Interviews: what to ask... and how not to act. Discuss...

Hey Anka. Did you mean avoiding candidates should avoid racism related questions or did you mean a particular candidates was racist unconsciously.

In fairness, I am Asian origin and in interviews always like to suss out if the organisation has a culture of rascism. Its as much my opportunity to learn about their culture as its their to learn about me . Some may argue that its not best to do so, but I don't want to be wasting my time where an organisation will mark me down just because of colour of my eyes. I would rather not start the relationship then fail for issues outside my control. Unfortunately the risk of raising this at interview is that organisation may view it unfavorably but then thats a risk worth taking in my view.

Hi Geetika

In this situation, the candidate used a racist term about a particular group, seemingly without any awareness whatsoever that the term was prerogative or might be construed as racist which astonished the manager and myself.

I sometimes wonder how people feel walking into a workplace that might be overwhelmingly white. This is is frequent in the industry I work in but I think / hope the causes are more likely to be unconscious bias or class prejudice or a combination of both as I have not personally come across overt racism. It is, however, difficult to get to the bottom of it as there is no solid data from which to draw conclusions and attempts at collecting it have not been very successful over the years.

Excellent point, Artur Kidacki.

"Pejorative" of course!

Great point Artur, and one that should be well noted. I cannot believe how many hiring managers I come across who have either never had recruitment training or certainly not had refresher training to keep them up to date. Many a time it seems managers assume they are good at it because they are good at other parts of their job....which of course doesn't necessarily follow.

Hi Steve,

It's funny that the qualities are largely subjective - in an interview anyway. Lack of professionalism has been brought up - we all have ideas of what is professional and what isn't. I doubt all the ideas are exactly the same though! I've seen some lovely people get so excited when discussing their passion, it could come across as arrogance or excessive agreeability.

Maybe it's me, but I wonder whether I could make a killing training people 'how to succeed during an interview' - doesn't matter on their skill-set for the role ;-) but as long as they are precise, neutral in approach (can't be too excited, can't look bored), have been shopping beforehand etc etc they should be fine! (sarcasm this late on a Thursday)

The 5 questions piece made me smile - and it sounds like I've had similar experience to Jeny. I once interviewed someone who had written down these types of questions, and even though we'd actually covered a couple of the answers already, they asked because they were so nervous they were on auto-pilot - once they finished asking, they then realised we'd already answered it. (First ever interview we then found out; unfortunately our offices at the time were very strict on 'interview ettiquette' so although I'd always prefer to be in a comfy quiet place, we had rooms more like interrogation which never helped those nerves).

I would say though, I've also interviewed someone who interrupted myself and another interviewer repeatedly to ask their own questions, so we didn't get a single answer. I stopped the interview to point it out, because I felt I owed it to them to say that their approach was hindering us in understanding them, and would result in rejection if we didn't get our own answers.

Kind regards,
Laura

I can relate to what you're saying, Laura... and just noticed you've passed the 100 posts milestone. Thank you :)

Hi Steve

My favourite when interviewing is the response from candidates- 'I thought you might ask me that question'.

The only problem is you are creating high expectations. The answer you give needs to be a Pulitzer prize-wining answer!

In my view, candidates aspiring for mid-to-senior positions, may ask what support will be provided by the management. Further the candidates can try to find out what are the expected deliverables in next 3 months and 6 months' duration.
This may set up the tone and organization's expectations in the mind of the candidate. In case hiring manager is lesser prepared for these questions, she or he should respond to the candidate later.

Sometimes my overwhelming concern if the candidate is due to be working in my team is how well (and how frequently) they make tea...


;)