The Long and Winding Road to “You’re Hired”

“Hiring Employees is Tedious and a Business Expense,” says a subhead in an article that’s typical of the advice being offered to small companies in recruitment mode. Hiring is also time-consuming, and that’s an added burden for small enterprises without HR departments or relationships with outside search firms.

Probably no part of the recruiting process is as trying as the interview—the face-to-face meeting at which the employer must make an intuitive as well as an objective judgment about the candidate seated on the other side of the desk. Here are some tips from recruitment professionals that can help to sharpen the interviewer’s insights and lead to better judgment calls.

Preliminary telephone interviews can be highly effective tools for prescreening applicants, according to PrintLink, a print industry recruiting firm. Besides saving time, interviewing by telephone “frees the interviewer from prejudices arising from visual first impressions” that are unavoidable in face-to-face meetings. Because candidates on the phone tend to be less guarded than they would be in person, an interviewer who’s good listener can pick up clues that an in-person meeting might not yield. PrintLink recommends listening closely for changes in vocal quality and paying attention to what the sound of the candidate’s voice says about his or her apparent emotional state.

Tardiness on the interviewer’s part is as counterproductive as it would be on the part of the interviewee, in this writer's view. “Do not be late to a candidate interview—just don’t be. As tempting as it may seem to put yourself in a position of power because a candidate wants what you have—just don’t.” Another waste of time is the follow-up interview drill: requiring the candidate to come back multiple times to meet with different members of the company. “Making someone come back repeatedly doesn’t mean that they really want the job,” the writer observes.

Don't oversell. It’s natural for entrepreneurs to speak glowingly of the companies they’ve created and the job opportunities they offer, but according to this article, the owner should dial down the enthusiasm a bit when evaluating candidates for key positions. Why? Because the candidate may not last beyond the “hiring honeymoon” if the position has been characterized as more than it really is. Workforce turnover is difficult enough without the disruption caused by new hires who say “yes,” grow disillusioned, and disappear within a few months or a few weeks.

Watch body language. What the candidate says and what his or her posture, facial expressions, and gestures are conveying could be very different things. Is that general hangdog look a sign of desperation? Inability to make eye contact—what should that say to the interviewer about the applicant’s confidence and candor (or lack thereof)? As for the spoken answers, if they’re rambling, evasive, or unclear, treat them as red flags. There’s more advice along these lines (in the form of do’s and don’ts for applicants that employers can be alert for as well) here and here.

There’s obviously much more to successful hiring than can be covered here, and some aspects of the process have ramifications for business liability and/or compliance with the law. For example, the Southeast Minnesota chapter of SCORE reminds employers to check their insurance coverage when creating and filling new positions—policies may need to be changed even though current employees are protected.

Sometimes employers perform background checks either by doing the research themselves or by hiring outside screening agencies to do it for them. It’s a legitimate business practice, but gathering information about people for employment purposes may be subject to the Federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA). The law, which applies to companies of all sizes, is meant to assure that background checks are accurate and that the privacy rights of those being investigated are upheld. An organization called the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse (PRC) has detailed information about background checks and many other subjects related to privacy in employment.

Finally, a reminder that immigration laws call for employers to verify eligibility for employment. This requires submission of a form called an Employment Authorization Document (EAD), sometimes referred to as an I-9 check. For more information about complying, visit the web site of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.