How To Interview A New Employee

Have Others Do It For You

I can be fooled other people can be fooled but a whole team is very hard to fool. If you have team interviews, most of the time they will sniff out the toxic employee. I like to interview, narrow it down to two or three prospects that I like, and then have the team decide. If you do hire that person accidentally, take care of the problem sooner rather than later! —John Rampton, Host

Question # 1 Lets Start With An Overview Of Your Resume

I know thats not a question! But this statement is essential to begin any interview. It is one of the key stages of recruitment .

Before doing anything else, analyze your candidates CV to understand their experiences and achievements. Pay attention to gaps in the candidates resume, and to areas in which details are lacking.

Yet, resumes with a lot of information still dont mean you are in a better position! Just try and pinpoint relevant information that you can further explore later.

The candidate will certainly have much more to say about his/her resume than the 2-3 pages of information on their paper.

So come prepared!

Tips For Writing Good Interview Questions

• Prepare your questions ahead of time, this way you will already know as to what you information you would like to acquire from an interview.
• When preparing for your interview, make sure that you understand the tone of your own questions. Whether you are going for funny or serious, be sure that the questions match your tone.
• Make sure that your questions are open-ended to ensure that the interviewee can provide you with a lot of information.
• Take a good look at the applicants resume before the interview, this can help you do background checks as well as help you develop questions based on what more you need to know from the applicant.

While these tips are important in helping you create great interview questions, you must also learn how to judge the responses to those questions. So in the event that you would like to know how to do so, then there are Interview Evaluation Forms that can provide you with information regarding how one can properly look into the the results of any interview.

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Evaluate Which Positions You Need To Fill

Sonya Schwartz, founder of Her Norm, said this step is important to prevent redundancy of positions in the company.

“The best thing you can do is approach the process with the mindset of filling needs, not desks,” Deosingh added. “You are looking for the best person to fill a specific need, not just getting someone in and calling it a day.”

Train Your Brain To Accept New Information

Efficient studying is a habit. Your brain needs constant training if you want to improve your focus and complete complex tasks without taking breaks.

One way to achieve this goal is to create a private learning space in your home. Youll also need a specific time of day that youll devote to studying. That will make your brain ready to accept the information it gets, so youll notice youre starting to learn much faster by the day.

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Watch Out For Complaints

A complainer is the least productive employee you could bring on as part of your team. Avoid one like the plague. If the person you’re interviewing complains about his or her current employer throughout the interview, that’s a red flag. It is OK for candidates to dislike parts of their current role, but it all depends on how they explain the issues they are facing. —Brian Honigman,BrianHonigman.com

Tell Me About Yourself

If everything else seems too much, lead with this timeless question. You simply cannot go wrong here.

Sometimes, the best answers come from open-ended queries. This is your best chance to know the candidates history, career accomplishments, and get a feel for their career goals all at the same time.

It is less intrusive and leading with this question makes it easier to approach other questionsdepending on how sensitive the position is.

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What Was One Of Your Favorite Jobs And Why

This question will reveal what motivates a candidate. They might describe a position where they ran their own crew, signalling that they value autonomy and can handle responsibility.

Maybe their favorite job involved working alone with minimal customer interaction, and the position youre looking to fill requires a lot of customer face time. That might be a red flag.

Dont be afraid to dig a little deeper if the response is minimal. Ask them why they feel they did a great job leading that crew, or if they have any other experience interacting with customers.

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Culture Fit Interview Questions

Building on the idea that hiring for personality is at least as important as hiring for experience , hiring an employee that fits in with the culture you are trying to establish is extremely important.

The right answer to many of these questions will depend on the culture of your business, or the culture you would like to build. What does your company look like, and what does ideal company culture look like for you? If youre just starting out, get a sense of how to answer these questions for yourself first, before you begin asking candidates.

For example, if you strive to create a company culture where employees are like family, and routinely grab a meal or a round of drinks after work, a job candidate who expresses distaste for workplace functions and social gatherings might not be a great fit.

Look out for areas where your style of running an office and their preferred work environment overlap, and where they clash. This can be the hardest thing to get right, because while someone may be a great employee on paper, the two of you also need to share a similar philosophy about what makes a place great to work for.

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Questions To Ask New Employees In Their 1st Month

The first 30 days of a job can feel like a blur. New hires are getting to know their co-workers, managers, the job, the company, the tasks and more. Learn what questions to ask new employees!

The first 30 days of a job can feel like a blur. New hires are getting to know their co-workers, managers, the job, the company, the tasks and everything in between. As a manager, hopefully, youve been able to spend adequate time with your new hire. But a lot of it has probably been spent on task-oriented training. Making time for feedback questions as they relate to manager interaction, job performance, team dynamics and career progression will help you understand what makes your new employee tick. Here are 23 questions to ask new employees that will help you get to know them and their preferences at work better. What aspects of work would you like more involvement and direction from me? Which would you like less? If you can sort this out, it will save you both time. How can I make your job easier? As a manager, your job should be to support employees. Find out firsthand how you can do it. What would be the best use of our one-on-one time? Some employees prefer to review tasks and others want a brainstorm session.

How To Conduct An Effective Job Interview

The virtual stack of resumes in your inbox is winnowed and certain candidates have passed the phone screen. Next step: in-person interviews. How should you use the relatively brief time to get to know and assess a near stranger? How many people at your firm should be involved? How can you tell if a candidate will be a good fit? And finally, should you really ask questions like: Whats your greatest weakness?

What the Experts Say As the employment market improves and candidates have more options, hiring the right person for the job has become increasingly difficult. Pipelines are depleted and more companies are competing for top talent, says Claudio Fernández-Aráoz, a senior adviser at global executive search firm Egon Zehnder and author of Its Not the How or the What but the Who: Succeed by Surrounding Yourself with the Best. Applicants also have more information about each companys selection process than ever before. Career websites like Glassdoor have taken the mystique and mystery out of interviews, says John Sullivan, an HR expert, professor of management at San Francisco State University, and author of 1000 Ways to Recruit Top Talent. If your organizations interview process turns candidates off, they will roll their eyes and find other opportunities, he warns. Your job is to assess candidates but also to convince the best ones to stay. Heres how to make the interview process work for you and for them.

Further Reading

Dont:

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How To Fill An Exit Interview Form

When filling an exit interview form, one must place in the following information:

• Name of the employee
• Date of the exit interview
• Employees job position and department of origin
• Name of the employees supervisor
• Reason as to why the employee wishes to leave the company or organization
• Signatures of the employee and those who may authorize the release

The information above may also be used to fill out Interview Assessment Forms in PDF that focuses on an employee leaving the business.

Career Goal Interview Questions

Finally, get a sense of where your job candidate sees him or herself going in life. What is their required salary for the current position, and tentative career trajectory? What are their big-picture dreams?

Answers to these questions will reveal a lot about your interviewees longevity as an employee, and their long-range goals. If they mention that theyd like to move up within the company, that could signify that theyre ready to work hard and could potentially be built into your business as an integral, foundational memberbut what if you dont have a vacancy for them to grow into?

Again, the right answers will depend on your business and the role you are hiring for, so keep that in mind and have a sense beforehand of what the deal breakers arefor example, if you know youd rather hire someone for the long haul, and they tell you that their five-year plan involves starting up their own company within the next few years.

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How To Select Candidates For The Job Interview

Your starting point, before scheduling a job interview with a candidate, is to review each candidate’s cover letter and resume.

When faced with 100 to 200 candidates, it’s important to use tools that separate the great candidates from the many. These will help you select the best candidates for the job interview. They will also help you prepare your list of questions to use to telephone screen candidates and then ask during your onsite or online job interviews.

Where Do You See Yourself In The Next 5 Years

An ambitious professional with a clear set of goals for the short, medium, and long term, is an invaluable asset to the company. This is true especially if they parallel their career growth with the company they are interviewing at.

As they grow professionally and financially, the company grows and expands too.

During the interview, confident job seekers will discuss that they seek a company with upward mobility as they help the company prosper.

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How To Develop A Selection Matrix

In order to develop a selection matrix, you and/or your selection panel will need to analyze the positions required qualifications, preferred qualifications, and job functions. As you analyze these qualifications and functions, take the following steps to develop a selection matrix:

• Identify what qualifications are on the application, and organize them into general categories on the matrix, such as education, technical job skills, and supervisory experience
• Determine what qualifications/skills must be observed in an interview or discerned from responses to interview questions, and organize these into categories
• Develop interview questions about the technical job skills and performance job skills that you cannot see on applicationsthis will let you structure the interview in a way that helps you fill in these gaps of information on the selection matrix
• Create a numeric rating system for the matrix:
• Assign a range of rating points to each qualification and interview question
• You may also give a numeric “weight factor” to each qualification and interview question based on their importance to the functions of the job. For example, if 50% of the position is performing one specific task, you might weigh that qualification as three times more important than other qualifications

Hold A Behavioral Job Interview With Each Candidate

During the job interview, help the candidate demonstrate their knowledge, skills, and experience. Start with small talk and ask several easy questions until the candidate seems relaxed. Then hold a behavioral interview.

A behavioral interview is the best tool you have to identify candidates who have the behavioral traits and characteristics that you have selected as necessary for success in a particular job.

Additionally, behavioral interview questions ask the candidate to pinpoint specific instances in which a particular behavior was exhibited in the past. In the best behaviorally-based interviews, the candidate is unaware of the behavior the interviewer is verifying. This is a much better approach to learning about your candidate then asking the individual to look into a crystal ball and predict probable future behavior.

In addition to the candidate’s verbal responses during the job interview, you’ll want to notice all of the nonverbal interaction, too.

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Tips For Before The Interview

In the days before your job interview, set aside time to do the following:

1. Start by researching the company and your interviewers. Understanding key information about the company youre interviewing with can help you go into your interview with confidence. Using the companys website, social media posts and recent press releases will provide a solid understanding of the companys goals and how your background makes you a great fit. Review our Complete Guide to Researching a Company.

2. Practice your answers to common interview questions. Prepare your answer to the common question: Tell me about yourself, and why are you interested in this role with our company? The idea is to quickly communicate who you are and what value you will bring to the company and the roleits your personal elevator pitch. Review our guide to answering

Tip: You should come prepared to discuss your salary expectations. If youre unsure what salary is appropriate to ask for, visit Indeed’s Salary Calculator for a free, personalized pay range based on your location, industry and experience.

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Tips on responding to “Tell me about yourself:

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Gauging The Candidates Level Of Self

As you try to determine a candidates awareness of themselves and how they fit into organizations, consider opening your interview with a question like:

• Walk me through your progression in your career leading me up to your current role.

This is a good way to get a candidates job history as well as their view of their progression. Once you have their answer, follow up with questions such as:

• How have you had to reinvent your job in light of your organizations changing needs?
• What makes you stand out among your peers?
• What would your most respected critic say of your strengths, areas for development, and future potential in your field?

In addition to probing an individuals assessment of themselves, you also want to ask questions about how they assess their organizations, with questions like:

• How many employees does your company have?
• Whats your organizations annual revenue base?
• How is your department structured in terms of reporting relationships?
• How exactly does your company make money, and what are its two biggest expenses?

Depending on the level of the candidate youre interviewing, their responses can provide excellent insights into their level of business acumen and self-awareness.

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Interview Questions To Your New Boss

1) What made you decide to invite me on my CV?

You will learn what your boss particularly appreciates for the position to be filled in his team. This question is also suitable psychologically in the first part of a conversation. Because this way your conversation partners consciously connect something positive with you.

2) How will you see in 6 months that Im doing a good job here?

In my experience, this is one of the most important questions that every applicant should ask in the first or second interview. Because over the years I have worked with applicants, I have noticed that interviews talk far too little about mutual expectations. Here your future boss should specifically formulate what he / she is measuring you for at this point. I experience a lot of employees in coaching who have not passed their probationary period. With this question and a clear answer to it, this would have been avoidable in most of these cases.

3) Is there anything you particularly value about your team?

4) What motivates you personally in your work?

5) What do you particularly like about this company?

6) What are the goals against which you are measured?

7) How can you support me in developing myself further?

8) How would you describe your type of leadership?

9) What do you think your employees would tell me about you in private?

10) What are the biggest challenges for your team in the next few months?

11) How are decisions made in your team and in the company?