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Doing my first ever interview tomorrow. I figured MT would have something helpful, so I searched iTunes for "interview" and I found the Quick and Dirty Interviews podcast. Perfect!

Took notes while I was listening, maybe it'll help someone else out there.

Cheers,
Julian.

 

Prep
- Review the resume before the interview.
- Don't read the resume in front of the candidate.
- Don't tell them you've read the resume .
- Circle two bulleted accomplishments from their resume you'd like them to talk about in the interview.

- Review the past year of your team's performance, looking for big success, big failure or big stumble. What was the underlying skill, ability, trait or characteristic that really drove the success, or the absence of which caused the failure.

What business news have you been following lately?
Do technical people choose a non technical topic, or do they choose something understood by many people?
Are they well rounded?
Can they adapt their experience/interest to talk about topics relevant to the hiring company?
Are they interested in engaging with ME on this topic?
EG. financial person interviewing for IT role would hopefully be able to talk about IT/technology news.
The word 'following' attempts to engage them in a conversation, to see what they're thinking.
Does their answer make sense to me and the company?
Have they done critical thinking and can they communicate?
Inability to answer might indicate a lack of interpersonal skills.
 
What is the latest book you read and what did you like about and learn from it?
Do they read? Lack of reading may correlate to lack of desire for learning or development.
Was it professional or business related?
Don't reveal if you've read the same book. Get them to describe what they got out of it.
If fiction, ask "what else?"
But, for fiction, look for descriptions of characters in the book that reveal the interviewee's interpersonal skills.
Bonus if they can correlate the book's characters and events to real life.
 
Tell me about when you ... <take something from their CV - circled beforehand>
.. do two of these questions.
Use their own bulleted accomplishments.
Can they organise their answer in a coherent fashion, rather than just ramble.
Looking for their communication skills on a topic they should know about.
 
Tell me about a time when you ...
.. do two of these questions.
How did you do it? What were the results?
Review the past year of your team's performance, looking for big success, big failure or big stumble.
What was the underlying skill, ability, trait or characteristic that really drove the success, or the absence of which caused the failure.
EG. Tell me about a time when you had to persuade people with alot of divergent interests to get on board with a new plan or initiative. How did you do it and what were the results?
Interviewee does not need to know what is driving the question. Just looking to see if they have skills that your team had, and that they can talk about it.
If they can't talk about it, they are less likely to be able to repeat the behaviour.
Bonus is that you might learn something from the candidate with this question.
 
Then give feedback in four concise parts.
Interpersonal - how well they interact with you and why.
Cultural - how well would they fit into the firm and why.
Skills - what you saw in the four behavioural questions including how they communicate their answers.
Technical - only if interviewer is qualified to comment on the technical requirements of the position.
 
Format for feedback: Category, evaluation, behaviour.
EG:
"Persuasion. I found this was weak. When I asked how he convinced someone, he just said he went to his boss and got approval."
"Communication skills. Excellent. Answered concisely, came back with clear answers, and admitted a mistake openly."