3 Common Interview Pitfalls to Avoid
WWhether you are a business owner, hiring manager, or an up and coming leader in your company, it is critical to the growth of your organization that sound hiring decisions are made when you are looking to fill an available position. The dilemma facing most hiring authorities is how to select and hire the most appropriate candidate. Organizations large and small alike have at some point hired an employee that ended up not working out, costing money and time. However, making a bad hire is not inevitable if companies take the time to implement specific processes that will vet candidates background and experience so the most appropriate hiring decision is elected. Seasoned and novice hiring authorities alike are guilty of making impractical hires for a variety of reasons from liking the candidates personality to just needing a warm body to fill a seat. Rather than risk another poor hiring decision, companies can work towards establishing protections against the top three hiring mistakes made:
1. Failure to Conduct a Preliminary Phone Interview: Companies and candidates can only learn so much about the other
through a brief job description or a two-page resume. Prior to setting up a face-to-face interview, hiring authorities should take the time to spend thirty to forty-five minutes on the phone screening a candidate’s background to ensure that some presumptive match exists.
2. Failure to Plan: Before the formal interview process begins, hiring authorities should know exactly what type of candidate they want for the position, who will be involved in the interview process, what questions will be asked, how responses will be collected, and what assessments will be used to qualify skills necessary to the position. Realistic job previews, for instance, offer hiring authorities a glimpse into how a candidate would perform in the position.
3. Hiring the First Qualified Candidate: Since the interview and hiring process often represents a significant challenge to those responsible for filling a position, some hiring authorities may select the first available candidate that meets most of the requirements. In some cases, this may work out and end up being a successful relationship; however, more often than not, it will result in a bad hire and an anticipated termination.
Although it may be easier to make an offer to the first qualified candidate, it is not always the best option. For that reason, it is in an organizations best interest to form a candidate pool of qualified talent of at least three people to allow the best hiring decision to be made. Rather than select a candidate because of the ease it represents, an offer instead can be made to the most appropriate candidate based on careful deliberation of each available candidates profile to determine who would make the best fit.
Since people remain the foundation of any organization’s success, the interview and hiring process is one of the most important practices a company can engage in. Most companies are familiar with the stress and inconvenience an improper hire characterizes. Similarly, most are also familiar with the elation and success a right hire embodies. Whether your organization uses executive search firms, like Reaction Search International, staffing firms, or internal recruiting capital, it is important to remain cognizant of the common mistakes every hiring manager faces and take the necessary steps to minimize your chances of making a regretful hire.
