For employers: Interview dynamics for larger businesses

Employers have a vested interest in achieving top quality, efficient, well structured recruitment methods. The foundation of the structure is the job interview.

Interview dynamics are really the principles of how interviews behave when in operation, from the organizational level to the actual conduct of the interviews.

Interviews aren't an infallible method of hiring. Some can be mediocre, some can be excellent. The fact is that interviewers are the main heroes and villains of the interview system. If the interview dynamics are good, the interviews will be good.

If you're seeing a pattern of non performance, or finding yourself hiring a lot of high value employees, you can take a pretty accurate guess how that's being achieved.

Interview dynamics: The basics

Good recruitment is achieved by good interview quality and high standards.

A well organized, trained, HR or administration team will prevent mistakes.

You require:

• Effective management oversight of recruitment. Management can prevent problems and address recruitment much more effectively with active oversight, getting input from staff, and engaging with the hiring process at all levels.
• Trained, experienced, interviewers. These are people who can turn the whole hiring process into an extremely quick, efficient, and much cheaper exercise. They know the employment laws, they can advise, and they have depth of experience in the actual conduct of interviews, which is invaluable in quality control.
• A very clear recruitment policy and standards. The interviewers need recruitment guidelines, and a set of standards to apply to qualifications, levels of experience, etc.
• Participation of key supervisors and managers. This is absolutely critical in maintaining a realistic view of recruitment needs of the business. Senior staff expertise is the most important resource available to management in this regard. Needs can be identified instantly.

Conducting interviews: Picking your interview panel

Your interview panel are literally the people doing your hiring for you. A good result depends on their ability to do the job.

The normal interview panel is three people, but that's not set in stone. You can, if you wish, include other relevant people to check technical expertise, etc. It's very effective, because the experts are good quality checks on interviews.

Your panel must have:

• A trained, experienced interviewer. This doesn't really have to be the convener, but acts as an advisor to the convener regarding interview requirements, employment law, and other issues.
• A person fully aware of the needs of the job. Preferably a supervisor, but senior or experienced staff can be used. The need is for a person who can gauge the applicants in terms of the practical needs of the job.
• A person able to assess any relevant expertise or qualifications. Where qualifications or expert level skills are required, this panel member acts as a quality monitor. This person can also double as the person keeping track of the practical side of the job.
• In some countries, an independent panel member is required by law. This is mandatory, and there are no choices. You're advised to contact a business associate to provide staff for this post on the panel.

With this sort of panel structure, you're guaranteed of high quality results from your interviews. The recommendations will be based on reliable sources of information, and hiring standards will be excellent.