For those of you that read this blog religiously, you will remember the quote last week from the employer who interviewed one of my candidates. For those of you that didn’t catch it, here’s what happened: I sent two candidates to an employer, and here is what he wrote about one of the candidates:
“Seemed distant, poor body language, and lacked enthusiasm. He also seemed to not have done much diligence on researching our company or preparing questions that would give him more insight into the position or general responsibilities. His previous production numbers also seemed askew from what our expectations for the role would be, which I know I’ve shared with you. When asked about how he would go about prospecting into smaller clients than at his last two positions, he replied by defining a market segment that was not in line with the market segment I had just explicitly defined. Also, he was dressed in an unpressed button down shirt and slacks–no tie, no jacket. While I would not find this an automatic disqualifier, combined with the other mitigating factors, I do not believe he will be a good fit at our organization.”
Well, the candidate got hired Friday. (It was not one of our clients, but that’s okay. We’re really proud of him.) He said that he learned from his interviewing mistakes. He did research on the company. He had some really good questions. He said he was more engaged in the interview. He said that he made it a lot more clear what his production and previous performance numbers were. He said that he dressed much more professionally.
He thanked me for what he learned and was grateful that he found a position. We are very proud of him and confident that if he keeps learning what he did here, he’ll do fine.
It’s rather unfortunate that hiring authorities decide about a person’s ability to do a job based on their interview performance. But, interviewing is like democracy, it’s not really fair, but it’s the best we’ve got.
Congratulations to our candidate!
