Blog, Interview Skills

A Brief History of the Job Interview

March 16, 2022

Thomas Edison’s prodigious legacy as an inventor is unparalleled. Although, favour has fallen to his “current war” rival Nikola Tesla in recent years, Edison’s impact on modern innovation is still felt today, often in ways we hardly consider. One such invention was not comprised of wires and coils, but a much more human process: he invented the job interview.

Getting Hired Before Edison’s Time

Before Edison’s day, getting a job was a family business. To better understand why a job interview was such a novel idea, remember that the first “job” was to find food and shelter.

In ancient Rome, Greece, and Egypt, assigning professions to certain members of society came through apprenticeship, most commonly through family. This tradition continued until the 1800s. If your father was a fletcher, you were likely in training to be one as well.

During the industrial revolution, when factories were springing up, jobs were plentiful, requiring little more of the applicant than being present. By the 1920s, the workforce had enough college-educated potential employees that those hiring were able to be a little more selective.

Edison’s Interview

Though scientists may quibble about alternating versus direct current, there’s no question that Edison’s famous invention factory in Menlo Park, New Jersey — where the phonograph was created — was instrumental in modernizing the West. Famous even in his day, Edison would get applications from hundreds of college graduates eager to work in the lab.

Edison, though he had a reputation for being slovenly, had incredibly high standards — most geniuses do. So, he set about composing a list of questions for each potential hire. Some would be skill-oriented, ensuring they had the requisites. Other questions were more arcane — often involving literature or geography (take the test here).

Edison’s test was likely much more difficult than what applicants would face today. Only about seven percent of candidates would pass.

The Edison Test Makes Headlines

It wasn’t long before newspapers ran with the story. The headline of a 1921 New York Times paper read, “Edison questions stir up a storm.” The interviewees were described as “victims.” The Times was sure to include as many of the questions that a single candidate could remember being asked — all 141 of them.

The test, however, wasn’t derided everywhere. Other captains of industry began composing lists of their own, and of course those who were lucky enough to pass spoke highly of it.

Edison’s test wasn’t the first time someone had ever been asked questions before getting a position — the Woolworth Psychoneurotic Inventory was introduced to the military four years earlier in World War I — it was the first time a job interview was ever considered a trial.

Edison’s demeanour didn’t help. Candidates reported that he paced around the room while firing off the questions, before being quickly told to “leave the air” (go away).

Interestingly, apart from Edison’s gruffness, the complaints from candidates are not dissimilar to objections raised to more esoteric questions today. Larry Page’s brain-twisting, Barbara Walters-esque questions over at Google have often gotten the same negative feedback. Regardless, those curve-ball questions have become part of the norm. Thank, or blame, Edison.

Kenny Hedges | Contributing Writer

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Employee Selection Strategies

By assistantdesigner@theedgeleaders.com on

June 23, 2020

- Blog

Employee selection is one of HR’s strategic roles and key performance indicators. It involves manpower forecasting, staffing and retention activities. By planning, recruiters collaborate with hiring managers in predicting and anticipating the demand for personnel. This is a pro-active approach to ensure there is adequate supply of highly qualified candidates suited to fill in current and future vacancies. Human resources and requisitioning department heads identify and justify the need for new hires. Consequently they define job specifics, set parameters and allocate budget. As an executory body, HR is well-trained in this field. To achieve their goals they employ appropriate selection systems as well as standardized policies and procedures that are necessary for delivering the best prospects.

Below are some employee selection strategies, most admired firms adapt to ensure success in hiring the best candidates.

By putting in place effective recruitment initiatives, organizations will be able to serve job openings at any given time. Sources and availabilities of talents possessing the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSA) necessary to perform the most critical and technical tasks, will vary depending on Top Management’s support and how a particular company adjusts to changing technological trends. Great hiring entails significant operating expenses and for some, sizable investments in infrastructure.
Create an employment brand. Do you provide competitive compensation and benefits package? Is your company in the top echelon of corporations? Have you been operating for over a decade or more? Do you take care of your employees? These are just some of the many questions applicants consider before joining any organization. If your answer is yes to all questions then there’s a big probability that you will be able to find the perfect match. Make your company the employer of choice. This way, you will be able to attract topnotch individuals to come and join your firm. As a result, you will have a pool of well-qualified candidates to select from as well as more negotiating power to ensure that you’ll take in the cream of the crop that best suits your budget.
In Canada, the job market is very competitive as it has a huge blend of talents, coming from a variety of cultural backgrounds, and skills sets. Therefore, HR must have more options expanding and improving its selection schemes, so that it can provide better impact to the organization. Efforts must be made to exhaust and optimize all recruitment channels and sources by deploying computerized screening and electronic database management systems like Taleo.
A candidate may have all the skills and experience required to be successful on the job, but a recruiter must confirm that they have the proper references. Conducting a comprehensive background investigation validates the credibility of a recruit. Through this process, a company can certify their credentials. Resumes are unfortunately often manipulated. As a consequence, feedback from employers matters more and more. Be vigilant in doing reference checks, it should be a direct supervisor of the candidate that you are speaking to since colleagues can be friends with an overly emotional attachment to the prospect.
In some countries, checking the candidate’s background is not limited to just authenticating work performance, attitude or contributions with past employers. It extends to knowing how the person relates to the community. This may require them to undergo drug testing, or other tests to comprehensively assess their character before placement.
Do not limit yourself to interviewing candidates using only the “generic” interview questions. Take time to develop a unique and well-structured one to assess competencies to a greater extent. Most applicants, because they’ve been applying to so many jobs, are used to answering the standard questions, and many simply say the answers hiring managers want to hear. To really target the person that’s right for the job, perform an extensive screening. For example, if you are looking for a sales personnel, give him actual sales simulation exercises, and see how he’ll be able to use his expertise in actual scenarios.

The list could go on and on, but one thing is for sure, there is always risk attached to hiring. Even if you have selected “the best of the best”, organizational fitness still matters. Install an on-the-job trial to be sure that you’ll only choose the right fit before fully offering the job. If your first choice fails, try the second one. That’s why it’s always necessary to have a backup. Try to have at least three shortlisted candidates on your list for any position.

Adapting best practices in your process will surely influence the company’s bottom line in a meaningful way. Remember, through effective selection, organizations will have repeat customers, increased revenue, a more engaged workforce, sustained job performance, lower turnover, and much more.

M G Beltran | Contributing Writer

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How To Hire Right

By assistantdesigner@theedgeleaders.com on

June 16, 2020

- Blog

Beyond having the right product and service, another vital aspect every organization should look into is “Finding the Right Fit”. Hiring someone whose character the business must have in order to succeed. Failure to do so will cost your company time, dollars, and effort. However, given proper tools, training and direction your new recruit will become your premium capital investment. So, don’t take recruitment for granted, remember, your employees are your most valuable asset. Now, the challenge is how to hire right, the first time. Although the world has become extremely technologically-driven, it still needs Human Resources to be successful.

Let me share a three-part checklist that will surely yield better results in getting the perfect match…

Establish the need to hire.
A proactive and strategic human resources always refer to the plantilla to ensure that the company has the right quantity and quality of people able to keep the business running. In cases of manpower requisition, HR in collaboration with the Hiring Manager must be able to answer the two (2) key questions before initiating recruitment:

Is the vacancy created due to internal movement such as resignation, maternity/paternity leave, demotion or de-hiring?
If none of the foregoing was the reason, is it an additional headcount due to business expansion?

Remember, hiring is an overhead expense. Thus, ROI shall always be taken into consideration. Also, it is a must to review your existing workforce, you might have a potentially qualified internal candidate who has the eligibility or whose promotion is long overdue. Review employee profile/records or announce/advertise vacancies via intranet or bulletin boards. You can also check if there is an underutilized personnel that can occupy/fill up open position. If and only if you have fully exhausted your internal resources that you should proceed on searching for external candidate.

The bottom line here is this: Hiring Manager with the assistance of HR may opt promote or distribute duties within the department/organization. It saves the company time and money at the same time increase motivation of employees.

Conduct Job Analysis.
Envisioning what you want or defining labour needs in clearer terms. This tool is not only used in recruitment, it could also be a realistic basis for training, wage and salary administration, job re-engineering, health and safety.

The output of job analysis is job description (JD). A well-crafted JD shall be the foundation in designing a competency-based recruitment strategy. It clearly defines major scope and responsibilities of the job as well as relationship with other jobs/departments. It also emphasizes working conditions and hazards, most especially for high-risk profession. A ideal JD is always up to date, with specific title and detailed duties. It has the reporting structure, challenges and opportunities, qualification, knowledge, education and personal characteristics.

From JD, HR can develop job specifications, this is statement of minimum acceptable qualities of a position. The success measure is always the value of the person hired to execute the tasks.

Map out your Recruitment Platform.
The goal is to have a systematic hiring process that will aid HR and Hiring Managers in attracting the best candidates for the job. The bottom line is: the more qualified candidates you have, the more likely you are to locate the most suitable person to fill the job. Utilizing the details in the JD, HR together with Hiring Manager and approval of top management, create job specifications, salary range and timeline. To increase employee morale, it is necessary to advertise the position internally prior to exploring other sources. Internal placement is a great way of motivating employees to perform at their fullest potential. If no one will be selected from within the organization, reasons must be clearly explained and communicated or it might lead to grievance. If lack of skills is the cause, HR may recommend training so that person will be prepared should the same position arise again. One of the advantages of internal placement is culture fit, which is the number one consideration in hiring. A candidate can be fully qualified based on KSA but the risk is how the person can mesh well with the culture. When an internal candidate is offered the new position, transition timeline with the current supervisor should be planned.

HR can now proceed to external sourcing when no one qualifies. The commonly employed sources are social media (LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook), on-line job sites, newspaper ads, job fairs, and campus recruitment (colleges/universities). Conducting career talks to top graduating students is another strategy to invite top graduates to join the company. For high-profile positions, HR are trained on how to court passive candidates or they can use manpower agencies or head hunters who are likewise equipped with tools and expertise in recruiting.

Effective and Efficient Screening and Selection.

Due to scarcity of jobs, there is an influx of active candidates. To simplify HR’s job, setting of criteria/parameters and preparing structured interview questions, will help in separating the desirable to average. It is like designing a Hiring Scorecard. In constructing interview questions, equal employment opportunity and conformance with legal and labour standards should be taken into consideration.

HR performs the following in screening and selecting candidates:

Resume paper screening enables HR to easily identify which one to process by matching information to the job checklist.
Phone interviews will be conducted for candidates who meets at least 3 out of the 5 items. Only those whose rating is 8 and above in the phone screening will be invited for face-to-face in-depth interview. Again, based on point system, HR should present the short-listed candidates to Hiring Manager who will make an initial impression.
Don’t forget to verify sterling credentials of at least top 3 candidates through professional reference checking. Some industries even require credit history such as banks, insurance companies and the like. When the report is ready together with all the other documents used in screening, HR will present again to Hiring Manager for the final decision. The closing will happen at job offer. For some companies, a non-compete and confidentiality of information agreements are presented during the job offer. These documents are needed to protect the company’s products, clients and trade secrets.

On Boarding is Important.
Make sure candidates are well inducted about the company’s mission, vision and core values before endorsing him/her to his/her assigned department. Be sure to provide the initial tools he/she needs to become successful on the job. It is ideal if a company can invest in a “First 100 Days Development Plan”. Keeping in mind that workforce must embrace the company’s philosophy and business principles, because this is when employee engagement begins.

In conclusion, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to recruitment, it should always be tailored and catered to the type of business. As a tip, don’t embark on a search without answering 5W’s and 1 H. Why/Who/When/Where to get the best talents and what recruitment techniques are helpful and how effective is the hiring process. Stop hiring the wrong people, it is possible!

DBPC | Staff Writer

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4 Qualities of a Successful Staffing Agency

By assistantdesigner@theedgeleaders.com on

May 26, 2020

- Blog

Hiring can sometimes be a nightmare. You need someone to fill a position quickly, but you’re not sure where to look, or you don’t have time to take care of it on top of all the other things you have to do. There are lots of companies dedicated to servicing this issue, but weeding out the good ones from the bad can be almost as confusing as actually hiring for the job you’re looking for. This week, we’re here to help you make the distinction a little more painlessly. Here are four qualities of a successful staffing agency:

A Good Curated Network

A good recruiter knows that their strength only extends as far as their contact list will allow it to. Any respectable staffing agency will place the highest emphasis on making sure their candidate pool stays “free of leaves” and will screen their candidates extensively before adding them to their database. Bear in mind that a great network only stays “great” if it’s updated constantly. Look for companies that maintain a strong presence within the professional community and seemed to be as engaged now as they were 5-10 years ago. Otherwise, you may end up with a list of people who were fantastic prospects – a decade ago.

Regional Knowledge

Before you get too excited about the size of a company’s database, make sure that they actually have a strongly established network for the region you’re hiring in. If they claim to hire all across Canada, press them about the areas that they say they have the strongest presence in. If yours is one that they’re still “developing”, then it might be best to find another agency.

Industry Know-How

So the agency has a solid network in your area and a strong commitment to keeping it that way. Seems like a great time to jump on board with them, right? Well, not so fast. Before you decide whether a company is right for you, make sure that they’ve actually got experience hiring for the field and the type of position you need. A recruiting organization dedicated to helping young professionals might not be the best place to find new senior management; likewise, a staffing firm with a history of helping marketing/sales professionals probably isn’t going to have the right structure to help you find a new mobile app developer. Do some research on the companies you’re considering and observe whether they’ve hired successfully for the areas you need. Meet with them and ask them questions about the industry and see how comfortable they are with the subject matter.

They Communicate & Ask Questions

When sitting in a meeting with a representative from the agency, there should be plenty of questions being asked from both parties. If you’re the only one who seems curious, then that should be a big red flag. Hiring can be a complicated process, and every company has very different ideas about what the ideal employee will be. A good recruiting organization will maintain a constant dialogue with you to make sure that they know exactly what you’re looking for. This an on-going process, since new questions can come up on almost a daily basis. For example, if someone has a great personality and all the skills required but only has 4 years of experience instead of 5, should they be considered for the role? Regular follow-up is key in ensuring that stellar candidates don’t slip through the cracks in those kinds of situations.

Staffing is already hard enough without creating another headache by wrestling with ineffective recruitment agencies. Bad hiring can cost an organization thousands in a very short amount of time, so focus on finding the one with the right connections, location, knowledge and engagement before you fork over any of your hard earned cash.

L. Wang | Contributing Writer