I often tell my career success coach clients that business meals are not about the food.  They are about the conversation.  Tweet 75 in my latest career advice book Success Tweets says, “Learn and use simple table manners.  Good manners make you look polished and poised.”

The other day, I saw a great article by Kirk Baumann on the Corn on the Job blog.  It was about how to handle job interviews over lunch.  Check it out…

For recruiters or hiring managers, the lunch interview gives them additional perspective and insight into the “real you”.  People can memorize GREAT answers to the toughest interview questions; having a phenomenal resume, even appearing to have excellent communication skills can only get you so far.  The lunch interview (or dinner – whatever) puts you to the test.

It’s designed for two reasons:

1. To allow the recruiter or hiring manager to get to know you on a more personal level.

2. To see how you react to situations out of your comfort zone or element.  You’re not in the office conference room with the interviewer or a panel.  You’re in a much different setting with all kinds of variables to throw you off your game.

A few tips to help you make the most of your lunch:

• Bring a notepad and something to write with – just because it’s lunch doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be taking notes
• Be polite to the host, wait staff, ANYONE you interact with at the restaurant – people are watching and listening.  I’ve even known hiring managers to arrive late and ask the staff about their interaction just to test the candidate.  NOTE: Wait for the interviewer to arrive before being seated.
• Know before you go – check the restaurant’s menu ahead of time.  Most are online these days.  If you have dietary restrictions or are watching calories, you’ll have plenty of time to pour over the menu.  Select 2-3 (just in case the restaurant doesn’t have your first choice) dishes that look good and keep them in mind when ordering.  Be prepared and know what you want – you’ll  make a good impression.
• Order something simple – the point is to land the job.  You can order the rack of ribs during your celebration dinner afterwards.  Stick to things that can be eaten easily with a knife and fork.  I’d also recommend water or other non-alcoholic beverages.  If the host orders wine, politely decline. 

Kirk is right on with this post.  A recruiter friend once told me the story of a young man who lost a sales position with a very prestigious company because he did not know the proper way to eat a foil wrapped baked potato. 

The proper way, by the way, is to cut into the potato with the foil on, open the potato, add condiments (butter, sour cream etc.) and eat the potato while it is still in the foil, leaving the foil and potato skin on your plate when you are finished.  The young man  removed the potato from the foil, balled up the foil and placed it on the table.

I think that the sales manager who decided not to hire this oung man was a bit impulsive.  If he was an otherwise outstanding candidate, I’m sure that once he was told how to properly eat a foil wrapped baked potato, he would not have repeated the mistake.  Unfortunately, he lost the job because of this gaffe.

There is some great career advice here through.  If you know basic table manners, you won’t have to worry about faux pas like this.  And, you’ll be comfortable at the lunch or dinner table because you’ll be able to focus on the conversation, not on worrying about the rules of dining etiquette.

Business meals provide you with a great opportunity to make a positive personal impact. They also can be disasters waiting to happen.  If you know and follow the simple rules of dining etiquette you’ll be fine. 

Here’s an embarrassing business dining story from my youth that goes to Kirk’s point about ordering something simple…

About 30 years ago, I had just accepted a job as the Training Manager for a division of a large company. Our division was located in New Haven, CT, a city with a large Italian population and a lot of great Italian restaurants.

About a month after I began my job, the VP of Human Resources for the corporation was hosting a two-day meeting of all of the senior HR people in the company at our location. Since the meeting was at our location, junior people like me were invited to a dinner held the evening of the first day of the meeting. I was looking forward to this dinner.  It was an opportunity for me to impress some senior people in other divisions.

One of my junior colleagues was a local woman. She was excited about the choice of the restaurant. Of course it was an Italian restaurant. She had been there on special occasions with her husband. She was very fond of a dish called zuppa de pesce, a medley of seafood served over spaghetti. A couple of days before the meeting she told me about that this dish and that it was available for two only and asked if I would be willing to share it with her. I said, “Sure.”

We arrived at the restaurant, and sure enough, zuppa de pesce was on the menu. My friend and I ordered it. What a disaster!

First the waiters brought lobster bibs for both of us. No one else had ordered this dish, so we were the only ones wearing our bibs. When the food arrived, everyone had a dish of pasta, or some grilled fish, or a steak. The zuppa de pesce was served on a silver tray so big that the waiters had to bring a side table for it. There was enough fish and pasta to feed the entire table. My friend dug in and really enjoyed her dinner. I felt like I was a character in The Godfather.

I spent my time trying to carry on an intelligent conversation with people I wanted to impress while I was wearing a lobster bib and working hard to make sure that I didn’t spill any red sauce, or “gravy,” as the waiter called it, on my suit. 

I didn’t lose any points that night – but I didn’t make any either.  It was pretty apparent to most people that I was there for the food, not for the conversation.

I learned a lesson that day. Always order something that is easy to eat and don’t call attention to you as you eat it. I try to be a good friend, and in social situations, I will often share an entrée that is available for two only – but I never do that in a business situation.  Because business dinners are not about the food.  They’re about the conversation.

The common sense career success coach point here is simple.  Business meals are not about the food.  They’re about the conversation.  That means you need to follow the career advice in Tweet 75 in Success Tweets.  “Learn and use simple table manners.  Good manners make you look polished and poised.”  You want to look polished and poised during business meals.  If you know the rules, you’ll be able to spend time focusing on the conversation – not worrying about which fork to use.  As Kirk Baumann points out in his guest post on the Corn on the Job blog, this career advice is even more important when you are being interviewed over lunch or dinner.

That’s my take on the Kirk Baumann’s career advice on lunch interviews in his guest post on Corn on the Job.  What’s yours?  Do you have any funny stories about business meals?  If so, please take a minute and share them with us in a comment.  As always, thanks for reading these musings on life and career success.

Bud

I’m still writing about the ideas in my new career success coach book, Success Tweets: 140 Bits of Common Sense Career Success Advice, All in 140 Characters or Less.  I have a little less than 100 more blog posts to go to further explain each of the tweets in Success Tweets.  When I’m finished, you’ll have an in depth discussion on each of the 141 tweets in Success Tweets.  You can get a free copy of the eBook at www.SuccessTweets.com.  Hard copies of the book are available on Amazon.com and your local bookstore.

Today’s career success coach post is on Tweet 47…

Act.  Feel the fear and do it anyways.  That the definition of courage, and a great way to build your self confidence.

I subscribe to Sharon Melnick’s online newsletter.  In a recent post, she made several interesting points about confidence.

Confidence will help you be flexible.  You will consider all alternatives and options.

Confidence will help you follow through on ideas that you might otherwise talk yourself out of.

Confidence will help you be persistent – and hold on you your vision for your life.

She’s right.  Confidence is the foundation of all success.  Without it, you will have a difficult time creating the life and career success you want and deserve.  To build your self confidence, you have to be optimistic, face your fears and act, and surround yourself with positive people.

Fear is a confidence and career success killer.  Elbert Hubbard, the author of “A Message to Garcia” (http://budbilanich.com/garcia) one of the best essays on personal responsibility ever written, has some great things to say about facing your fears.

“The greatest mistake you can make is continually fearing that you will make one.”

Read that again.  Those 14 words are powerful!  They are some fundamental career advice.

If you let your fear of making a mistake stop you from taking action, you will never take any action.  Your fear will ruin and any chance of creating the career success you want and deserve.

In 1988 I was ready to start my career success coach and speaking business.  I was afraid.  I was worried that I wouldn’t succeed.   I had always worked for large companies.   I wasn’t sure I knew exactly what to do to run a successful career success coach business. 

Nevertheless, I looked my fear in the eye, quit my job and moved forward.  22 years later, I’m still at it.  My fears were unfounded – but at the time, they were real and could have held me back.  I’m glad I faced them and acted.

Fear is persistent.  It doesn’t go away.  It will wait for one of your weak moments and then it will strike.  If you let it get the best of you, you’ll never move forward nor create the life and career success you want and deserve.

Fear often manifests itself in procrastination.  When I find myself procrastinating, I always ask myself, “What are you afraid of here, Bud?”  Identifying what I fear always help me defeat it.  Once I identify what I am afraid of, I can take positive steps to move forward  — to get past my fear and on to career success.

Make a list of your doubts and fears.  Decide what you can do to overcome them.  Then act.  Take at least one positive action – no matter how small — every day to overcome your doubts and fears.  Even if these actions don’t work out as well as you hope, you will be on the road to overcoming your fears and creating the life and career success you want and deserve.

Remember – procrastination feeds fear; action cures it.  The choice is up to you.  I choose action.  My best career advice says you should too.

The common sense career success coach point here is simple.  Successful people are self confident.   Self confident people don’t let their fears get in the way of their success.  They follow the career advice in Tweet 47 in Success Tweets.  “Act.  Feel the fear and do it anyway.  That’s the definition of courage, and a great way to build your self confidence.”  Identify your fears, and then do what you need to do to move past them.  Action is the great antidote to fear.  It puts inertia on your side.  Once you are moving forward, you are likely to continue moving forward.  It’s the first step that is the hardest – and scariest.  If you want to beat your fears, you need to take the first step — act, and then keep on going.

That’s my take on the career advice in Tweet 47 in Success Tweets; and on fear and self confidence.  What’s yours?  Please leave a comment sharing your thoughts.  Also, please share your personal stories of triumph over fear.  As always, thanks for reading.

Bud