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Professional Selection Interviewing

Training course in Professional Selection Interviewings

Learn to consistently recruit ‘good’ quality employees into the organisation

One Day Course

Course Brochure Download
Professional Selection Interviewing brochure
  • Develop an awareness of how to define a role clearly
  • Conduct interviews with a sense of confidence and professionalism
  • Manage candidates expectations and ‘sell’ the vacancy with skill and integrity

Overview

The selection interview is a conversation with a purpose. That purpose is to provide an opportunity for the interviewer to identify whether a candidate is suitable for a job vacancy, and for the candidate to decide whether the job on offer is suitable for him or her. It is a two way process that involves the recruiter presenting the company in a good light and uncovering what the candidate has to offer the business; while giving the candidate enough information so that they can decide whether or not the vacancy is right for them.

Learning objectives

By attending this highly interactive one-day course you will:

  • Gain an insight into the key psychological principles involved in conducting an effective interview
  • Understand how to specify what is required for success in a given role so that the hiring criteria are clear to everyone involved in the process
  • Master an elegant routine for starting an interview so that the candidate is put at ease
  • Discover two, simple yet powerful interviewing methods that will help you to uncover a candidates strengths and weaknesses
  • Become aware of what questions you should not ask in a selection interview situation

Who should attend?

Anyone who wants to acquire a methodical and professional approach to recruiting good calibre employees.




Day 1

The inner game of selection interviewing

The phrase the ‘inner game’ is a term borrowed from sports psychology. It is a reference to the fact that what is going on inside a person’s head (their state of mind) is crucial to good performance. Here we consider the role perception and beliefs of expert recruitment interviewers.

  • Examining your current beliefs
  • Reviewing expert beliefs
  • Making changes that you feel are appropriate for you

Exercise: applying the ‘affirmation’ technique

Defining the job

In order to find the right person for the job we need to be clear about exactly what the job involves. Having a clear and comprehensive profile that covers the purpose of the role plus the core duties and responsibilities is the starting point for all effective recruitment decisions. The use of competency profiles as part of this specification activity is an important part of making the recruitment process efficient, fair, and consistent.

  • Job descriptions
  • Person specifications
  • Understand competencies
  • Example competency profiles

Exercise: reviewing job descriptions

Initial Screening

How to identify the most able candidates from all those who apply for the vacancy in an efficient and effective manner.

  • The role of testing
  • Telephone interviews

Exercise: understanding tests and their application

Behavioural event interviews

If someone has successful completed some activity or task in the past the chances are that they can do it again in the future. Behavioural event interviews are based upon getting a detailed account of what the person actually did in a specific situation, as a means of gathering data about the extent to which they demonstrate a particular ability or skill. This evidence of past achievements can them be used to predict future performance.

  • Opening the interview
  • Introducing the BEI method
  • Asking about a competency
  • Exploring the ‘story’ with the ‘listening funnel technique’
  • Taking notes
  • Closing the interview

Exercise: conducting a behavioural event interview

The biographical interview process

The biographical process is concerned with building up a picture of the whole human being in terms of their likes, dislikes and preferences. By asking a person what choices they made at key points in their life and what they liked or disliked about the result of those choices it is normally possible to see a clear pattern of values emerging of the things the candidate seeks and those he/she endeavours to avoid. Any pattern that we uncover can then be compared to the criteria that we have identified as necessary for success in the role in question.

  • Opening the interview
  • Introducing the biographical method
  • The six stages in the biographical method
  • Taking notes
  • Closing the interview

Exercise: conducting a biographical interview

Realistic Job Previews (RJP’s)

The interviewer should ensure that any candidate who accepts a post with the company stays in situ for a reasonable length of time. The emphasis of the work in this area has been on ‘realistic job previews’ (RJPs.) which means that we need to give an up-beat but honest picture of what working in the business is like.

Exercise: giving a job preview

Choosing the successful candidate

Understanding how to collate the interview notes and test scores for all the candidates in order to identify the ‘best’ choice for the vacancy in a logical and rational way.

  • The decision matrix concept
  • Acceptance criteria
  • Scoring schemes (including the importance of ‘weighting’)

Exercise: drafting a decision matrix

Interviewing and the law

In the EU (and the USA) it is illegal to discriminate against anyone when making hiring decisions on the grounds of factors such as Race, Religion, and Gender etc. This means that it is important to avoid asking questions of a candidate (or writing text in a advert) that touch on these areas because it could lead to an unsuccessful candidate claiming that they didn’t get the job as a result of unfair bias.

  • Key areas to be aware of
  • Examples of discrimination

Exercise: case study in discrimination



Feedback

Feedback is based upon peer reviews using Boulden assessment checklists. Completing the assessment checklists is not only valuable to the people involved in a given case study, it also helps those completing them to gain an in-depth understanding of the building blocks that make up an excellent interviewer.


Remote Training

All of our workshops can be delivered as Remote Training via e-learning modules plus Zoom based virtual workshops. Please see our Virtual Training page for more information.


Contact

Further information on this course is available by contacting
Boulden Management Consultants:
via our Contact form
Tel: 0844 394 8877