Once I applied for a Recruiter
job in country in Europe, and the interviewer wrote me an e-mail to schedule a
Skype interview. I got excited about it! I was ready online 10 min before the
interview time, connected on Skype, and decided to write a short text to the
Recruiter to say something like “Hi, I am ready here, let me know when you want
to start”.
She replied immediately to say
that she was sorry, but she had to re schedule the interview. I was
disappointed, but OK, we re-scheduled it for the following week. The next
interview day arrived, I was ready again in front of my computer, and the
Recruiter was there, on the other side of the screen.
The interview lasted 8:37min
in total, from the moment I said my first “Hi, good morning”, until my last
“Thank you very much, bye”. 8 minutes and 37 seconds. Nothing else.
How long a job interview should
last? Is there a minimum time? Is it necessarily bad to go through a short
interview? Who said that long interviews are always a good sign to the
candidate?
I used to work with massive
recruitment. It means that I had to recruit for a big number of position, and
consequently interview a bunch of candidates daily. When a Recruiter needs to
deal with time pressure, targets and big numbers, the length of the interview
is something that he needs to be careful.
A
part from considering the interview length, in a massive recruitment the
Recruiter needs to be clear about the main aspects and skills he need to check
during the conversation. He needs to optimize his time in the best way
possible.
For example: If we are looking
for a Receptionist candidate who can speak fluently 2 different languages and
have experience in 4 or 5 star hotels, we need to make sure we cover those
aspects during the interview.
If I speak with candidate A during
the interview using the two languages he said he can speak, and I see the
candidate is fluent in both, I can move fast to the other aspects I need to
check. I can ask for more details about his hotel experience, and I might even
do that switching from one language to the other, to check his technical
vocabulary.
If all his replies matches to
what I am looking for, the interview will probably move fast and I can easily
make my decision about whether the candidate should go ahead on the process or
not. This situation could end up being a fast interview, and the reason is that
the candidate was good and met all the requirements I was looking for. I didn´t
need a longer time to confirm that, things were already clear to me.
Imagine I interview now a
different candidate (B). When I start checking his language skills, I notice
that his level is not fluent (although that´s what was written on his CV). He
starts to feel nervous, so I decided to switch to the other language I need to
check. His fluency is not as high as the position requires in this language
either, but I think that it might be happening because he is already nervous
from speaking the previous language.
I decided to take it easy and
speak about different things, to “break the ice” and give him some time to
recover and maybe get confident again. After that, I need to go back and check his
languages skills. When he speaks again, his level is “on the limit”, so I am
still not convinced that he meets the requirements. I appeal for more details
about his hotel experience in one of the languages I need to check, and then I
ask for the same details in the other language.
At the end, the candidate
could give me the details I was looking for, but it took much longer than the
previous candidate did. I had doubts about this candidate´s language skill, so
I needed to make the interview longer to check things repeatedly, until I was
ready to make my final decision.
If I had to choose between
both candidates above, I would probably go for the first one. Maybe his
interview lasted 20 minutes, maybe a bit less or a bit more. Was this time
enough to check everything a Recruiter needs to check and make an important
decision like offering a job that can change the person´s life? Well, in an
“ideal” world, we Recruiters would have plenty time to spend as much as we want
in a job interview, but reality is different.
If we Recruiters can check all
the aspects we need during the interview in a short period, in most of the
cases there is no point of stretching the conversation. I already have the
information I need to support my decision about offering the candidate a job or
not. In some cases, a short interview can perfectly be a good sign. It can be
the best thing that can happen to you!
Do not be necessarily suspicious
about short interviews. The feeling from the candidate´s side can be “I had so
many other things to say, but I didn´t have enough time”. We know about it, and
we are sorry that the work volume and time pressure does not allow us,
Recruiters, to spend more time with you. Remember, you are doing a job
interview, and both parts involved, Recruiter and candidate, want the same
thing: a positive reply. If a short interview is enough to lead to this
situation, the goal was accomplish.
Be yourself and show who you
are since minute one of the interview. You never know how long it will last,
but remember that every impression, every detail and every information will
support the Recruiter´s final decision.
Do
your best and go ahead!
As you know, English is not my
native language. I use it because I can reach more people and share my
experience with you.
Click here to subscribe to my YouTube channel.
No comments:
Post a Comment