1. Interviewing Candidates7
Interviewing Candidates
Chapter 6 focused on important tools managers use to select employees. Now we’ll turn to one of these tools—interviewing candidates. The main topics we’ll cover include types of interviews, things that undermine interviewing’s usefulness, and designing and conducting effective selection interviews.
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2. Learning Objectives List the main types of selection interviews.
List and explain the main errors that can undermine an interview’s usefulness.
Define a structured situational interview.
After we complete this chapter, you will be able to:
List the main types of selection interviews.
List and explain the main errors that can undermine an interview’s usefulness.
Define a structured situational interview.
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3. Learning Objectives
Explain and illustrate each guideline for being a more effective interviewer.
Give several examples of situational questions, behavioral questions, and background questions that provide structure.
In addition, you will be able to:
Explain and illustrate each guideline for being a more effective interviewer.
Give several examples of situational questions, behavioral questions, and background questions that provide structure.
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4. Basic Features of Interviews
An interview
A procedure designed to obtain information from a person through oral responses to oral inquiries
Types of interviews
Selection interview
Appraisal interview
Exit interview
Interviews formats
Structured
Unstructured

5. Types of Interviews Selection interview Appraisal interview
A selection procedure designed to predict future job performance on the basis of applicants’ oral responses to oral inquiries.
Appraisal interview
A discussion, following a performance appraisal, in which supervisor and employee discuss the employee’s rating and possible remedial actions.
Exit interview
An interview to elicit information about the job or related matters to the employer some insight into what’s right or wrong about the firm.
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6. Basic Types of Interviews
Structured vs. unstructured
Questions to ask
Situational
Behavioral
Job-related
Stress
Puzzle questions
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7. Basic Types of Interviews
In unstructured (or nondirective) interviews, the manager follows no set format.
In structured (or directive) interviews, the employer lists the questions ahead of time. He or she also may even list and score possible answers for appropriateness.
Structured interviews are generally superior. In structured interviews, all interviewers generally ask all applicants the same questions.
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9. Interview Content: Types of Questions
Situational interview
A series of job-related questions that focus on how the candidate would behave in a given situation.
Behavioral interview
A series of job-related questions that focus on how they reacted to actual situations in the past.
Job-related interview
A series of job-related questions that focus on relevant past job-related behaviors.

10. Interview Content: Types of Questions
Stress interview
An interview in which the interviewer seeks to make the applicant uncomfortable with occasionally rude questions that supposedly to spot sensitive applicants and those with low or high stress tolerance.
Puzzle questions
Recruiters for technical, finance, and other types of jobs use questions to pose problems requiring unique (“out-of-the-box”) solutions to see how candidates think under pressure.

11. Administering Interviews
Panel
Phone
Video/web-assisted
Computerized
Second Life
Speed dating
Case interviews
Employers also administer interviews in various ways. These include one-on-one or by a panel of interviewers, sequentially or all at once, and computerized or personally. In an unstructured sequential interview, each interviewer generally just asks questions as they come to mind. In a structured sequential interview, each interviewer rates the candidates on a standard evaluation form, using standardized questions.
A panel interview is an interview conducted by a team of interviewers who interview each candidate and then combine their ratings into a final panel score. Employers do some interviews entirely by telephone. These can actually be more accurate than face-to-face interviews for judging an applicant’s conscientiousness, intelligence, and interpersonal skills.
Firms have long used the Web to do selection interviews.With iPad-type video functionalities and the widespread use of Skype™, their use is growing.
A computerized interview is one in which a job candidate’s oral and/or computerized replies are obtained in response to questions and/or situations.
Several employers such as Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard use the online virtual community Second Life to conduct job interviews. Others have tried a “speed dating” model wherein candidates visit briefly with selected employees.
Finally, Bain & Company uses case interviews as part of its candidate selection process.
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12. Administering Interviews
In an unstructured sequential interview, each interviewer generally just asks questions as they come to mind. In a structured sequential interview, each interviewer rates the candidates on a standard evaluation form, using standardized questions.
A panel interview is an interview conducted by a team of interviewers who interview each candidate and then combine their ratings into a final panel score.
Employers do some interviews entirely by telephone. These can actually be more accurate than face-to-face interviews for judging an applicant’s conscientiousness, intelligence, and interpersonal skills.
Copyright © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. Publishing as Prentice Hall

13. Administering Interviews
Firms have long used the Web to do selection interviews. With iPad-type video functionalities and the widespread use of Skype, their use is growing.
A computerized interview is one in which a job candidate’s oral and/or computerized replies are obtained in response to questions and/or situations.
Several employers such as Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard use the online virtual community Second Life to conduct job interviews. Others have tried a “speed dating” model wherein candidates visit briefly with selected employees.
Finally, some companies use case interviews as part of its candidate selection process.
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14. Three Ways to Make the Interview Useful
Structure the interview
Carefully select traits to assess
Beware of committing interviewing errors
Structured interviews are more valid than unstructured interviews for predicting job performance. This is especially true for structured interviews using situational questions
To reduce interview errors, limit yourself mostly to situational and job knowledge questions. This will help you assess how the candidate will actually respond to typical situations on that job.
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15. Errors that Undermine Interviews
Snap judgments
Job requirements
Candidate-order & pressure to hire
Nonverbal behavior & impression management
Personal characteristics
Interviewer mistakes
Perhaps the most consistent finding is that interviewers tend to jump to conclusions—make snap during the first few minutes of the interview. Sometimes this occurs before the interview starts, based on test scores or résumé data.
Interviewers may not have an accurate picture of the job requirements and what sort of candidate is best suited for it. If that’s the case, they may make their decisions based on incorrect impressions or stereotypes of what a good applicant is.
Candidate-order error means the order in which you see applicants affects how you rate them. There is some indication that the effects of primacy (who you interviewed first) or recency (most recently interviewed) can impact your decisions.
The applicant’s nonverbal behavior can also have a surprisingly large impact on his or her rating. Interviewers infer your personality from your nonverbal behaviors in the interview. Clever candidates capitalize on non-verbal behavior and impression management. One study found that some used ingratiation to persuade interviewers to like them. Psychologists call using techniques like ingratiation and self-promotion “impression management.”
Unfortunately, physical attributes such as applicants’ attractiveness, gender, disability, or race also may distort an interviewer’s assessments.
Interviewers may make numerous mistakes such as:
Having favorable pre-interview impressions
Playing district attorney or amateur psychologist
Asking improper questions
Being inept

16. Factors Affecting Interviews
First impressions
The tendency for interviewers to jump to conclusions—make snap judgments—about candidates during the first few minutes of the interview.
Negative bias: unfavorable information about an applicant influences interviewers more than does positive information.

17. Factors Affecting Interviews (cont’d)
Misunderstanding the job
Not knowing precisely what the job entails and what sort of candidate is best suited causes interviewers to make decisions based on incorrect stereotypes of what a good applicant is.
Candidate-order error
An error of judgment on the part of the interviewer due to interviewing one or more very good or very bad candidates just before the interview in question.

18. Factors Affecting Interviews (cont’d)
Nonverbal behavior and impression management
Interviewers’ inferences of the interviewee’s personality from the way he or she acts in the interview have a large impact on the interviewer’s rating of the interviewee.
Clever interviewees attempt to manage the impression they present to persuade interviewers to view them more favorably.

19. Factors Affecting Interviews (cont’d)
Effect of personal characteristics: attractiveness, gender, race
Interviewers tend have a less favorable view of candidates who are:
Physically unattractive
Female
Of a different racial background
Disabled

20. Factors Affecting Interviews (cont’d)
Interviewer behaviors affecting interview outcomes
Inadvertently telegraphing expected answers.
Talking so much that applicants have no time to answer questions.
Letting the applicant dominate the interview.
Acting more positively toward a favored (or similar to the interviewer) applicant.

21. Review
Errors that undermine an interview’s usefulness include jumping to conclusions, not having accurate job requirements or the order in which candidates are interviewed. Non-verbal behavior, personal characteristics and physical attributes also create errors. Interviewers may make numerous mistakes such as playing district attorney or amateur psychologist or asking improper questions
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22. How to Conduct an Effective Interview
There are 8 steps to conducting an effective interview
Make sure you know the job: Do not start the interview unless you understand the job and what human skills you’re looking for. Study the job description.
Structure the interview: Base questions on actual job duties. Use job knowledge, situational, or behavioral questions, and know the job to be able to evaluate the interviewee’s answers. Use descriptive rating scales (excellent, fair, poor) to rate answers. If possible, use a standardized interview form.
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23. How to Conduct an Effective Interview
3. Get organized: Hold the interview in a private room where telephone calls are not accepted and you can minimize interruptions.
4. Establish rapport: The main reason for the interview is to find out about the applicant. To do this, start by putting the person at ease. Greet the candidate and start the interview by asking a noncontroversial question, perhaps about the weather or the traffic conditions that day. Also, let the candidate know what the timeframe is for the interview.
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24. How to Conduct an Effective Interview
Ask questions: Try to follow the situational, behavioral, and job knowledge questions you wrote out ahead of time.
Take notes: Take brief, unobtrusive notes while conducting the interview. Doing so may help avoid making a snap decision early in the interview, and may also help jog your memory once the interview is complete.
Close the interview: Leave time to answer any questions the candidate may have and, if appropriate, to advocate your firm to the candidate.
Review the interview: After the candidate leaves, review your interview notes. Then score the interview guide answers (if you used one), and make a decision. Do this as quickly as possible so your thoughts and perceptions are as fresh as they can be.

25. Give several examples of situational questions, behavioral questions, and background questions that provide structure
It’s useful to categorize your questions into situational (what would you do), behavioral (describe past behaviors) and background questions. We will discuss two examples of each.
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26. Situational (What Would You Do) Questions
Suppose your boss insisted that a presentation had to be finished by tonight. Your subordinate said she has to get home early to attend an online class, so she is unable to help you. What would you do?
The CEO just told you that he’s planning on firing your boss, with whom you are very close, and replacing him with you. What would you do?
Situational questions require the candidate to project themselves into a particular situation and explain what they might do. Such questions can provide information about leadership, communication, managing stress, ambition, problem solving and many other important characteristics. It’s a good idea to develop such questions from actual situations that have occurred in your firm.
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27. Behavioral (Past Behavior) Questions
Tell me about a time when you had to deal with a particularly obnoxious person. Describe the situation in detail, and explain how you handled it.
Tell me about a time when you were under a great deal of stress. What was the situation, and how did you handle it?
Asking behavioral questions (the candidate’s past behaviors) is another way to gather the types of information we discussed. Here, the candidate can demonstrate careful preparation for the interview. That is, a good candidate will have thought through questions similar to the ones you ask and prepared answers carefully. Such preparation may also suggest appropriate introspection on the part of the candidate.
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28. Background Questions
What kind and how much experience have you had actually repairing automobile engines?
Describe the types and years of experience you have had creating marketing programs for consumer products?
Background questions are usually best use in the early stages of an interview to help establish rapport as well as validate the resume. They also can lead to other follow-on questions later and provide a touchstone for both the candidate and interviewer.
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