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Hiring Personnel Behavioral Interviewing |
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 Assessing Personnel Needs Advanced-Beyond Job Descriptions: Job Matching for Real Estate Sales Recruitment Planning Advanced: What Top Performers Want from You Recruiting Salespeople Advanced: Tips for Recruiting the Seasoned Professional Recruiting Support Personnel Advanced: The Family and Medical Leave Act The Interviewing Process Advanced: Behavioral Interviewing Tips for Selecting a Psychological Test Structuring Compensation Advanced: Compensation Tips for Management Personnel |
Lynn Nemser, a human resources and management consultant with Partners in Performance Inc. in Pittsburgh, and a member of the board of directors of the Employment Management Association, a special emphasis group of the Society for Professional Human Resources, is a proponent of behavioral interviewing as a useful tool in selecting top candidates. Q: What is behavioral interviewing? Nemser: It's a style of interviewing that seeks examples of a candidate's past behavior to predict how well they'll perform on the job. Rather than asking hypothetical questions such as, "What would you do it you disagreed with someone at work?" (candidates then can give the textbook answer), you ask, "Tell me about a time when you disagreed with someone at work." You want to hire someone who has functioned in the mixed-up, crazy world in which we're working, not someone who just memorizes the correct answers. Q: What benefits does behavioral interviewing elicit? Nemser: Behavioral interviewing helps you understand a candidate's past behavior on the job, which is the best predictor of future behavior. The technique doesn't work perfectly in and of itself. You have to be very diligent about asking probing follow-up questions. It's absolutely key to good behavioral interviewing. Q: Could you expand on the idea of follow-up probes? Nemser: If you only ask the opening question, you'll only get the shell of the behavioral answer. If candidates are making up a story, the probes will make the story fall apart. For each open-ended question, such as 'Tell me about a time when you worked with someone very different from you and you didn't see eye-to-eye," you're going to ask at least three to four follow-up questions. Some will be based on what candidates say. Some you can plan in advance, such as, "Who else was involved? How long ago did this happen? What was the result?" Ask smart follow-up probes that are specific, measurable, action-oriented, and result-oriented. Q: Is behavioral interviewing particularly appropriate for hiring real estate salespeople? Nemser: It works best for salespeople. You can measure what salespeople do. You can break the sales cycle into discreet parts, then ask them to walk you through a sale, and tell you about the typical, difficult, or easy sales—any number of parts of a sale. It's a really effective way to cut through the fluff. Q: What are some questions to avoid when doing a behavioral interview? Nemser: I have a list of the worst interview questions. One is: "Tell me about yourself." It's a totally unfocused question. You can waste a whole interview asking someone that and not get any of the information you need. What you have to do is ask questions based on requirements of the job. Another bad one is, "Tell me about your weaknesses." What you get is a canned response. You have to decide first what's important to the job. You can ask someone, "Tell me about a very important problem you solved that really challenged your abilities, but you were able to get it done to uncover their strengths and thinking process. If you're looking for weaknesses, ask them about a time when they couldn't solve a problem. Tips for Conducting Second Interviews The second interview provides the option to establish whether a candidate you like is a good fit for your company. During the second interview:
TIP: Be sure to ask all candidates to make the same presentation and take the same tests to avoid charges of discrimination.
Tips on Reference Checks Check the references on only your two or three final candidates.
Portions adapted from "Providing Structure to Interviews and Reference Checks," Workforce, Paul Taylor, May 1999 Other Background Checks to Consider
Tips For Selecting a Psychological Test > |
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