The Consultant Interview

Curriculum Vitae

You will fall at the first hurdle if you are searching for a consultant job with a poor CV. There are numerous websites providing tips and hints and all word processors come with a spell checker these days which must be used. I am always hesitant about berating peoples spelling and grammar too much when I am writing a web page but please get someone else to proof read your work.

These common errors are from www.monster.co.uk which has lots of excellent advice.

   1. Spelling Errors, Typos and Poor Grammar
   2. Too Duty-Oriented
   3. Inaccurate Dates or None at All
   4. Inaccurate or Missing Contact Information
   5. Poor Formatting
   6. Functional CVs
   7. Long CVs
   8. Long Paragraphs
   9. Unqualified Candidates
10. Personal Information Unrelated to the Job

You cannot proof read your own work. These days with spell checkers everywhere the commonest mistakes is misspelling words which are still spelt like other words, missing 's's of words and poor grammar. If English is not your first language it is imperative to get someone to check your sentence structure and general syntax.

The other common mistake especially in non-English speakers' CVs that I have proof read is poor use of capitals. Only capitalise the first work of new sentences, proper nouns, and titles when they are being used with a person's name. So capitalise 'Dr. Smith' but not 'the doctor will see you now'. In titles (for example publications) capitalise all words except articles (a, an, the), prepositions under five letters (in, of, to), and coordinating conjunctions (and, but).

The format of my own CV (though not the information) is available for download below - feel free to download and modify it for your own use.

Curriculum Vitae

It is certainly good practice to keep your cv updated regularly - sometimes it is needed at fairly short notice (research proposal, ethics committee, PYA).

Consultant Interview Questions

Administrative

Do you have any changes to make to your CV?
When are you available from?
Do you have any courses booked?
How many jobs have you previously applied for?
Do you have any other job applications in at present?
Why didn’t you apply for our previous post?
Do you have a driving license?
Have you looked around?
Have you met any of the panel members?
Do you have any questions?

Personal

Why should we give you this job?
Why do you want this job?
What makes you good for this job?

Where do you see yourself in 10 years time?
Why did you become a doctor?
When did you decide to become a geriatrician?
Why did you want to concentrate on stroke medicine?
Do you want mainly to be a geriatrician?
What qualities make a good consultant geriatrician?

What would you see as your role in this department?
What is your special interest in this department?
What can you offer this Trust?
How would you develop the stroke service?
What would you bring to this unit?
How would your appointment raise the profile of this Trust?

What are your strengths/weaknesses?
What is your biggest fault?
What makes you angry?

What do you think of moving area?
How do you feel about living in ……………?
What do you do in your free time?
Tell us of a recent triumph/disappointment?

Training

How does your previous training fit you for this job?
What training do you think you should have to become a consultant geriatrician?
Take me through your training so far?
Why did you do a BSc, MSc?
How has it helped you in your working life?
Do you see any deficiencies in your training?
Is there any post you regret not doing as an SHO?

What courses have you attended recently?
Was it useful?
What courses would you like to attend?

Should hospital consultants have spent some time as GPs?
Who should provide management training?
In what way was the management course that you attended useful?
What do you think of SpR training with respect to general medicine/geriatric medicine?
How would you improve the training of SpRs?
How do we attract the best junior doctors to this trust given the advent of MMC?

Politics

What is clinical governance?
What is NICE?
Was the NSF for Older People a helpful document? How?
What is your opinion of our last Health Care Commission report?
What do you know about the recent NHS White Paper?
What do you think of payment by results in geriatric medicine?
What is your opinion of the recent GMC publication?
What have we learnt from the Bristol heart cases?
How has the Alder Hey scandal changed practice?

Do you think the increased spending on the NHS has been put to good use?
How does foundation status help patients?
Why is acute medicine busier these days?
How should we measure consultant productivity?
What do you feel about the burden of proof shifting to that of civil courts for doctors?

What do you think of the mission statement of our trust?
How will the NHS reforms affect you in your daily practice?
How would you ration healthcare?
Is there any limit to the demand for health care?
What is the future for geriatric medicine?

How can we ensure patients from ethnic minorities receive proper access to health care?

Are junior doctors’ hours now too short?
How will MMC impact upon geriatric medicine?
What do you think of the new consultant contract?
What is your opinion of the GMS contract for GPs?

What do you think about the super-specialisation of geriatrics?
What is the role of NHS consultants in teaching hospitals?
Does general medicine exist anymore?

What do you think about private practice?
How involved should doctors be in management?
What do you think about the CEA awards system?

Management

What are the main roles of a multidisciplinary team leader?
What is the role of a consultant geriatrician as a manager?
What do you know about resource management?
How should intermediate care services be organised?
Are Day Hospitals an expensive luxury?
What are the advantages of Day Hospitals?
What is the biggest area of waste in the NHS?

How would you deal with a 10% cut in your budget?
How would you pay for a new piece of equipment if no new money was obviously available?
How would you spend a £20000 one off grant?

What are the components of a complaints procedure?
How would you assess user satisfaction with your service?
How would you define quality in geriatrics?

What do you know of clinical governance?
What is the difference between audit and governance?
What clinical audits have you done?
Who should appraise you?
How should revalidation be undertaken?

How would you reduce the number of acute admissions?
How might you cut waiting times in your clinic?
If you could change one thing in the NHS what would it be?

What is your management style?
How would you persuade the PCT to continue to purchase your service?

How would you deal with an underperforming colleague?
How would you deal with a colleague who turned up for work drunk?
What would you do if you strongly disagreed with a colleague’s decision?

Teaching

What did you last teach to nurses?
What’s wrong with undergraduate education?
What in geriatrics are the three main take home messages you would want to pass onto undergraduates?
How would you make clinical meetings more appealing?
What will you present on your first grand round?
What is the purpose of a College Tutor?
What makes a good educational supervisor?

How should continuing education for consultants be arranged?
What is the role of a supervisor for an MD/PhD?
How do you see your teaching role with respect to SHOs and SpRs?
Do you find the presence of undergraduates in your clinic a hindrance?

Research

Do you have any current research interests?
How is research relevant to clinical medicine?
Why did you do an MSc?
Explain your MSc in a few short sentences for the interview panel.
What have you presented at an external meeting recently?

What journals do you read?
Tell us about a recent article that caught your eye?
What is the most important advance in geriatric medicine in the last 10 years?

How would you pursue your research interests in this job?
Have you been allocated enough sessions for research in your job plan?
If you haven’t got any research to show after a year should we reduce your salary by 2.5 SPAs?

Do you feel it is important to have published research as a clinician?
Why are you not the 1st author on more research?

Explain how research differs from audit?

Clinical Topics

Can you give an example of where you have encouraged good team working?

What are the current controversies in your field?
What are the main recent developments?

What constitutes an acceptable delay in diagnosis?
Should ‘geriatric’ patients be for resuscitation?
What is the place of palliative care in geriatric medicine?

In which areas do you need more experience?

Who should manage a patient with a stroke?

Closing Questions

Do you have any questions for us?
Would you accept this job if it was offered to you?

consultant interview