Insight Blog

In last week’s blog post, Interviewing Candidates Effectively I: Preparing For Interviews, the main point was that an effective and productive interview process begins with preparing appropriately before candidate interviews even begin. By putting forth an effort to properly prepare, you make the time spent interviewing candidates well worth it.

Now let's discuss what you, as a hiring executive, need to do during interviews to enhance your process and to support the hiring of employees who will be successful within your organization and its culture, and in the role itself.

Always begin interviews on a personal note as this will put candidates at ease, which will provide you a truer representation of their personalities. You may also want to outline how interviews are being conducted so that candidates know what to expect.

Focus your attention, listen to candidates and observe their body language. Analyze the content of their responses and also be attuned to their tone and speed of communicating, their movements and energy level.

Consider:

• Are they confident?
• Do they seem prepared and are they truly considering the questions prior to responding?
• Does your opportunity support their goals?
• Do they view themselves objectively and are they self-critical in a positive way? These attributes are correlated with their emotional intelligence. 

Do not make judgments or develop opinions for at least 30 minutes. If you do, your first impressions of candidates may be based upon personal biases, presentation, chemistry and stereotypes. This may cause you to overlook candidates’ real experiences, talents and capabilities.

At the appropriate time, address the extraneous intangibles of candidates such as: commute time, children/schools, leisure activities and hobbies that may affect their schedules and their spouses’ / significant others’ support of a career change. Be careful to pose these questions within legal parameters.

Allow candidates to ask their own questions. Keep in mind that, many times, candidates can better illustrate their skills and capabilities through the questions they ask.

After questions have been addressed by both parties, now comes a critical part of the interview process that many hiring managers forget - “selling” your organization and its opportunity. Keep in mind that, as a hiring manager, the impression you make upon candidates directly correlates to your organization’s ability to hire high-caliber professionals. And these candidates are in demand in almost every industry so they need to be attracted.

To accomplish this, Make candidates feel special and show your excitement about the potential for them to join your organization.

Describe the role as an opportunity and not just a position with responsibilities. Elaborate on how it impacts the department and entire organization.

Be truthful about the challenges of the role. Candidates respect honesty as they know that every company has room for improvement.

Outline how the role is incentivized and its bonus structure.

Discuss your organization’s:

• Structure
• Financial status and profitability
• Ability to differentiate itself from its competition
• Growth opportunities and planned strategies
• Succession planning
• Corporate culture
• Special benefits (i.e. 401k matching, paid time off, flexible work hours, educational reimbursement)

Consider why you enjoy working for your employer and express that to candidates.

Discuss the characteristics of your most successful employees. Show them the work environment of the position.

Prepare information for candidates to take home and review (i.e. company brochure, benefits information) Other ideas include: Meet with candidates outside of the office at a neutral location, which can make interviews feel more personable. Give a tour of your office and introduce candidates to some employees. If an interview goes well, allow the candidate to contact you directly with questions.

After interviews: Immediately following interviews, take a few minutes to write down a summary of your thoughts. Make specific notes that will help distinguish candidates from each other. If there were multiple interviewers, make the process more efficient and productive by having a meeting within a few days of the interviews to discuss potential candidates.

Keep candidates informed of the hiring time frame and their status. Make final decisions within a reasonable time as upper-tier professionals may be entertaining multiple offers. Delaying a decision can cause a candidate to view you and your organization as indecisive or disinterested and it may result in them accepting an offer with another organization.