Chapter 7

Interviewing Candidates
 Learning Outcomes
• List the main types of interviews.
• List and explain the main errors that can undermine an interview’s usefulness.
• Define a structured situational interview and explain how to design and conduct
effective selection interviews.
• Discuss how to use employee selection methods to improve employee engagement.
• List the main points to know about developing and extending the actual job offer.
 Basic Features of Interviews
 An interview
– A procedure designed to obtain information from a person through oral responses to
oral inquiries-- to predict future job performance
 Types of interviews
– Selection interview
– Appraisal interview
– Exit interview
 Interviews formats
– Structured
– Unstructured
 Types of Interviews
 Selection 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 with the firm
– It is conducted with an employee when he or she leaves the company.
– The information from each survey is used to provide feedback on why employees are
leaving, what they liked about their employment and what areas of the company need
improvement.
 Formats of Interviews
 Unstructured or nondirective interview
– An unstructured conversational-style interview in which the interviewer pursues points of
interest as they come up in response to questions.
– Managers follow no set format
– There is seldom a formal guide for scoring “right” or “wrong” answers.
– E.g. “Tell me about yourself,” “Why do you think you’d do a good job here?” and
– “What would you say are your main strengths and weaknesses?”
 Structured or directive interview
– The employer lists questions ahead of time, and may even weight possible
alternative answers for appropriateness.
– An interview following a set sequence of questions.
• Structured interviews are generally best.
• In such interviews, all interviewers generally ask all applicants the same questions.
• Interviews tend to be more consistent, reliable, and valid.
• Having a standardized list of questions can also help less talented interviewers conduct
better interviews.
• Standardizing the interview also enhances job relatedness
• Reduces overall subjectivity and thus the potential for bias, and may “enhance the ability
to withstand legal challenge

• The interviewer should always have an opportunity to ask follow-up questions and pursue
points of interest as they develop
 Interview Content: Types of Questions
 Classify interviews based on the “content” or the types of questions interviewers ask
 Situational interview
– A series of job-related questions that focus on how the candidate would behave in a
given situation.
– Situational interviews ask applicants to describe how they would react to a
hypothetical situation today or tomorrow
– E.g. how he or she would act in response to a subordinate coming to work late 3 days
in a row.
 Behavioral interview
– A series of job-related questions that focus on how they reacted to actual situations
in the past.
– E.g. phrases like, “Can you think of a time when…. What did you do?”

• Vanguard uses an interviewing technique it calls STAR.

• Vanguard managers ask interviewees about a particular situation (S) or task (T) they
faced to uncover the actions (A) the candidates took, and the results (R) of their actions
 Job-related interview
– A series of job-related questions that focus on relevant past job-related
experiences or behaviors.
– The questions here don’t revolve around hypothetical or actual situations or
scenarios.
– The interviewer asks questions such as, “Which courses did you like best in
business school?”
 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.
Structured Interview
Guide
 How Should We Conduct the Interview?
• Employers also administer interviews in various ways:
• one-on-one
• by a panel of interviewers,
• sequentially or all at once,
• computerized or personally, or
• online.
• Most selection interviews are probably still one-on-one and sequential.
• In a one-on-one interview, two people meet alone, and one interviews the other by
seeking oral responses to oral inquiries.
• Employers tend to schedule these interviews sequentially.
• In a sequential (or serial) interview, several persons interview the applicant, in
sequence, one-on-one, and then make their hiring decision.
• In an unstructured sequential interview, each interviewer generally just asks
questions as they come to mind and form independent opinion.
• In a structured sequential interview, each interviewer rates the candidates on a
standard evaluation form, using standardized questions.
• The hiring manager then reviews these ratings before deciding whom to hire.
• A panel interview, also known as a board interview, is an interview conducted by a team
of interviewers (usually two to three), who together question each candidate and then
combine their ratings of each candidate’s answers into a final panel score.
• This contrasts with the one-on-one interview (in which one interviewer meets one
candidate) and a serial interview (where several interviewers assess a single candidate one-
on-one, sequentially).

• Enables interviewers to ask follow-up questions- elicit more meaningful responses

• More stressful
• Mass interview. Here a panel interviews several candidates simultaneously.
• The panel might pose a problem, and then watches to see which candidate takes the lead in
formulating an answer.
• Phone Interview
 Computerized Interviews
 Computerized selection interview
– An interview in which a job candidate’s oral and/or computerized replies are obtained in
response to computerized oral, visual, or written questions and/or situations.
– Most such interviews present a series of multiple-choice questions regarding
background, experience, education, skills, knowledge, and work attitudes.
 Characteristics
– Reduces amount of time managers devote to interviewing unacceptable candidates.
– Applicants are more honest with computers
– Avoids problems of interpersonal interviews
– Mechanical nature of computer-aided interview
• An online video interview requires little special preparation for employers.

• Things that interviewees should keep in mind. It’s often the obvious things people overlook

• Look presentable. It might seem silly sitting at home wearing a suit, but it could make a
difference.
• Clean up the room. Do not let the interviewer see clutter.
• Test first. “Five minutes before the video interview is not a good time to realize that your
Internet is down…”
• Do a dry run. Record yourself before the interview to see how you’re “coming across.”
• Relax. The golden rule with such interviews is to treat them like face-to-face meetings.
Smile, look confident and enthusiastic, make eye contact, and don’t shout, but do speak
clearly.
 Avoiding Errors that can Undermine an Interview’s Usefulness

• If done properly, then the interview is generally a good predictor of performance as

compared to many other selection techniques.
• Keep three things in mind—
• Use structured interviews, (particularly structured interviews using situational questions)
• Know what to ask, and
• Avoid the common interviewing errors.
 Avoiding Errors that can Undermine an Interview’s Usefulness
 First impressions
– The tendency for interviewers to jump to conclusions—make snap judgments—about candidates during
the first few minutes of the interview.
– One researcher estimates that in 85% of the cases, interviewers had made up their minds before the
interview even began, based on first impressions
– First impressions are especially damaging when the prior information about the candidate is negative
such as unfavorable reference letters

– Two more interviewing facts.

– First, interviewers are more influenced by unfavorable than favorable information about the candidate.
– Second, their impressions are much more likely to change from favorable to unfavorable than from
unfavorable to favorable.
 (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 impressions or stereotypes of
what a good applicant is.
– More job knowledge translated into better interviews
 Candidate-order or (Contrast) 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.
– Pressure to hire accentuates this problem
 (cont’d)

 Nonverbal behavior and impression management

– The applicant’s nonverbal behavior (smiling, avoiding your gaze, and so on) can also have a surprisingly
large impact on his or her rating.
– Interviewers infer 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.
– “Impression management” -Self promotion, ingratiation (individual attempts to influence another
person by becoming more likeable to their target.)
 (cont’d)
 Effect of personal characteristics: attractiveness, gender, race
– Interviewers tend to have a less favorable view of candidates who are:
• Physically unattractive
• Female
• Of a different racial background
• Disabled

 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.
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 How to Design and Conduct an effective Interview

The structured situational interview

• The structured situational interview—a series of job-relevant questions with predetermined
answers that interviewers ask of all applicants for the job—produces superior results
• The basic idea is to;
• (1) write situational (what would you do), behavioral (what did you do), or job knowledge
questions, and
• (2) have job experts (like those supervising the job) also write several answers for each of
these questions, rating the answers from good to poor
 How to Design and Conduct an effective Interview

– Designing a Structured Situational Interview

The procedure is as follows
– Use either situational questions (preferred) or behavioral questions that yield high criteria-related validities.
– Step 1: Job Analysis
– Step 2: Rate the Job’s Main Duties (say from 1 to 5)
– Step 3: Create Interview Questions: Create situational, behavioral, and job knowledge interview questions
– Step 4: Create Benchmark Answers
– Step 5: Appoint the Interview Panel and Conduct interview

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 How to Conduct an Effective Interview
 Structure your interview:
1. Base questions on actual job duties.
2. Use job knowledge, situational, or behaviorally oriented questions and objective criteria to
evaluate the interviewee’s responses.
3. Train interviewers.
4. Use the same questions with all candidates.
5. Use descriptive rating scales (excellent, fair, poor) to rate answers.
6. Use multiple interviewers or panel interviews.
7. If possible, use a standardized interview form.
8. Take brief notes during the interview.
9. Establish rapport
 Profiles and Employee Interviews

• Employers using competency models or profiles (which list required skills, knowledge,
behaviors, and other competencies) can use the profile for formulating job-related
situational, behavioral, and knowledge interview questions.
• Table 7-1 summarizes illustrative skill, knowledge, trait, and experience profile items for
chemical engineer candidates, with sample interview questions.
 Employee Engagement Guide for Managers
• Building Engagement: A Total Selection Program
• Many employers create a total selection program aimed at selecting candidates whose totality of
attributes best fits the employer’s total requirements.

• The Toyota Way

• Toyota’s hiring process aims to identify such assembler candidates. The process takes
about 20 hours and six phases over several days:
Step 1: an in-depth online application (20–30 minutes)
Step 2: a 2–5-hour computer-based assessment
Step 3: a 6–8-hour work simulation assessment
Step 4: a face-to-face interview
Step 5: a background check, drug screen, and medical check
Step 6: job offer
 Developing and Extending the job Offer
• After all the interviews, background checks, and tests, the employer decides to
whom to make an offer using one or more approaches.
• The judgmental approach subjectively weighs all the evidence about the candidate.
• The statistical approach quantifies all the evidence and perhaps uses a formula to
predict job success.
• The hybrid approach combines statistical results with judgment.

• Statistical and hybrid are more defensible; judgmental is better than nothing.
The difference between a job offer letter and a contract.
• In a job offer letter, the employer lists the offer’s basic information.
• This typically starts with a welcome sentence.
• It then includes job-specific information (such as details on salary and pay), benefits
information, paid leave information, and terms of employment (including, for instance,
successful completion of job testing and physical exams).
• There should be a strong statement that the employment relationship is “at will.”
• There is then a closing statement. This again welcomes the employee, mentions who
the employer’s point (focal) person is if any questions arise, and instructs the candidate
to sign the letter of offer if it is acceptable.
• In contrast to a letter of offer (which should always be “at will”), an employment
contract may have a duration (such as 3 years).
• Therefore, the contract will also describe grounds for termination or resignation, and
severance provisions.
• The contract will almost always also include terms regarding confidentiality,
nondisclosure requirements, and covenants not to compete.