Google’s Interview Warmup helps job seekers prepare for interviews

As the competition for jobs intensifies, tech giant Google has gone live with the launch of its Interview Warmup, a tool that enables job seekers to practise answering interview questions to become more confident and comfortable with job interviews.

Announced in October 2022, at the second Google for Africa Event, the tool is designed to help Google Career Certificates learners prepare for job interviews, but it is also available for everyone to use.

Getting a job

Google said an average job listing in Africa attracts over 2 400 applicants showing that the chances of landing a job can be very difficult.

It said interviewing in a new field can also be hard especially when a job seeker does not have access to friends, family, or mentors in the field who can help them practise and prepare.

Google added that Interview Warmup enables job seekers to practise answering questions carefully selected by industry experts and uses machine learning developed by Google Research to transcribe their answers and help them discover ways to improve.

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How does it work?

Individuals preparing for interviews can simply start practising with a simple click on the homepage, choose the kind of job they are interviewing for, and then do a practice interview that consists of five randomly selected questions or individual interview questions.

Users will also be able to see insights: patterns detected by machine learning that can help them discover things about their answers.

These include job related terms, words used most often and talking points that are mentioned in each answer, so users can see how much time they spend talking about areas like their experience, skills and goals.

Technology to help

Mojolaoluwa Aderemi-Makinde, head of brand and reputation at Google Africa said the company is excited about the project.

“We are excited about Interview Warmup because it shows how new technologies have the potential to help young people in Africa and hone the skills needed to grow their careers. The tool can help create more opportunities for African job seekers.”

Growing population

Google said Africa has the youngest population in the world, with 70% of sub-Saharan Africa under the age of 30.  Many of them are creative and entrepreneurial, and over the next five years, 300 million people will come online in Africa.

“The digital exposure of young Africans will create opportunities to acquire digital skills through training to assist them in getting the right jobs. Just as important as it is for them to acquire digital skills, it is also important that they have the skills to successfully scale an interview session to land their dream jobs.”

Interview Warmup is available at grow.google/interview-warmup and can be accessed on the latest versions of Chrome on OSX, Windows, Android, as well as the latest version of Safari on iOS devices.

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