It’s still the first year of the new millennium, but we can already sum up the theme of the 21st-century job market.
Who wants to be a dot-com millionaire?
It seems everyone wants to get in on the hot opportunities of the cyber-economy and is out there applying for jobs in E-commerce.
And who can blame them? The Internet has created tremendous economic opportunities for talented Web designers, application developers, and project managers.
But the new Web-based job market leaves employers with a tough problem , how to tell the duds from the dynamos when everyone out there claims to be a cyber-super hero.
– Hiring Smart
May Save Money
Hiring smart not only saves time and headaches, it saves a great deal of money. In fact, employee turnover is one of the biggest cash drains a company can experience.
In just four years, our company has grown from the two founders to 75 employees. We’ve done a lot of hiring and, thankfully, very little firing because of a precise strategy designed to hire the right people for the job.
After sifting through resumes, most companies conduct a series of interviews with candidates to determine which person is the best fit for a position.
However, traditional interviews are very subjective. A manager has a 50/50 chance of choosing the right candidate based solely on the results of the interview. The key differences between effective and ineffective interviews are structure and focus.
Traditional interviews tend to be unstructured and unplanned conversations. They typically do not focus on job-related issues and are highly subject to personal bias.
A structured interview, on the other hand, consists of carefully planned, job-related questions that can be systematically scored to guarantee that the best candidate is selected.
– Four Basic Types
Of Questions To Ask
There are four basic types of interview questions: closed-ended, open-ended, behavior based and situational.
The closed-ended question generally solicits one word answers, usually yes or no. This often leaves the manager in a position of dominating the conversation.
Interviews are most effective when applicants spend most of the time talking. Therefore, employers should always ask open-ended questions so applicants have the opportunity to expand on their job-related knowledge, skills or experiences.
Most closed-ended questions can be converted to open-ended ones. For example, rather than asking if a candidate liked his or her last position, ask what he or she liked best and least about the job.
Behavior-based questions provide an interviewer examples of how an applicant has handled work issues in the past.
We always ask candidates to tell us stories about a challenging situation they had at their last job and how they handled it. And we give them an opportunity to tout their victories by asking about projects in which they take pride.
The responses to these questions allow us to see how clearly the candidate can communicate concepts, how well they analyze a situation, and the level of personal commitment they have towards their job.
– Answers To Situational
Questions Are Revealing
We can also tell a lot about a candidate by the way he or she responds to situational questions. Behavior-based questions focus on how the candidate has already handled past work issues. Situational questions are when the employer poses a “what if” question to see how the candidate would respond to a future crisis or challenge.
The responses to these questions offer many of the same windows into the character of the candidate that behavior-based questions do. But they also allow employers to see how well an applicant thinks on his or her feet.
In the fast-paced world of E-commerce, employers need a person who can shift mental gears smoothly and confidently. The best types of questions are the real life issues your company has recently faced. This way, you can see if the candidate truly understands the management style and ethics of your company.
It is said that a person makes a first impression in seven seconds of meeting a new person. In that time, we typically make assumptions about a person’s capabilities based on the way they look, dress and carry themselves.
This is a mistake. Some of the most sharply dressed, clean-cut candidates have turned out to be duds, while their tongue pierced counterparts understand every nuance of E-commerce. Take time to look beneath the surface.
While the job market is full of candidates eager to make their dot-com millions, very few have what it takes to succeed in this highly aggressive marketplace. Taking the time to structure a focused interview is an investment that yields impressive returns for companies.
Stone is the human resources specialist at Silicon Space, Inc., a Southern California E-business professional services firm.
