Prevent Fires: Hire Right

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A former corporate planner in the food and pet-products industries, Smith now assists start-up companies and small businesses as a consultant. He suggests clients adding to their workforce pre-interview job candidates on the telephone to gauge their knowledge levels. “A lot of that knowledge will show up in the conversation by how they communicate and how they react to the questions,” says Smith.

Asking about personal challenges, childcare resources, life philosophies and motivation are also ways to find out how well the person will fit the requirements of the position. With one candidate who would have to relocate to take a middle-management position, Smith even asked the candidate’s spouse to attend the interview.

When a smaller company is considering hiring a displaced worker downsized from a large corporation, the company should assess if the candidate has the personality to  successfully switch from years of experience within one kind of system to an entirely new system, says Smith.

Complex to Plain English
When interviewing technical workers, Smith asks for explanations of complex elements of the job. “If (the candidates) can put it in plain English, then you know they can probably work well with the nontechnical people.”

Smith advises that regardless of the job duties, you should always ask candidates three questions: Why this company? Why this area? What attracts you to this particular position? "How they go about answering will tell you as much as the answers themselves,” he says. “And ask what their reference contacts will say about them when you call. The difference between what the applicant says and what the contact says can be very enlightening.”

Concerning Checklists
A study done by Mississippi State University and posted on its Cooperative Extension Web site, www.msstate.edu/dept/coop/interview/favq.html asked executives to share their best interview questions. Some of the most creative included using hypothetical questions to probe the candidates’ thought processes, such as asking for five uses for a common red brick.

Another took a photo of electronic gadgetry, explained its intended use and then asked the candidates to describe what concerns would be on their checklists before they initiated the gear’s implementation project. Presenting unexpected scenarios allows the interviewer to observe the candidates’ reactions to unfamiliar territory and evaluate their analytical skills.

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