November 12, 2007
Grueling Job Interviews: Required or Excessive?
By Tom Ryan
Companies are increasingly instituting extensive interview processes to wring through personality quirks and ensure commitment before making initial hires.
At investment banks, applicants have long endured dozens of interviews partly designed to see if new hires will get along with everyone in the office. Whole Foods holds group interviews, in which people who will work under a manager are part of the team that grills candidates and collectively picks hires.
At Rackpace Managed Hosting, job interviews last all day with the aim of outlasting any fake pleasantries.
“They’re here for nine or ten hours,” Rackspace CEO Lanham Napier, told The Associated Press. “We’re very cordial about it. We’re not aggressive, but we haven’t met a human being yet who has the stamina to BS us all day.”
Mr. Napier adds, “We’d rather miss a good one than hire a bad one.”
At Lindblad Expeditions, an adventure cruise company, job applicants watch DVDs showing crew members cleaning toilets and washing dishes.
“It’s meant to scare you off,” admits founder Sven Lindblad, noting that a majority of job applicants do drop out.
Kris Thompson, Linbald’s human resources manager, notes that new hires “undergo a drug test, a physical exam, they have to pack up their life, we buy them a plane ticket and outfit them with hundreds of dollars in uniforms…If they get on board and say, ‘This is not what I expected,’ then shame on us.”
At KaBoom, a nonprofit that builds playgrounds, job applicants are observed in the reception area, which is set up as a playground, to see how they act around playground equipment. If they stand gripping their suitcases instead of sitting on the playground equipment, they aren’t asked back.
KaBoom also sends prospective project managers to one of its four-day playground building trips, with the actual build on the last day involving 200 to 300 volunteer. If uncomfortable taking questions from volunteers, it’s likely not going to work.
Since KaBoom started sending them on the trips four years ago, the average project managers’ tenure has increased from one year to two-and-a-half and three years.
“We got more passionate people who stayed longer,” co-founder and CEO Darell Hammond told AP. “What was going to be expected of them when they came on board wasn’t a stab in the dark.”
One possible downside is that people generally like people similar to them, so hiring for congeniality can limit diversity of opinions, according to a Harvard Business Review article, Fool vs. Jerk: Whom Would You Hire?. One venture capitalist told the authors that one capable manager built a team that “had a great time going out for a beer, but the quality of their work was seriously compromised.”
Discussion Questions: What are some best practices for interviewing job applicants? What unorthodox methods have you seen work? Given the turnover rate and skill levels required, should the interviewing process for retail positions differ from corporate hires?
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Many retailing executives assume that 100% annual staff turnover is OK because so many other retailers have similar turnover. Lots of recruitment and screening is similar to dating: the employer and the applicant are both on their best behavior for the first date, so neither party signals the other about what can really be expected. Some retail executives say they don’t care about turnover in the first 90 days of employment. That’s similar to admitting their recruitment and screening procedures are ineffective.
The companies cited in the article generally don’t seem to be hazing their applicants. They’re trying to find the best fit possible. The goal isn’t cruelty, it’s process improvement. It’s bad that some good folks may be screened out, but the company wins if it succeeds in measurably reducing turnover.
The higher level the job, the more in-depth the interview. Chemistry is important when employees are part of a team and must interact all day; however more essential is whether or not the potential employee can perform the task and exceed expectations.
Often, when interviewing for higher level positions, I would leave silence to see what the applicant would do with it. Would they add to the previous question or would they reveal something that doesn’t always come out through Q & A. Would they ask a question, would they attempt to take control.
There shouldn’t be one standard technique for all employees.
This is an area we discuss passionately and comprehensively in our retail and supplier coffee talk groups. The ultimate objective is to hire people that truly meet the needs of your company, but I recommend a more important first step; interview your company to find out what it is exactly that you really need to take your company to the next level. Be honest, objective, and get help, if you feel you are not able to do so.
Successful interviews uncover such qualities as problem solving & critical reasoning capabilities, one’s ability to learn, the level of conscientiousness, emotional intelligence, leadership styles and capabilities, etc. However, it’s also important for employers to avoid the cookie-cutter approach to hiring, which results in having almost all people with exactly the same strengths and weaknesses, and almost identical types of personalities and characteristics.
Great companies need to be challenged from within by a positive mixture of personalities and strengths; as opposed to “group-think” which is actually counter productive. These days, it’s also important that companies completely realize that the steady and stable resume might not be what they really want if leadership, drive, and entrepreneurial thinking are what they are seeking.
Hire people that can take your company to the next level. Often, these types of candidates have taken more risks, and there might in fact be more jobs on their resumes for any number of reasons, many which are exactly what you really need!
Actually, I have encountered a couple of unusual corporate hiring processes. On two separate occasions, I have received the “We regret to inform you that we have selected another candidate for our
Actually, I am impressed with this process. It’s similar to a stress interview–except the behavior in response to this test provides insight into the individual’s confidence level and willingness to stand up to adversity.
As for retail positions–I have been subject to many personality tests. In general, I have been less than impressed. Although the rejection letter tactic will not work for a retail position–there has to be a better method than transparent and obtuse personality tests.
A while back I interviewed for large national retailer. I had three interviews. I was so annoyed by having to go to three interviews that I didn’t go to the last one. Another time I interviewed for a nice corporate position. They stuck me with interviewing with someone in human resources and filling out a job application–two big wastes of time. One guy I was suppose to interview with at a large national wholesaler would not get off the phone making me wait 20 minutes. I walked out. If I’m not important enough that they drop what they are doing, imagine how I would be treated if I worked there. Best practices to get good people are to first keep human resources out of the picture until its time to fill out the W-4. Treat applicants with respect and have them spend time with the decision makers. Otherwise you will get stuck with people who need the job more than you need them.
There is not enough time or space to write about all of the things you need to do to make sure you hire the best person. If anyone would like a complete copy of the white paper on achievement based interviewing and evidence based hiring, email me at mkleiman@humetrics.com and I will send it to you.
A couple of quick points.
1. Know what you want to buy before you go shopping;
2. Make a shopping list;
3. Look for the best employees not the best applicants;
4. Make it easy for people to apply;
5. Make the job hard to get;
6. Everything you do in the hiring process is a test;
7. In most cases the interview is only 5% better then flipping a coin;
8. Only let your best people interview;
9. Get ridged, not structured;
10. Do all the background checks you can;
11. Once you hire it’s best to keep re-recruiting them.
My disclaimer here is that I did a lot of recruiting and interviewing when I was in consulting, and I probably had a dozen interviews when I was an MBA, and oh the stories I could tell.
It’s not worth it for every position, but for the ones where you’re going to be investing a lot of time, dollars, and intellectual capital, then I do believe in the all day thing. I’ve been through them on both sides, and they are grueling, but it’s like boot camp in a way–if you can make it through this, then you can make it through anything you’re likely to see on the job.
The only people I’ve hired that I’ve regretted are the people that I didn’t put through my two favorite interview techniques: “Tell me about a time…” (By the way, this works for applicants too–when they turn it over to you to ask questions, this is a great way to get insight into a company. I once asked an interviewer to tell me about a time when his company did something that challenged his integrity and what he did about it, and the answer told me way more about his company and their ethics than I think he intended). My other favorite is, “Here’s a problem I’m working on today. What would you do to solve it and why?”
Would these techniques work for the playground manufacturer, for example? Probably not. The most important thing to remember is to design the day to get to the skills and personality traits you’re looking for. I was looking for people who would make good consultants. “Tell me about a time” isn’t going to work for, say, a graphic designer.
I’m in favor of anything that can help applicants and employers get a clear idea of what a given job will actually be and how a given person will actually perform in a given role.
Very often, a candidate and a hiring manager can get to know and like each other over a couple of meetings, imagining themselves working together–or the candidate joining a bigger group–and the team accomplishing great things. Only it turns out later that the job the candidate thought s/he was interviewing for isn’t the one s/he got hired to do, and sometimes the gap is wide indeed.
So I would think that having a candidate–especially a finalist–spend a day or more in the position, or at least with the team, learning the true role s/he would play, is essential if you don’t want to repeat the entire exercise in six months to a year.
I think many companies use the multiple interviews to share the blame for bad hires. The only thing worse than going through these multiple interviews is to having to be the interviewer for a position you don’t care who they hire. I remember one time I was the hiring manager and I really wanted to hire someone and a colleague who I barely knew was standing in the way. Talk about frustrating.
Like David’s examples above, this extensive interview process leaves a lot of people frustrated and unhappy. And that’s just the people who get hired!
The one thing I got from the KaBoom example is their hiring process added value to both the applicant and the company. Not only did it let the company get to know the prospective employee better, but also the applicant could get a better idea about the position they were applying for. It was a win-win. In retail I’m not sure you’re going to create these win-wins.
Here’s the best hiring advice for retail I was ever given. It was an old timer who told me, “Only hire people who smile during the interview. Remember, you’re seeing the best 45 minutes you’ll ever get out of them. It’s all downhill from there.”
I’m not sure putting an applicant through six hours of interview changes a thing.
Employee referrals are an excellent way to acquire new people to be interviewed for company openings while at the same time limiting the length of the interview process. And such hires are often quite successful for several reasons.(Obviously the employee doing the referring needs to be someone who is respected and has some tenure and credibility within the firm.) It is not uncommon for employees on the line or on the floor to have a much better handle on the traits and personalities required for success in their jobs than the managers who are sitting in HR or the corner office do, not to mention possessing a more honed BS meter. Most employees do not want to work with a slug.
The referred candidates also benefit in that they are not coming into the interview blind. They have already heard the good, bad and the ugly and enter your hiring process with an initial understanding of the position’s potential, joys, and drawbacks from your current employees’ perspective.
A small company I know not only publicly recognizes the yearly anniversaries of all employees but at that time also acknowledges the referring person of that successful employee with a small gift or monetary reward.
Just read a book on this. It’s called Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. It’s about thin slicing. People can know the results of some encounter before they can describe it. But things get missed and mistakes are made unless conditions are just right. A really experienced interviewer might do it in less than an hour (nay, 5 minutes) but, for the sake of new interviewers and out of respect for applicants, in my opinion, a little longer should be spent.
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Many retailing executives assume that 100% annual staff turnover is OK because so many other retailers have similar turnover. Lots of recruitment and screening is similar to dating: the employer and the applicant are both on their best behavior for the first date, so neither party signals the other about what can really be expected. Some retail executives say they don’t care about turnover in the first 90 days of employment. That’s similar to admitting their recruitment and screening procedures are ineffective.
The companies cited in the article generally don’t seem to be hazing their applicants. They’re trying to find the best fit possible. The goal isn’t cruelty, it’s process improvement. It’s bad that some good folks may be screened out, but the company wins if it succeeds in measurably reducing turnover.
The higher level the job, the more in-depth the interview. Chemistry is important when employees are part of a team and must interact all day; however more essential is whether or not the potential employee can perform the task and exceed expectations.
Often, when interviewing for higher level positions, I would leave silence to see what the applicant would do with it. Would they add to the previous question or would they reveal something that doesn’t always come out through Q & A. Would they ask a question, would they attempt to take control.
There shouldn’t be one standard technique for all employees.
This is an area we discuss passionately and comprehensively in our retail and supplier coffee talk groups. The ultimate objective is to hire people that truly meet the needs of your company, but I recommend a more important first step; interview your company to find out what it is exactly that you really need to take your company to the next level. Be honest, objective, and get help, if you feel you are not able to do so.
Successful interviews uncover such qualities as problem solving & critical reasoning capabilities, one’s ability to learn, the level of conscientiousness, emotional intelligence, leadership styles and capabilities, etc. However, it’s also important for employers to avoid the cookie-cutter approach to hiring, which results in having almost all people with exactly the same strengths and weaknesses, and almost identical types of personalities and characteristics.
Great companies need to be challenged from within by a positive mixture of personalities and strengths; as opposed to “group-think” which is actually counter productive. These days, it’s also important that companies completely realize that the steady and stable resume might not be what they really want if leadership, drive, and entrepreneurial thinking are what they are seeking.
Hire people that can take your company to the next level. Often, these types of candidates have taken more risks, and there might in fact be more jobs on their resumes for any number of reasons, many which are exactly what you really need!
Actually, I have encountered a couple of unusual corporate hiring processes. On two separate occasions, I have received the “We regret to inform you that we have selected another candidate for our opening.” On both occasions, I called the HR director and hiring manager to ask to throw my hat back in the ring and provided thorough justification as to why I believed my qualifications and experience would add value to the company. In both cases, I was immediately hired–one employer admitted this was the SOP to determine whether the job candidate was desirous of the position.
Actually, I am impressed with this process. It’s similar to a stress interview–except the behavior in response to this test provides insight into the individual’s confidence level and willingness to stand up to adversity.
As for retail positions–I have been subject to many personality tests. In general, I have been less than impressed. Although the rejection letter tactic will not work for a retail position–there has to be a better method than transparent and obtuse personality tests.
A while back I interviewed for large national retailer. I had three interviews. I was so annoyed by having to go to three interviews that I didn’t go to the last one. Another time I interviewed for a nice corporate position. They stuck me with interviewing with someone in human resources and filling out a job application–two big wastes of time. One guy I was suppose to interview with at a large national wholesaler would not get off the phone making me wait 20 minutes. I walked out. If I’m not important enough that they drop what they are doing, imagine how I would be treated if I worked there. Best practices to get good people are to first keep human resources out of the picture until its time to fill out the W-4. Treat applicants with respect and have them spend time with the decision makers. Otherwise you will get stuck with people who need the job more than you need them.
There is not enough time or space to write about all of the things you need to do to make sure you hire the best person. If anyone would like a complete copy of the white paper on achievement based interviewing and evidence based hiring, email me at mkleiman@humetrics.com and I will send it to you.
A couple of quick points.
1. Know what you want to buy before you go shopping;
2. Make a shopping list;
3. Look for the best employees not the best applicants;
4. Make it easy for people to apply;
5. Make the job hard to get;
6. Everything you do in the hiring process is a test;
7. In most cases the interview is only 5% better then flipping a coin;
8. Only let your best people interview;
9. Get ridged, not structured;
10. Do all the background checks you can;
11. Once you hire it’s best to keep re-recruiting them.
My disclaimer here is that I did a lot of recruiting and interviewing when I was in consulting, and I probably had a dozen interviews when I was an MBA, and oh the stories I could tell.
It’s not worth it for every position, but for the ones where you’re going to be investing a lot of time, dollars, and intellectual capital, then I do believe in the all day thing. I’ve been through them on both sides, and they are grueling, but it’s like boot camp in a way–if you can make it through this, then you can make it through anything you’re likely to see on the job.
The only people I’ve hired that I’ve regretted are the people that I didn’t put through my two favorite interview techniques: “Tell me about a time…” (By the way, this works for applicants too–when they turn it over to you to ask questions, this is a great way to get insight into a company. I once asked an interviewer to tell me about a time when his company did something that challenged his integrity and what he did about it, and the answer told me way more about his company and their ethics than I think he intended). My other favorite is, “Here’s a problem I’m working on today. What would you do to solve it and why?”
Would these techniques work for the playground manufacturer, for example? Probably not. The most important thing to remember is to design the day to get to the skills and personality traits you’re looking for. I was looking for people who would make good consultants. “Tell me about a time” isn’t going to work for, say, a graphic designer.
I’m in favor of anything that can help applicants and employers get a clear idea of what a given job will actually be and how a given person will actually perform in a given role.
Very often, a candidate and a hiring manager can get to know and like each other over a couple of meetings, imagining themselves working together–or the candidate joining a bigger group–and the team accomplishing great things. Only it turns out later that the job the candidate thought s/he was interviewing for isn’t the one s/he got hired to do, and sometimes the gap is wide indeed.
So I would think that having a candidate–especially a finalist–spend a day or more in the position, or at least with the team, learning the true role s/he would play, is essential if you don’t want to repeat the entire exercise in six months to a year.
I think many companies use the multiple interviews to share the blame for bad hires. The only thing worse than going through these multiple interviews is to having to be the interviewer for a position you don’t care who they hire. I remember one time I was the hiring manager and I really wanted to hire someone and a colleague who I barely knew was standing in the way. Talk about frustrating.
Like David’s examples above, this extensive interview process leaves a lot of people frustrated and unhappy. And that’s just the people who get hired!
The one thing I got from the KaBoom example is their hiring process added value to both the applicant and the company. Not only did it let the company get to know the prospective employee better, but also the applicant could get a better idea about the position they were applying for. It was a win-win. In retail I’m not sure you’re going to create these win-wins.
Here’s the best hiring advice for retail I was ever given. It was an old timer who told me, “Only hire people who smile during the interview. Remember, you’re seeing the best 45 minutes you’ll ever get out of them. It’s all downhill from there.”
I’m not sure putting an applicant through six hours of interview changes a thing.
Employee referrals are an excellent way to acquire new people to be interviewed for company openings while at the same time limiting the length of the interview process. And such hires are often quite successful for several reasons.(Obviously the employee doing the referring needs to be someone who is respected and has some tenure and credibility within the firm.) It is not uncommon for employees on the line or on the floor to have a much better handle on the traits and personalities required for success in their jobs than the managers who are sitting in HR or the corner office do, not to mention possessing a more honed BS meter. Most employees do not want to work with a slug.
The referred candidates also benefit in that they are not coming into the interview blind. They have already heard the good, bad and the ugly and enter your hiring process with an initial understanding of the position’s potential, joys, and drawbacks from your current employees’ perspective.
A small company I know not only publicly recognizes the yearly anniversaries of all employees but at that time also acknowledges the referring person of that successful employee with a small gift or monetary reward.
Just read a book on this. It’s called Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. It’s about thin slicing. People can know the results of some encounter before they can describe it. But things get missed and mistakes are made unless conditions are just right. A really experienced interviewer might do it in less than an hour (nay, 5 minutes) but, for the sake of new interviewers and out of respect for applicants, in my opinion, a little longer should be spent.