Interviewing

The Hiring Interview: How to ensure accurate and consistent evaluation of candidates

by Robert Adams, AIMM Consulting, November, 2001, 2003

The first step in evaluating candidates is to make sure that you observe and document behavior during the interview. Write down important behaviors described by the candidate as soon as they occur and document only those behaviors that occur during the interview session. Do not evaluate during the interview - your role during this phase is to record and capture all relevant candidate responses.

Be careful about making inferences and conclusions about the candidate. If you do write down an inference or a conclusion (e.g., unorganized, not assertive), you should always support that inference or conclusion with a relevant descriptive behavior (e.g., ignored critical deadlines and did not communicate upcoming dates with her team, did not ask customers probing questions to get the whole picture). Relevant behaviors should be used as the basis for evaluations, not conclusions about vague traits or characteristics unrelated to the job.

Be aware of common rating errors and interviewer biases which may influence our judgment process. Some of the most common are halo effects (judging a candidate strong in many areas because he or she is strong in one area), stereotyping (judging a candidate because of the people or group with whom he or she is associated), similar-to-me (judging a candidate because he or she is believed to be like the interviewer), and central tendency (viewing all candidates as "middle of the road").

For each skill or competency, use performance standards and success criteria developed with the aid of subject matter experts to help you make accurate evaluations. This way, candidates will be evaluated by comparing their behavior against evaluation criteria, not against each other! Align the evaluation criteria with a traditional Likert scale of 1-5 or 1-3 with 5 or 3 equaling the highest performance. Behaviorally define each evaluation point (e.g., 1, 2, 3, etc.) with a performance description. Review your interview notes and compare the candidate responses to the Likert scale, noting the performance level of the behaviors (e.g., 1, 2, 3, etc.). Assign a numerical rating for each skill or competency.

Is This the Right Person for the Job?

by Robert Adams, AIMM Consulting, 1999 - 2003

The best way to know if the person you are interviewing has the skills, abilities, knowledge and attitude appropriate for the job is to ask the right questions. You want to pick a winner! Connect your questions with the critical skills, abilities, knowledge, and attitudes required for successful performance.

Prior to the interview, talk to job experts and high performers about the job requirements. Once these are identified and defined, write down some questions designed to uncover them during the interview. The best questions require the candidate to talk about past experiences, successes, and failures. You want to know more than whether the candidate can describe a skill or talk about a knowledge or subject area. You want to know if the candidate has demonstrated performance or applied the knowledge on-the-job consistent with the important competencies defined by your job experts and high performers. Require the candidate to be specific and behavioral by asking for examples of behavior and using follow-up questions. Remember, past performance is an excellent predictor of future performance in similar jobs or work roles.

We have listed what we think are good questions below. Please note that these are examples only. Your target job(s) may be quite different and may require different questions and skills, knowledge, etc. We want to work with you to ensure that the questions you ask and the skills you focus on in your interviews match your target job(s).

Examples:

Leading & Coaching

Describe a situation in which you achieved the most success in a leadership or coaching role working with others. Think of a situation where you were in charge or personally involved in a project, a team, or in solving a problem.
How did you see your role as a leader or a coach? How did you give feedback?
How did you ensure your success? What made you successful? Why do you say that?
How did you know when you achieved success?
What did you do after you achieved success?

Interpersonal Relations - Working With Others

Think about a time when you had to work closely with a person or a group. You may have worked with the person or the group as a leader, advisor, consultant, or customer. Please describe a specific situation or encounter that you remember as being challenging for you and critical to your success or the group's success.
Who initiated the interaction? How did they do this?
How did you communicate with them? What did you say?
Why was this interaction difficult or challenging for you?
What was the result of the interaction? What did you accomplish?

Developing Customer Service Teams

Describe a situation in which you and your work group had to work effectively with a customer.
Please explain your role in the situation.
How did you begin to work with the group?
What impact did your efforts have on the group? the customer?
What impact did the group's efforts have on the customer?
How did you know when you were successful or unsuccessful?
If unsuccessful, what did you do?

Please stay tuned for our upcoming feature: Is our interviewing process legal?

If you would like to know more about interviewing and our interviewing assessment programs, please contact us by email, info@aimmconsult.com or by phone, 1-800-965-AIMM (2466).