The Fine Art of Interviewing - Getting Really, Really Specific

Despite continued belt tightening in the broader economy, many firms in the collection industry are planning to increase their ranks. According to insideARM’s recent Credit & Debt Collection Industry Confidence Survey, over 55 percent of collection agencies were planning to increase their staffing levels in the first half of this year.

For long term growth, it’s critical to hire the right people, and get it right the first time. Hiring the wrong person for the job takes up valuable management time, it leads to an unsatisfied new hire, and it may hurt the credibility of the manager and the company each time it happens. Not to mention the potential costs of severance, legal fees, or lost productivity. A bad hire is an expensive mistake – a recent survey from Right Management estimated it costs from one to five times the annual salary, depending on the job (for details on a specific job, check out ADP’s “Bad Hire Calculator”).

We all know that there are plenty of job seekers currently looking for work, so for now it’s a buyer’s market. With more people looking for jobs than there are jobs available, it can actually be more difficult, as you have to locate the diamond in the rough from a stack of hundreds of resumes.

So how do you find that diamond in the rough? Last month I wrote about the job ad as the secret weapon in attracting the top candidates to apply. Now I’d like to discuss a later step in the process, the interview.

Much has been written about various interview styles. In his book, Hiring the Best, Martin Yate offers an excellent outline of interview styles and their benefits, including behavioral (premised on the fact that past actions will predict future behavior, and uses questions such as “tell me about a time when…” or “give me an example of…”), personality profile (which focuses on the personality traits that are key to success in the job), stress (which tests a person’s ability to perform under pressure), and more.

There is one principle I’ve learned that crosses all interview styles. In my 15 years of hiring experience, it has proven to be most important: getting the candidate to be really, really specific.

At some point, most interviews involve asking candidates to review their job history, starting with the oldest position and working up to the newest, explaining along the way what they did, how they got where they were and why they changed from one position to another. It can be very easy to engage in a pleasant conversation with a personable candidate and follow their lead without challenging what they are telling you, especially if they sound confident.

But someone who is good at selling you on their experience might not be the best person to actually do the job you have in mind. How do you get to the real meat of what the candidate has done, versus what their colleagues did? HR professionals will typically be experienced at this. Hiring managers, who only interview occasionally, may already appreciate this principle, but are not practiced in getting the information.

Stick with a subject until you feel you’ve exhausted it

It’s better to cover less ground more thoroughly than to have a complete sense of where the candidate has been, but only a surface understanding of their capabilities. Don’t ever accept their first description as complete; ask for more details.

For example, if a candidate tells you about a project they spearheaded that grew the business by 24 percent, ask them to explain:

“Who else was involved in the initiative?”
“What exactly was your role in the project?”
“Who were the main customers for the product/service?”
“What challenges existed at the start of the initiative?”
“Tell me more about that… how did you approach it at first?”
“Who were your competitors?”
“How did you track progress?”
“Who gathered the progress data and where did it come from?”
“How much of your time was spent on this project?”
“What other responsibilities did you have at the same time as this initiative?”

A candidate who didn’t really own the project will not be able to get specific about all of these questions. One who did really own the project should light up at the opportunity to get into the detail.

Look for the fire in the eyes

Candidates who are passionate about what they do will willingly provide the details you seek on questions like these. You can do a deep dive on just about any subject and determine whether there is real depth behind the candidate’s initial claims. Beyond qualifications, these details give you insight into the way the candidate approaches the job, what s/he’s passionate about, and what his or her work habits look like.

We all want to hire self-starters who are internally motivated and will have a positive effect on those around them. This is important for any role. By asking them for true details on their work history, you’ll quickly be able to determine if the candidate has these and other qualities you seek.

Next time I’ll be writing about testing – the most effective interview tool I’ve ever used. Testing can take many forms – not all of them “paper and pencil,” but the bottom line is to get as much information as possible about how the candidate will actually perform when they are in the job, not when talking about the job.

Check out the new and improved JobsInsideARM.com – with powerful new features for job seekers and employers!

Stephanie oversees all operations for Kaulkin Ginsberg. She has more than twenty years of experience in operations management and consulting, both for start-ups and large established firms. She can be reached at 240-499-3806 or by email.