Interviews And Your
Online Interview Notes
Your interview of a job candidate is your opportunity to evaluate the
person from many points of view. The emphasis in this discussion is risk
management. Of course
you want to know if the person can do the job, what experience they have,
whether they will work well with your current employees, and the compensation
that they expect. However, it is also very important for you to determine if
the candidate could be a risk to your company in the future.
For numerous reasons, we think that you can conduct the best personnel security interview
if you use our pre-interview tool The Examiner(tm). It puts you in the
enviable position of reviewing what the candidate has already admitted online.
You should tell the candidate that you are going to conduct a personnel security
interview. Then, there are a few things that you should keep in mind.
 First is the discussion of all prior employment. You want to
 know who the candidate worked for, exactly when, why they
left, what they were paid in that job, and what their
responsibilities were. Candidates have a propensity to
exaggerate their start and end dates so that they feel like
their resume looks better. They use vacation time, sick
leave and other things to try and mask gaps in their employment
when no masking is really necessary. The truth is
necessary. If you have a problem in the future, you will
wish that you had discovered the truth up front.
Your company is going to be investing a lot of money in
training a new hire and you want to know the person's
attitudes toward staying in a job. You are also trying
to get a feel for how and why the person appeared to
progress in their past jobs. Does the person really have
7 years of experience, or do they have one year of experience
7 times over? Does the person have any motivation to work
for your company other than a paycheck and normal career
development? Are they joining your company to get your
client names, to get your marketing plan, to discover your
manufacturing procedures, or to just bide their time until
something happens in their life that they are waiting for?
Second is a discussion of past residence addresses. You will
expect these to match up with what you find in credit
reports, ID Verifications, driver's license records, their
employment history, their time in school, etc. In addition,
you will likely conduct a criminal conviction history check,
and you will want to know the possible locations to check.
You probably will not check everywhere that they have lived,
although some companies do, but you will want a "residence
framework" to hang the other things they say on so that you
can determine if it all makes sense.
Third is a discussion of education history. You not only want
to know if it is real, because your company is paying for
the knowledge, but you want to know what they liked best,
least, etc. Many times a very valuable candidate has
acquired their knowledge through self-study and seminars.
Be sure to listen for the details about their capabilities.
Don't be afraid to ask general questions.
With the three topics above behind you, you should then let the candidate tell
you why they want the job. As they explain to you, ask them questions about what
would motivate another employee to steal, or assault someone on the job, or take
things home for personal use, or fake sickness to get a few extra days off. See
what they say.
With what are the normal interview formalities out of the way, don't hesitate
to ask them if they left anything off the job application and why. You want to
ask them if they have ever been convicted of a crime, if they have ever had a
moving traffic violation, or if they have ever done something that would be a crime
if someone had known about it -- and what did they have in mind ? In
addition to the answers, you want to see the level of comfort in the person as
they answer.
In closing the security interview, remind them that the interview has been a
personnel security interview, and ask them to please offer their comments on the
risk associated with a new employee. Hopefully, they will talk about the risk
of not getting good productivity, avoiding interpersonal problems, and employees
who might go to work for a company with an ulterior motive possibly related to a
competitor or a business that they wanted to start.
From all of the above, you should be able to make very valuable entries in your
online Interview Notes. Things that you will want on the record, to
jog your memory in the future, and easily accessible to your colleagues if more
than one person will be interviewing the applicant.
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