| May/June
2004
Most
Effective or Least Offensive?
MORE
AND MORE INTERVIEW PANELS OPT FOR THE SAFE CHOICE
WHAT
BEGAN AS A DREAM SEARCH turned into a recruiter’s worst
nightmare. The top candidate for Marketing Director of the
company’s consumer products division had impeccable
credentials, understood branding like few other individuals
in the universe and was a natural leader. Highly recommended
by the outside search consultant and by numerous references,
he had survived tough interviews with the vice president to
whom he would report, as well as a senior HR professional.
Now it was time to meet the other division officers.
All went
well until he walked into the office of the division’s
legal counsel, who said, “I think I’ve met you
before.” As she told the division president later that
day, she would never forget the rude individual who had sat
next to her on a long flight to Tokyo – resisting all
attempts at conversation.
The following
morning, the search consultant received the bad news from
his disappointed client. The company would pass on Mr. Right.
When
Saying ‘No’ Beats Saying ‘Yes’
Here
are the three immutable laws of corporate job interviews:
(1) Résumés are twice as likely to rule candidates
out as to rule them in. (2) Spots appear on ties and blouses,
no matter how carefully a candidate eats lunch. (3) Introduce
a candidate to enough people, and someone will be rubbed the
wrong way.
Given
those immutable laws, confirmed by years of careful observation,
it is amazing that any job candidate survives the interviewing
and hiring process. Moreover, in recent years – and
for several reasons – the situation has grown worse.
First,
many managers today feel under intense pressure not to
make a wrong decision. The negative construction of the
previous sentence is deliberate. With companies of all sizes
and stripes having slogged their way through the 2001-2003
recession and with numerous positions hovering on the brink
of elimination, the emphasis in corporations everywhere has
been on avoiding mistakes – not on taking risks. If
one doesn’t want the proverbial axe to fall, the safest
choice is not to stick one’s neck out too far. And that
applies to hiring, as well as to every other business decision.
Second,
many managers wrongly believe that there is currently
an almost infinite supply of good people “out there”
– so one should not rush into any hiring decision. That
line of reasoning is almost as specious as the statement in
a well-known HR publication that demographics are wrong about
the forthcoming shortage of employees – since no one
will be able to afford to retire! (Now that will result in
highly motivated workers.) But whether demographics lie or
tell the truth, hiring managers can rely on the fact that
good people – i.e., those who would receive an A in
a Topgrading ranking – are always in short supply and
are rarely among the unemployed.
Nonetheless,
the penchant to avoid sticking one’s neck out leads
to wanting to hire by committee (so that no one takes all
the blame), while the belief in infinitely long unemployment
lines results in an unquenchable thirst to see more candidates
before reaching a decision.
Do
Interview Panels Work?
Interview
panels have been around for ever and ever and are certainly
not a creature of the past few years. But while they may be
a fact of life, that fact alone does not validate their helpfulness
or prove that they are used as wisely today as yesterday.
In the
dim past, somewhere in the middle of the last century, enlightened
employers regarded the on-site interview day as an opportunity
for the company to sell itself to the candidate, as well as
vice versa. “You will love working here,” the
employers said, “and today you will get to meet some
of the reasons why.” So the job candidate, in addition
to being grilled by the hiring manager and the hiring manager’s
boss, got to meet some of the line and staff people with whom
he or she would interact. Those individuals were certainly
encouraged to pass along any opinions, pro or con, but they
weren’t directly part of the hiring decision.
By the
1980s, as many employers became more self-centered, the “sell
ourselves to the candidate” philosophy fell by the wayside,
and interviewing took on a harder edge. The on-site visit
became more like running the gauntlet, pummeled by corporate
warriors who viewed their mission as penetrating a candidate’s
defenses. (“What do you see as your most serious shortcoming?”)
The ultimate torture was to have the candidate interviewed
by the panel all at once, somewhat like the Spanish Inquisition,
to determine how well the individual performed “under
pressure.”
Most
recently, in the current century, Sanford Rose Associates
has observed an increasing tendency at more than a few companies
to use interview panels as the ultimate committee –
where everyone has veto power and no one takes all the blame.
In addition to the “safety in numbers” protection
that committees offer, the interview panel now provides the
perfect excuse to keep looking for as long as it takes. Why
accept a blemish, if somewhere there is a blemish-free person?
But here’s
the rub when interview panels become decision by committee:
- People
with absolutely no responsibility for the success of the
open position are able to veto strong choices for weak reasons.
- The
focus shifts from what makes a person right (inclusion)
to what makes the person wrong (exclusion). And,
- Employers
end up making offers to the least offensive candidates,
not the most effective.
How
To Do It Better
As various
employment experts have noted, past performance is the best
predictor of future performance – at least for people,
if not mutual funds. So if you need someone to solve productivity
problems, look for someone who has de-bottlenecked plants.
The problem is that saying so does not necessarily make it
so, which has led to the concept of performance-based interviewing
– a process akin to peeling an onion:
“I
see you increased productivity by 42 percent last year –
very impressive! Exactly how did you accomplish such a feat?
Was your boss involved? What about your employees? Were you
part of a team, or did you have full personal responsibility?
What sort of obstacles did you face, and how did you overcome
them? (Etc.)”
That
kind of questioning, mapped out in advance, might require
most or all of a morning. One recommended approach is to have
two people conduct the interview – the hiring manager
and an HR representative (with one asking questions and the
other taking notes). A social lunch follows, and the afternoon
consists of get-to-know-you interviews with some potential
future colleagues.
There
are no “right” or “wrong” interviewing
methods. Indeed, if the prospective employee will make frequent
presentations to the Management Committee or Board of Directors,
then a group interview may be just what the doctor ordered.
But no
matter what the specific methodology, wise employers will
keep in mind that the responsibility for hiring should remain
centered on the person or persons with ultimate personal responsibility
for the success or failure of the new employee. Dissenting
opinions from other members of an interview panel obviously
should be considered and, if widely shared, acted upon. However,
the interview panel that never met a veto it didn’t
like runs a grave risk of hiring bland, mediocre people.
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