Thetownend.com

Good morning my beloved brethren,

Advice needed.

Interviewing - I know we've had oodles of threads of interview/CV tips for the unemployable amongst us, but what about from the other side of the coin?

In short, I am recruiting, I've never done it before and start interviewing next week. Assistance gratefully received on interviewing tips/questions etc.

Employ the women with the biggest breasts

Behavioural interviews are currently the vogue. Download some questionnaires and behavioural tests. That way you are sure everyone gets a standard interview and you don't recruit based on personality,  rather than suitability.

I think its relatively straight forward and I always find that I end up with :

1 - the person who can do the job
2 - the best fit for the team/role

If you get lucky this will be the same person, but if not go for the best fit as you can develop someone easier than you can force someone to fit in.

There are lots of questions about but ask them one or two which will highlight whether or not they have bothered to research the role/company - if they can be bothered to do that then they won't be bothered about the role.

 Theres the obvious stuff like making sure you ask open questions rather than closed ones - I find "Tell me about....." a good opener rather than "Have you ever...." etc.

When I did interviews a few years ago, I had a standard list of questions prepared that would get me started and provide a similar framework to each one, that makes it easier to compare the candidates. That doesnt mean you cant divulge a bit if needed though. I also like to throw in one or two totally random questions that get the candidates thinking on their feet rather than questions that they may well have prepared answers for. Something like "Which famous person would you compare yourself with and why?" None of them expected it, and seeing some of them really squirm under the pressure of thinking of someone can tell you a lot about them.

What's the role for?

Are you taken them under your wing Dave?  :hmmm:

 Let's face it...DMR is going to take Tans' advice, and rightly so.

I had an interview recently where the interviewer asked me what I would do if I was made Minister for Education. Bearing in mind it was not for a government job, this threw me slightly.

If you must ask daft "curveball" questions, at least don't laugh when they give a mad answer.

Hopefully, the obvious answer....a better job than Michael Gove.

Maybe dmr is actually hiring a cleaner?

Choose the person who keeps trying to set fire to things and rattles off verses from the bible.

I once had an interviewer ask me if I preferred Xbox or Playstation. I said Playstation and didn't get the job :(

Are you starting from scratch or do you have an interview pack ready?

I find that to get the best from candidates, I ask them to explain who they are to me before we start. It puts them at ease, you see their true colours and you can then start to piece together their CV and employment history. It works quite well for younger people who don't have much of a CV.

Tips

As the interviewer, you have to ask the questions.
Find out what it is you actually do, use this information to create a series of questions to ask the interviewee.
Don't wear shorts, you need to look professional.
Under no circumstances fart during the interview.
If in doubt check out the David Brent technique.

DMR...good morning,now what do you feel you can bring to our company?
Job Seeker....i feel i am honest,reliable and have a good sense of ambition that may help the company.
DMR...and can you give me a short run down on your list of jobs?
Job Seeker....yes i have been in retail for many years and have not had time off for illness ever.
DMR...Well that sounds brilliant....now fuck off and leave me in peace.

You forgot the bit where DMR tells her to get her tits out and have a nosh before she leaves

That bit was confidential tans ::)

Not sure why, but that tickled me. Good one.

In our old unit we had a big glass window between my office & the office the interviews took place in. When they were interviewing women we used to mark the women out of ten, the interviewer was looking at us & the interviewee had their back to us.
Also when i had to sort through the C.V's I would ring the women i thought looked good on paper i would ring them if they sounded horny they got an interview if not i would give the C.V to a collegue & get them to make a decision if they could have an interview. It got so bad once they took me off of sorting the C.V's as we were only having horny sounding women turning up for an interview.

Fit on the phone, add two stone.

One of my mates at uni thought a receptionist from our letting agency sounded proper fit. Flirted with them, chatted them up, eventually he set a date to go out for drinks. We followed along without his knowledge to see whether they were as fit as he insisted.

Was a bloke. He tried to save face and be polite whilst, unknown to him, we rolled about pissing ourselves in a corner.

In all fairness some were not as nice as they sounded, but most were. Out of all the interviews i set up the girl that was taken on was good at the job. The ones i didn't set up were shocking at the job they were taken on for.
They won't let me do the interviews though as i would ask inappropiate questions.
I asked one of the girls in sales at our suppliers yesterday how many dates it would take before she would let me do her up the shitter, she was shocked & asked me to repeat myself so i did, she then said it depended on if the date was for drinks or for a meal.

I was once recruiting for a telemarketing office I was managing.

I was holding telephone interviews considering the nature of the job. One interviewee wanted to meet in person instead as he didn't feel comfortable on the phone.

Needless to say, he didn't get the job.

Ideally the room should look like this. Make sure the blinds are closed, so they aren't embarrassed or pressured by passers by

[url width=595 height=370]http://i.imgur.com/kuSjA.png[/url]

 :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick: Quote of the evening.

The cameras a necessity too right??  ;) :girlgiggle:

Ah yes

The old casting couch  :D

I like these memory joggers, I interviewed a guy 5 or 6 years ago. He was 20 minutes late and I was a bit miffed. He ran in, sweating and stinking, and couldnt talk for 10 minutes. When he got his breath back he said he had just driven back from Moscow in an old KGB Zil? limo at breakneck speed since his agency rang him 2 days before. I just thought nutter, and got it over with pretty quick. Looked out the window 10 mins later and he's sat sat in the damn thing on the phone to his agency, I guess moaning about the miserable sod who just interviewed him and basically threw him out. I think the lesson is, go for the biggest tits.

That is quite tame, they all know i am a perv. I once found out loads about a new girl who had started & then repeated it all to her & put a load of doubt in her mind. I told her i knew her mum for about 18 months before her birth, her auntie who works with her played along with it & filled her mum in on it. It was 6 weeks before i told her that i wasn't her dad & let her know it was all a wind up & suprisingly she still talks to me.

Best interviewing tip is to shut up. If there's an awkward silence after they've answered a question, let it hang there for a minute. Most candidates will keep talking, fill the space and that's when they say interesting things.

As I mentioned earlier, watch the episode of the office when David Brent is interviewing for a new secretary (hope you don't have a football in the office DMR :). )

Don't ask hypothetical questions. Give them a scenario they will face in the job you are interviewing for and ask them to give examples of what they have done that is similar. For example...
 
Precursor: In this job there are lots of tasks that need to be worked at the same time.
Question: Can you give me an example of when you have had to manage multiple tasks?
Follow up 1: How did you know which task to do first?
Follow up 2: How did you manage the other tasks?
Follow up 3: What was the outcome?
Follow up 4: What did you learn from the experience?
Follow up 5: Did you have an opportunity to try a different approach?
Follow up 6: How did that work?

If you are interviewing with someone else then you can play interview games such as bullshit bingo or try to get phrases or names of cheeses into the interview.

If you manage to do it it is really is hard not to laugh. When I was at at a previous co we tried to get Little Britain phrases into our interviews.

"What is your greatest weakness?"
"Honesty."
"I don't think honesty is a weakness."
"I don't give a fuck what you think."

This reminds me of a time when we had to choose between a spotty 18 year old lad and a gorgeous 30 year old lady for a role in an elections department. The young lad had zero experience but good A levels and a range of relevant hobbies. The lady had worked in a variety of PR departments but came across as vacant.

We had asked them to give details of high pressure situations they had been in and how they would deal with abusive candidates and agents. Vacant lady used an example of how her colleagues at her last post had been unhappy with her choice of vol au vents when organising the staff christmas party. The lad with no experience got the job.