Smart hiring strategy: behavioral interviewing

The Big Dogz on Business: Smart hiring strategy: behavioral interviewing
Times Herald Record
11/14/2008
http://www.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081114/BIZ/811140353


Business
The Big Dogz on Business: Smart hiring strategy: behavioral interviewing
November 14, 2008 6:00 AM

Well, we did the preparation. It is now time to conduct our behavioral-interviewing session.

Behavioral interviewing looks at past performance as an indicator of future performance.
Here is the flow of a behavioral-interviewing session for job applicants:

1. Put them at ease
2. Tell them you will be taking notes during the session
3. Describe the job
4. Ask if they have any questions about the job
5. Ask them to tell you about themselves relative to the job
6. Summarize what they said
7. Tell them about behavioral interviewing and expected responses using "STAR."
With STAR, interviewees are expected to address the following in their responses:
Situation description
Task they were asked to do
Action they took
Result they achieved
Here are some sample skill related behavioral-interviewing instructions:
Persuasion. Tell me about a time when you were able to convince your manager to provide additional resources.
Handling difficult customers. Describe a situation when you handled a difficult customer successfully.
Creativity. Describe for me a problem you solved using your creativity.
Flexibility. Tell me about a time when you had to change your approach to work with another person.
8. Step through your behavioral-interviewing instructions. Give instructions in the same order to all candidates.
9. Insist on specific responses, help them with questions about STAR.
10. If there is silence in response to your behavioral-interviewing instruction, give the candidate time to formulate a response.
11. For each response, note the degree of competence for this skill. Here is a scale you can use:
does not meet the requirement
could meet the requirement with some training
meets the requirement
exceeds the requirement
far exceeds the requirement
12. Maintain control of the interview by keeping the focus on your behavioral-interviewing instructions. Gently bring them back from any tangential discussion.
13. If you get an overwhelming response that is positive or negative, make sure you give your contradictory evidence instructions.
14. After you have all the information you need, ask them if they have any questions.
15. Tell them when you will decide
16. Thank them for participating in the interview
Once you have interviewed all the candidates, make your selection.
Create an overall score for each candidate using either of these methods:
A. Add up the score by skill
B. Use weighted scoring. Assign an importance factor to each skill (1-5) and multiply the candidate's score by the importance.
If decision-making is a 5, and a candidate scored 3 on the behavioral-interviewing instruction response, the candidate score for decision-making is 15.
Total the scores.
The top candidates will be obvious.
Then, make your selection. Contact the candidate with your offer. Repeat until you get an acceptance.

It is good manners to send rejection letters to unsuccessful candidates. You might want to let candidates know where they fell short and what skills they need to improve.

Rick Bronder of Woodstock and David Dirks of Port Jervis write the "Running with the Big Dogz" blog about marketing, sales and people ideas for growing your business. The blog's at growingmybusiness.wordpress.com. This week's column was written by Bronder. Their column appears Fridays.
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This posting was made my Jim Jacobs, President & CEO of Jacobs Executive Advisors. Jim also serves as Leader of Jacobs Advisors' Insurance Practice.