1. Before the Interview 3. During the Interview 5. Cultural Bias 2. Developing Questions 4. Disabilities FAQ
	Filling a Vacancy
The Interview

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

37. When I call applicants for an interview, what kind of information should I give them?
    
    
    • Explain how to get to campus and to the building and room and what the parking arrangements are (meters, parking permits), if driving. Mention the closest disability parking spaces.
    • Given them a general description of the interview process, (e.g., people will take turns asking you questions; they’ll be taking notes to refer to later.”) and how many people will be participating.
    • Advise them if they will need to arrive early to complete or provide missing information on an application and if they should bring a list of references. Consider providing them with a copy of the interview questions a few minutes prior to the interview.
    • Give the applicant your name and telephone number, to call in case they have to contact you about the interview. Give them an alternate contact name and phone number for the day of the interview.
    • Don’t forget to ask if they will need anything else for the interview and if they have any questions.
      
      
38. What if I can’t reach a candidate to schedule an interview or what if they will not be available during the timeframe established for interviewing (e.g., they are on vacation)?
    
    
    • While it is important to be as flexible as you can in scheduling interviews for your top candidates to ensure that you get the best qualified person for your position, you must balance this against your need to fill your position in a timely manner. If you have selected a candidate for interview and you are unable to hold an interview because of issues related to availability, you should indicate that the applicant was unavailable for interview on the  RMS Worksheet: Job Offer - Open/Campus-Only Recruitments.
      
      
39. Do I have to ask each applicant the same questions?
    
    
    • During the interview, while the same standard questions should be asked of each applicant, you do not have to ask exactly the same questions of every applicant. You may deviate from your standardized questions by asking for clarification, asking an applicant to give examples or more description, or asking follow-up questions about one applicant’s specific work history.
      
      
40. How can I use my interview time most effectively?
    
    
    • Interviews are best used to gather information about a person’s past work experience, knowledge, and potential to be successful in the position. They’re poorest when trying to get material to make indirect inferences about a person’s motivations or hidden character flaws. For example, if you’re tempted to ask a “if you were a color, what color would you be?” question, ask yourself what that has to do with job performance.
      
      
41. What are the best kinds of interview questions?
    
    
    • The best interview questions are simple and direct, asking about a person’s ability and experience with respect to the requirements of the job, e.g. “Have you worked with UNIX before? Would you please describe what you did? What other kinds of computers and software have you used?”
    • The best predictor of future performance is past performance: ask applicants about what they’ve actually done, in specific behavioral terms whenever possible. For example, instead of asking, “Are you a good employee?” ask for specifics: “What kinds of documents did you prepare? What kind of volume? What kinds of decisions were you asked to make? How often were you asked to do a form over again? For what reasons?”
      
      
    • Examples of kinds of interview questions:
      
      
      • Questions of clarification that you might ask one person and not another, e.g.: We couldn’t tell from your application whether you designed workshops yourself or just conducted workshops that other people had designated. Could you tell us exactly what you responsibilities were?
      • Direct questions are easy to understand, and are more likely to yield concise answers and specific information. Ask what you want to know, e.g.:
        • What were your responsibilities at your last job?
        • What kinds of software have you used? For what kinds of tasks?
        • What kinds of decisions did you have authority to make on you own?
      • Open-ended questions allow the candidate to decide how to present an answer, and may therefore reveal something about speaking skills, ways of organizing information, and the way a candidate thinks about things, e.g.: Tell us about your job. What do you think is the best way to develop leadership skills in students?
      • Problem or situational questions require a candidate to analyze a situation and can tell you something about how they approach a situation, e.g.: What would you do in a situation in which …? When you evaluate someone’s performance, how do you handle areas in which the person is not performing adequately?
      • Questions that ask candidates to recall their actual past behavior in a situation can avoid some self report problems, e.g.: Think of a time you had to make a quick decision, and describe it for us. Tell us about a time when you disagreed with your supervisor. How did you approach him/her, and what was the result?
      • Probing questions ask the candidate to tell you more or clarify, e.g.: Could you explain more about what you mean by “student-oriented leadership”?
        
        
42. How can I assess multicultural competence?
    
    Don’t assume, ask questions such as:
    
    
    • What, if any, has been your experience working or living with people of diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds?
    • What have you done that required communicating with people whose first language was not English? What do you think is important to be aware of in communicating with non-native speakers?
    • We’d like you to think of a time when cultural differences came up in a job you held. Please describe the situation as well as how you dealt with it.
      
      
43. Can I ask hypothetical questions?
    
    
    • It’s fine to ask hypothetical questions, e.g. “What would you do if ...,” but remember that many people turn out to behave differently than they claimed. You are more likely to get accurate information if you ask a person to describe their actual experience, e.g. “We’d like you to think of a time in your past work experience when you had to deal with a conflict with a customer. Would you tell us what the conflict was, and how you handled it?”
      
      
44. What are common problems in making interview judgments?
    
    
    • First Impressions - Forming a favorable or unfavorable impression of someone in the first few minutes of the interview, and filtering or distorting information that comes later. E.g., we may immediately like a charismatic person and not notice that he or she lacks specific qualifications for the job. Or, we may decide right away that the person is unsuitable and tune out for the rest of the interview (creating the danger that the person will notice s/he isn’t being interviewed seriously and assume the worst).
    • Halo Effect - Over generalizing: being so influenced by one striking characteristic of a person that we ignore all others, e.g. rating someone high overall because that person seems to be articulate, or rating someone low overall because she or he is shy.
    • Contrast Effect - The tendency to evaluate someone in comparison with something other than the criteria -- e.g., evaluating a candidate too highly because he or she was interviewed right after a very unqualified candidate, or because she or he is most unlike your last unsuccessful employee.
    • Negative Information - When trying to distinguish among well qualified candidates, searching for any negative information to disqualify a person, and therefore giving undue influence to a negative factor that may not make that much difference in later performance, or just might not have been obvious on another person's application.
    • Fleeing to Objective Indicators - When faced with difficult decisions among well-qualified candidates, the tendency to search for any information that appears to be "objective" -- e.g., number of years of experience -- when it may not be a valid predictor of a person's performance.
    • The "Similar to Me" Effect - Being influenced by some way in which the candidate shares an experience or characteristic -- e.g., where a person is from, what school they went to, etc. Similar dynamic is whether a person is "a UCSC kind of person."
    • Stereotyping - Usually, using common social stereotypes to make assumptions about a person based on group membership -- e.g., Asians are attentive to detail but not assertive, or men won't take orders from women. We each also have personal stereotypes, based on past experiences -- e.g., a woman who would wear pants to an interview will have bad judgment dealing with people; or overweight people don't care about themselves and will not care about their work; or people with Southern accents are ignorant, but people with British accents are intelligent.
    • People who "will fit in well" - Feeling most comfortable with people like us, and thereby screening out diversity of all kinds. Important to try to distinguish a valid criterion of "interpersonal skills" from prejudiced judgments of personal style. Dangers to watch for: individual differences in dress, accent, eye contact, degree of formality in an interview, assertiveness, etc., can have a very different meaning in different cultures and subcultures. Also watch for sex differences in evaluating “style” -- e.g. confident women may be more impressive to women than to men; tentative and friendly women may be more impressive to men than to women. Make sure your judgments are job-related.
    • Inferences about Motivation - Assuming that we can know something about a person's motivation by inference from his or her life circumstances -- e.g., that a person who "really needs a job" will be more highly motivated than a person who isn't dependent on the income, or that a person who is currently commuting to a job "over the hill" is just looking for a way to avoid the commute. Related: "overqualified" judgments, i.e., that a person who has more than the required qualifications "will be bored with the job" and will leave as soon as a "better" job is available.

[Top of Page]