Selection Interview as an Effective Employee Selection Practice Essay

Selection Interview as an Effective Employee Selection Practice - Essay Example The rationale for the selection interview as the final determination of a candidate’s fate is that it will predict the performance of the potential candidate. However, this is a misplaced concept. Even lie detector test need a baseline to determine which statement are lies and which are not. Without a baseline for the candidate’s demeanor, inflections and overall behaviour it is very hard to accurately determine his intention and motivations or predict his future performance. Just the same, given that selection interviews are still preffered by many managers to â€Å"feel† their candidates, the Human Resoruce Management Department should equip these managers the skills and knowledge they need to have. â€Å"A competency-based framework is advocated as the best way to creating a level playing field for evaluating candidates and for improving the validity of the selection interview. Competencies should be developed as part of a job analysis in which job descriptio n defines the duties or tasks invovled and a person specification details the characteristics or knowledge, skills and abilities required to perform the job. Some competencies can be assessed only by experts and others may require work samples, while still others need to be monitored or assess over time in the job. Competency approaches should therefore be developed as part of the corporate resource policy.† (Swift & Robertson, 2000) According to Lou Adler (1998) in the book â€Å"Hire with Your Head† The best interviewers use two different critical thinking skills, one for the hiring decision and another for information gathering. They recognize that the hiring decision must be intuitive, since there is never enough information to match abilities, needs, and interests... In Hiring the Best the following were cautioned to be the normal problems when a the wrong person is hired for the job. â€Å"Poor analysis of job functions, leading to the recruitment of the wrong people. Misguided recruitment strategies, leading to an inadequte pool of talent. Poor analysis of the necessary skill sets and behaviors, leading to inappropriate selection criteria.Inadequate initial screening, leading to wasted time and the wrong candidate on the short list. Selection interviews it is best to be prepared, knowing what you want is better than the candidate telling you that you want them, a good charismatic salesman can do that. Unless the position that needs to be filled up is for a salesman that is not a good way to choose the best candidate. The job description of the position to be filled should be on hand and in the mind of the interviewer. But knowing the technical requirement of the job is not enough. The interviewer should also be familiar with the culture or operating atmosphere of the position that is going to be filled. Information such as these is useful in determining the right behaviour, temperament and attitude needed for the job that should be in the ideal candidate. For organizations, the best interviewers are those that do not harbour or display any strong biases in any form. Training the interviewers in basic psychology and conducting scientific interview is another strategy in assuring professionally conducted selection interviews. The best result however may not be within the range or near one hundred percent as far as choosing the best and ideal candidates. This is due to the fact that selection interviews are intuitive in nature. It’s just that some are better liars than most.