Don't Let Hiring Make You Crazy
I've spent a lot of hours over the last few days interviewing job applicants, and I have a few things to say. Job interviews are stressful for everybody and a skill like any other, which means the unfortunate human instinct to award a job to the best interviewer means that it's highly likely that the person who performs best in this weird situation and gets the job is not actually the best-qualified applicant or the one most likely to succeed. A job applicant who searches online for interview tips is going to get more suggestions than she knows what to do with, and that applicant is probably the best prepared and most anxious person in the room. An interview require an interviewer, though, and the only preparation that interviewer has had is probably an admonition from HR about the laundry list of things not to say. But a skilled interviewer can be as important to selecting a great applicant as is having a great applicant in the first place, so in that spirit, I'd like to offer a few suggestions to the people on the interviewers' side of the table.
- Do be friendly, welcoming, and, you know, human. If you're interviewing a well-qualified job applicant, she is in a position to be as choosy as you are. If you behave like an automaton or a jerk in an effort to prove a point or see how she handles the pressure, you're likely to either hire a masochist who doesn't mind being treated with undue suspicion or abrasiveness or lose out on a qualified applicant entirely when she chooses an employer who treats her like a real, live human who deserves respect. And if you're interviewing someone who is less than well-qualified, you've got bigger problems to address.
- Ask questions that actually address things that are relevant to the job. Questions that belong in left field, like asking an applicant to identify his spirit animal or tell you how windows there are in Manhattan, might give you a glimpse into his creativity and calm under pressure. Or they might just highlight his tolerance for absurd situations that waste his time. Similarly, if you're going down the well-trod road of behavior-based interview questions, make sure you understand what qualities or experiences you are trying to uncover and how this question relates to that goal. Otherwise, you're asking a talented job-seeker to tell you about a time when he had to make a decision under short deadlines and with insufficient information for no reason whatsoever other than your idle curiosity.
- Find a happy understanding with HR about guardrails and no-go zones. Although the guidance you receive from HR may be delivered with unquestioning certainty, human resources and human capital and talent management are all fields that are more art than science. The lived experience of everyone who has ever worked in large corporations is that if you don't like your HR officer's guidance, just ask another HR officer. So make sure you understand how you can probe for more information during interviews while staying out of any sort of potential legal jeopardy. Being too rule-bound to even ask a clarifying question disadvantages everyone in the room, while straying into truly inappropriate territory only risks your personal liability insurance policy.
- Don't put too much emphasis on the did-he-or-didn't-he question of applicant questions at the interview. Depending on the applicant, your company, and the position in question, the applicant may have done all the research needed ahead of time, and the absence of questions reflects outstanding preparation. On the other hand, even the best-prepared applicant may think of new questions or ideas during the interview and ask things that might surprise you. On top of that, interview experts are broadly split on the advice they offer applicants about whether to ask questions or stay silent. Sometimes a question is just a question; try not to read too much into this one.
