|
Opportunities
Manage interview time efficiently to get the right hire
Organisations need efficient performers to reach desired heights of success. Selecting good candidates who can thrive on the job is often a major challenge faced by organisations. An elaborate screening and selection process does not always guarantee success in this regard. Hiring mistakes prove to be very costly. Performance problems, productivity issues and attrition are the inevitable outcome of poor hiring decisions.
An interviewer often has a limited time of half an hour to one hour to assess a candidate. Within this short time he has to gather relevant information to predict the candidate’s success on the job. Interviewers who are not properly trained lack the ability to manage this limited amount of time efficiently. They are not focussed enough and devote more time to every thing else other than measuring the candidate’s ability to perform the job. A common folly often committed by the interviewers is to devote a major chunk of the time to introduction, small talk, description of the organisation, the culture and the job roles and responsibilities. They are left with little time to actually assess the competence of the candidate. Personal judgement rather than solid information about a candidate’s efficiency forms the basis for the hiring decision.
In order to make good hiring decisions, it is necessary to train the hiring managers and more importantly the direct supervisors who conduct technical interviews on how to manage the interview process effectively. They should be given guidelines that help them devote maximum time to measure the candidates’ ability and performance on the job. Information about the organisation and the job role can be communicated through other means such as the company web site. They should be enlightened on some common interview traps. For example, a candidate might demonstrate an energetic communication style but to assume that he will have the same positive approach on the job can be a mistake. The candidate is no doubt showing interest in getting the job but to know if he will be able to do a good job you must probe deeper. Similarly candidates who demonstrate knowledge about the company often impress the interviewers. This reveals the candidate’s preparedness for the interview and not necessarily his competence to perform well on the job. Many a times the interviewers allow the candidates to set standards. Instead of evaluating each candidate objectively with respect to the job requirements, they compare the candidates with each other and select the best out of them. An incompetent candidate appears to be competent if the overall competence of the applicant pool is low.
If you as a manager are responsible to select good people into your team here are some tips to make good hiring decisions:
• Know what you should look for in a candidate: Clearly define the performance standards and goals that the incumbent of the job should meet. List the tasks that differentiate performance among the employees. Analyse in what way your good performers handle challenges on the job. Based on this information frame the attributes and competencies necessary for a candidate to be selected for the post.
• Give weight to the unique challenges in your organisation: A candidate may be a star performer in his previous job but before you decide to hire him check if the conditions under which he has attained success are similar to those present in your organisation. If has to face completely different challenges in your organisation then he may not be as successful as he was in his previous jobs.
• Do not beat around the bush: Asking non-job related questions to predict on the job performance often yields poor results. Prepare a list of unique requirements of the job or the challenges likely to be faced on the job. Test the candidate’s ability to handle these challenges. Base your questions on the criteria used in your organisation to assess the day-to-day performance of your employees.
• Avoid subjectivity: Avoid making decisions on the basis of first impressions and intuition. Select employees on the basis of their ability to perform well on the job rather than their ability to interview well.
A well managed interview process that targets at solid information to predict on the job performance often results in better employment decisions, reduced turnover and recruiting costs.
faqs@cnkonline.com
N. PURNIMA SRIKRISHNA
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Opportunities
|
