The term Interview is not alien to any of us. By Definition, An Interview can be described as,

An interview is a formal meeting at which someone is asked questions in order to find out if they are suitable for a job or a course of study.

An Interview involves two primary Persona.

• Interviewer: A person who interviews someone, especially as a job.
• Interviewee(aka The Candidate): A person who is interviewed by an Interviewer. I will be using the term Interviewee and Candidate interchangeably here.

There are plenty of reads on how to get ready for an Interview as an Interviewee. However the need is from both the ends. An Interviewer has lots of stake in making an Interview a Great one or, a Horrible experience for some one.

Here are few points/tips that the Interviewer must keep in account to make an Interview effective.

You also need Preparation

Yes True, you as an Interviewer needs to prepare for the interview. You got to know about the candidate you are going to meet. Read the profile/resume/CV of the candidate. Sketch out of your understanding of his/her Technology Strength, Probing points and ambiguities from the Profile.

If you haven’t got a Profile in advance, raise a flag to your Manager or HR that, you may not be able to do your job properly in that case.

Greet Well, My Attitude is based on how you treat me

You as an Interviewer will be meeting a person (mostly) who is unknown to you, your nature, your habit. The best way to put your first impression right would be, Greet the person well with a firm handshake and introduce yourself.

You can do a small/casual talk to keep the nerve down for the Candidate and then get into the usual business of Interview. However don’t overdo it! Having a proper greeting/welcome set a very good tone for the entire Interview.

It is more of a ‘Skill’ than Process

Believe or not, Interviewing is a Skill to master. Unless it is learned well, you are going to waste,

• Your precious time
• Your Organizations’s resource/time/money
• Candidate’s time.

You need to learn the skill of judging where to stop, when to decide that, it is done, what to do when it is not going anywhere, how to take it to the next level. These are pure Skills to Learn.

It is not about you

Remember the Interview is very very less about You. You must introduce yourself in the context of your work, organization, position etc. But, please do not oversell. It is really not required as it would be a waste of time. Also, you may be setting a bad impression about yourself as a ‘Boasting Master’ to the Candidate.

Let the Interview be about the Candidate. His/Her Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Learning, Experience etc. that are related to the work and the open position.

Your only Job is to do the Interview while Interviewing

How do you feel, when you are telling something important to some one and that person is not listening to you? May be he is just playing a game, replying to email etc? It hurts, right?

I have seen many interviewers doing exactly the same. They keep their Laptop/Gadget open in front of them while doing the Interview. It is so very distracting for you as an Interviewer and annoying for the Interviewee. So, please shut it off.

Interviewee doesn’t know everything, neither YOU!

Do not have the assumption that, the Interviewee(Candidate) will know everything. Having such assumption or expectation is going to kill the entire Interview outcome as positive.

Have your own benchmark. Keep some flexibility around it. Judge the Interviewee on various aspects, not only one or two specific items. Have a short meeting with your peers after the interview and discuss the strengths and weaknesses. Don’t take a bias call just because he/she couldn’t answer that particular question. He/She will not know everything, You too!

#interview #general advice #recruitment #general programming #tips