Intuition in the Job Interview
Posted November 1st, 2011
When interviewing someone for a position, there is a lot riding on the decision. If you choose the right person, it can be a big boost for the company in productivity and revenue. Make the wrong decision, however, and you can have an even bigger headache, dealing with productivity problems, lost time and effort trying to get the person up to speed, and so on. If you terminate the person, there is the process of again looking for someone new and the time and expense for that.
Considering all that is riding on an interview, it is surprising that many interviewers still treat it as more of an art than a science, often relying on their “gut instinct,” their intuition about a candidate. Given that this is not an unusual practice, the natural question to ask is, how effective is it?
The answer, when you look at all of the psychological pitfalls involved, is: not very. There are a lot of things that can sway our “gut feeling” about a person, that don’t really directly tell whether the person will do the job or not.
One of the big things that can influence our opinion about someone is what is known as the halo effect. If you are interviewing someone who is very similar to you – for example, similar in age, in likes and dislikes, in what he or she does as a pastime, in opinions, in background – you are more likely to form a favorable impression of that person. She’s like you, so why wouldn’t you like her? But how much does this tell you about whether she’s capable of doing the job or not?
Another thing that influences our opinion — our “gut feel” — is how the person is dressed. Someone who is well dressed naturally will make a more favorable impression, but the question is, how well does this relate to her ability to do a job?
What can happen is that your “intuition” may end up giving an unfair advantage to a candidate because of psychological factors that might not even be directly related to the job.
What really counts is having a structured, organized job interview, one that is consistent with all candidates, and rates them all on the same scale, a scale that measures those criteria that are directly related to the ability to do the job.
If you need help sourcing and even interviewing great candidates for positions in your San Francisco-area company, give Bayside Solutions a call. We can help you find candidates, we can conduct preliminary interview, we’ll do all the necessary background checks, and more. Contact us today!
