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General Information
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August 18, 2006
• Vol.28 Issue 33
Page(s) 28 in print issue
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Refine Your Candidate Interview Process
The SME’s Approach To Landing The Right Hires
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As the IT job market begins to heat up again, it’s a perfect time to tune up your small to medium-sized enterprise interviewing process so you can land the needed full-time employees and contractors to staff your critical projects.
The way you interview a candidate reflects directly on your organization, and we’ve gathered some tips from experienced IT recruiters to help you refine your SME’s interview process.
 General Interviewing Tips
“Time. Just like the adage says, time kills all deals,” says Sheelah Malicse, technical recruiter for McLean, Va.,-based CelerityIT, a technology and business integration and consulting firm. “Each organization has the goal of hiring the best. Each organization usually has a process in attaining that goal. Sometimes you hire the best available candidate, and it can be a dance—some days it’s a waltz, other days it’s not. This is a hot market, and we need to remember to watch out for the tipping point of when that excitement of the new opportunity loses its luster and the candidate decides to go elsewhere,” Malicse says.
Walt Strausbaugh, senior vice president of national recruiting for Ajilon Consulting, based in Towson, Md., views honesty and directness as an issue with interviewers. He says, “As a hiring manager, always be honest and direct with the candidate about the company, corporate culture, job responsibilities, and your management style. In the interview process, an intuitive job seeker is always going to speak with other employees about you and the organization. Any inconsistencies that they uncover about what you’ve sold them on is a surefire way to lose them early on in the process.”
Strausbaugh advises the following to improve your interviewing process: “As an interviewer, dig beneath the surface! Remember, job seekers only display on their resume what they want you to see. Your ability to uncover any red flags [gaps in employment, reasons for leaving, conflicts with superiors, etc.] is critical in weeding out candidates.”
He further advises, “Also, make sure to do a deep dive into specific areas you want to address with the candidate. Instead of just having him/her discuss career highlights and accomplishments, pick one or two areas to focus on in-depth and ask detailed questions on their methodology and tactics. This will give you a much better perspective on how they achieved their goals and how their work style might match with yours. This key insight will help you better identify candidates that are the right fit to your culture.”
Senior Staff Interviewing Tips
When interviewing for senior staff, many of the same tips apply, but there are some notable process differences. Laura A. McCarthy, executive search director of Qualified Search, an IT management and executive recruiting firm based in Herndon, Va., sees disorganization as one of the biggest mistakes that companies make when interviewing candidates.
McCarthy says, “Hiring managers should have their business objectives for the position determined before the interview and should be able to share this information in an organized fashion with the candidate. Also, follow-up with the candidate is key, especially if the interview process is lengthy with long gaps in between interviews so that the candidate does not lose interest.”
She also offers the following tips to fine-tune your interviewing process for senior-level candidates: “Make sure you have the candidates meet with the appropriate level interviewers. Senior-level candidates can easily be turned off if they meet with people at too low of a level as the initial part of the process.”
Her next bit of advice applies to even junior and midlevel candidates: “The interview should be a 50/50 discussion with both parties talking about the same amount of time. Many interviewers will take up the entire interview describing the company and position. Half the discussion should involve insightful questions that will determine if the candidate can meet the business objectives. Those questions should be open-ended so that the candidate can describe their experiences in meeting similar objectives.”
Better Interviewing
Even if your SME doesn’t have an HR department, you can still have a well-honed interview process to interview and hire candidates to fill your open positions. Timing, preparation, honesty, and following up with the candidate can help your SME compete effectively in the current employment climate. 
by Will Kelly
Improve Your Interview Process
Here are some tips to improve your candidate interviewing process.
• Define the business objectives for the position you are hiring.
• Consider whether you have resources to interview the candidate. Can you set aside time to interview?
• Make sure budgets are in place before taking the steps to hire.
• Coach your interviewers to have a 50/50 discussion with candidates during the interview.
• Know your realistic timeline for hiring, including how long you will wait for that perfect candidate. How will waiting affect your team? Will you be ready to get the candidate started once you make the offer? |
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