage a team. If your natural tendency is to be an introvert, you might want to work on trying to be more outgoing. I was sort of shy as a kid, but my personality has changed a lot through necessity during my training.
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Yeah, but a technically incorrect usage of the term. Bet you say "could care less" too.
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actually not. The word existed and had a common usage long before Myers Briggs created their own bastardized definition. But that doesn't negate the technically correct usage of the term in common parlance, which is "someone who shrinks from social contacts", ie the shy wallflower type. That is what introvert means if you learned the definition outside of a psych course focusing on Myers Briggs, which is actually the minority view definition. If you look at most dictionaries, the shrinking from social contacts definition is one of the definitions out there, often the first definition listed. Which is why it's kind of silly that folks claim they are introverted but that everybody else simply defines it wrong. In language, when you are the minority view you by definition are wrong. Why? Because the whole point of language is communication, and so if you adopt definitions most don't know or agree with (which is exactly what Myers Briggs did in a number of cases), you are creating a chasm between what you say and what people understand you to mean. So no, the technically correct usage is the one that most people use. The later, psych created view that never really caught on with the public, is what you are trying to latch on to. So yeah, in short you are wrong and I could care less about your late-comer definition that simply makes you look confused in most social circles. You tell someone you are introverted and they rightly get a certain picture. And then you try to tell them they don't know what the word, a word that has been in existence hundreds of years before the Myers Briggs folks were even born, means and you look more foolish still. Nuff said.
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Project much?
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Dude, you are calling the dictionary usage of a word technically incorrect, and then purporting to know what my response would be. By my count you are 0 for 2...
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If you do a google search, the term originated in the 1600s, and Jung ascribed his own definition to it a couple of hundred years later. This is more an example of psychology creating a new definition for an old word.
At any rate it's not reasonable to tell folks who are using a word in the way indicated in most lay dictionaries as the first definition that they are technically incorrect.
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Me three
Given the apparent controversy of the term and the fact that you posted about this possibly being a disadvantage, can we assume that you are generally shy? (Instead of the 'introvert' who can be 'on' and easily move through an interview day) What specific issues are you worried about?
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