waiting room with our best clothes on awaiting a job (or school)
interview. You can feel your palms sweat and thoughts race as you wait
for your name to be called. You look around at the office environment
and imagine yourself walking through those doors everyday. People walk
by and smile, and overall, you have a really good first impression of
the organization. You hope they like you. You tell yourself to remember
to smile, while recalling all your experience that makes you the perfect
person for this job. A moment of self- doubt may occur, as you wonder
about the abilities of the other people being interviewed and hope you
have more experience and make a better impression than they do. You hear
your name, stand up, and give a firm handshake to the HR manager. The
interview has begun.
As she walks you back to a conference
room, you think you see encouraging smiles as you pass by people. She
asks you to take a chair and then tells you what the interview process
will be like. She then asks the first question, “Tell me about
yourself.” As you start discussing your experience, you feel yourself
relax, just a little bit. After the interview finishes, she asks you to
take a quick cognitive test, which you feel good about. She tells you
she will be doing reference checks and will let you know by early next
week.
To get to this point, the hiring
manager may have reviewed hundreds of résumés and developed criteria she
would use for selection of the right person for the job. She has
probably planned a time line for hiring, developed hiring criteria,
determined a compensation package for the job, and enlisted help of
other managers to interview candidates. She may have even performed a
number of phone interviews before bringing only a few of the best
candidates in for interviews. It is likely she has certain qualities in
mind that she is hoping you or another candidate will possess. Much work
goes into the process of hiring someone, with selection being an
important step in that process. A hiring process done correctly is
time-consuming and precise. The interviewer should already have
questions determined and should be ready to sell the organization to the
candidate as well. This chapter will discuss the main components to the
selection process.
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