To ask how hiring managers decide who gets the job?

[HonestTealPoster]

For those of you who have been involved in recruitment, particularly as hiring managers or interview panel members, how do you ultimately decide which candidate to offer a job to?

Say, in situations where you’ve interviewed two or more strong candidates at the final stage.

Is it purely down to interview scores or do things like personality, rapport, team fit and overall impression influence the decision?

And how often is it a genuinely difficult decision between two candidates?

Fourth round is standard in my industry (finance) with many processes having more than four rounds. This was an internal application.

It went:

1. First round competency interview with HR
2. Interview with Executive Director who would effectively be the line manager for the role
3. Partner interview
4. Second partner interview (slightly more senior partner, typically has ‘final say’).

Thank you. I’ve been job hunting since June. It’s demoralising, especially as I know people who are months and months into their search. It’s a very tough market.

I have recently interviewed for a job where the interview went amazingly well, down to the fact all of the interviewers told me they had really enjoyed the interview and I’d done extremely well. I then did not get the job. On asking for feedback, the response was that I had scored full marks and there was nothing different I could have done. There was another candidate who scored the same and they went with her. The person who got it had worked in the team before and was coming back to the organisation. She had interviewed before me and was talking to staff at reception when I arrived. When she left the staff members there (none of the panel) were talking about how much they hoped she would get it and come back. To not get that job felt awful..I know it was probably a known vs unknown thing, but it doesn’t help knowing that.

For me it usually is soft skills. Communication mostly, I usually need someone sho can explain our technical area to non specialists, confidently manage other teams to deadlines.
I also want someone positive with a can-do mentality. Someone who shows a bit of energy/excitement about the role & actually wants it.

In my industry reputation does matter, people tend to know who most people are and if you are a bit of a dick, a pisstaker or a grumpy bastard ive probably heard about you from someone.

I'd also say, most jobs ive got, havent been advertised, a head hunter has approached me. In that situation there's often not many in the running, its clear im a strong candidate and i know it will largely be personality & fit.

It means exactly what you’ve said here, someone who the team can work with and personality.

I do a lot of interviewing. I’m about to sit on six (yes, you read that right) interview panels.

All six, at interview stage, will be decided on 100% team fit. We’ll be interviewing for jobs overseas. We want people who will contribute to the life of our team out there, be good team players, not drop the ball and leave others to pick up their work, be personable and above all…just be decent humans. Nothing worse than being stuck in a country, away from home, with only two other people who speak English (and none of you speak the local language and the place itself is challenging to live in) and one of those people is a twat. Even in bigger teams, at the level I’ll be interviewing for…if they’re a twat it impacts the entire team out there. They won’t get to interview without a good work ethic and proven record but at interview it’ll be about them.

London based jobs…maybe 20% ‘team fit.’

Personality and team fit are important at my work. We can have 5 people interview all with good experience and all with good answers to the questions, but if they can’t get on with the team and won’t pull their weight with certain tasks then they’re not going to fit well.

Every organisation is different. Someone very clever, methodical and organised to a tee might be one businesses dream candidate, in my creative biz they are gonna piss every one off.

In my team we are very diverse in terms of ethnicity & background stuff, its nothing to do with "faces not fitting", what we have in common is being sharp as tacks, very very quick learners. Speed/efficiency over detail. If someone is a slow & steady perfectionist they just won't get on well. Someone who's stick on detail, is going to be having to work very very hard, pull long hours etc to keep up mentally, this job wont suit them, they'll burn out.

Skills and attitude. I'm a bit wary about the "team fit" idea because it often translates to "someone like me" and isn't really objective. They also have to want the job and have done at least a bit of research.

Saying someone is "too experienced" is often a get out clause to let the candidate down gently. More than likely, there was a better candidate on the day.

And like an earlier poster said, I often find there is a stand out candidate early on in the process. (And more often than not it's not the best candidate on paper.)

Personality goes a long way. DH was interviewing last week and the person with qualifications and experience coming out his ears was such a prick he couldn't hire him. The man actually shushed the female member of the panel when she asked him a question!

I must have interviewed getting on for 100 people over the last 25 years. I’m in the public sector, so every decision we make needs to be transparent and it really helps to be quantifiable. We look for an understanding of organisational culture, I guess this is “team fit”. I’ve only twice had it too close to call. In the first instance, we thought we’d give an internal candidate the oppurtunity , largely because we could get her in post most quickly. She turned it down, because she hadn’t realised she’d be based in a depot 60 miles from home - this didn’t reflect well on her! The external candidate we brought in was worth her 3 month notice period and has been superb.

On the other occasion it was 2 internal graduates looking for the next grade up. Similar high scoring, all rounder applications, interviews and technical exercises. Both great guys. We brought them back a couple of weeks later for a second technical scenario, but with a few curveballs thrown in - there was still only a mark between them, but there was something. An extremely difficult decision to make.

I can’t remember who it is, but a big household name - maybe Google - always sends a taxi for their interview candidates, then ask the taxi driver how the candidate treated them.

Many years ago I interviewed for a job that went really well. It was through a recruitment agency and she was very confident I'd get it. It was a niche thing straddling two skill sets which I happened to have. Basically someone doing a role alone in an organisation needed a second person as they were swamped. The HR interview went so well to the point that they pretty much told me I had the job but I just needed to meet the person I'd be working with. That interview went well too but it was someone I had little in common with personally. Another candidate came along less suitable in some ways but the two got on like a house on fire and had a common hobby. So I lost out. I was quite devastated but I get it now. I work in a team of 2 in a different industry and it's intense, we are physically in the same room all day interacting constantly and client facing in a role where we need to project calmness. The person that might recruit to be with me is not the same as the person they might need next door for the same role. Energy, communication style and personality trumps qualification and it's impossible to pin in down in advance.

Same questions to each candidate, 3 panel members, scoring sheet decided what the domains are before interviews start, average the scores, best scorer gets offer.

It’s done quite tightly on scores in my area of education. Often I feel that a candidate who did less well and tanked one score area could be better overall but they get bettered by the more consistent responder. Being great at interviews doesn’t always translate to being great at the role and I think the process could be improved.

We have genuinely had two candidates who have been pretty equal - think it’s more likely in certain job sectors. Pupil panel can usually see the best candidate!

I'm also slightly wary of the term 'team fit' because I think in some cases it can be used to mean 'someone like me' and that isn't always the right thing. But we do often decide on team fit based on personality... someone who is engaging, curious, emotionally aware etc. but also who complements the team we have. We are in a fast growing area and while we may recruit an additional person to do a role that already exists (e.g. we have 2x senior specialists and need a 3rd) we often see at interview that somebody has new experience that we don't have, our just that they are a detail person that will complement the current ideas people. So team fit is not about recruiting people whose faces fit or who are the same as the existing team, but more about how will they add to or balance the team and bring something we don't already have.

Honestly I make mum my mind up usually in the first ten minutes of the interview if I want to hire someone or not. I’ve often taken the person I liked more intially over the person who on paper would have been more suitable. Most of the time it’s worked out well.
Being cheerful, bright and seeming like you really want the job is a good place to start .

Who will fit in best, contribute most.

i agree its the first 10 minutes of the interview

We do pure scores averaged across the interview panel but have the option to veto a candidate for unacceptable behaviours not scored by the interview (only happened once or twice and I've interviewed a lot). I'm surprised by the answers.

I agree and know what you mean, it’s tricky not to end up with a homogeneous team but having a small team (which I do), the wrong fit is really hard to get past.

I had an accountant making people cry with their blunt attitude and undermining behaviour. I had made plans to address it formally but she resigned. On paper her replacement is less qualified and experienced, but she has surpassed her predecessor by miles in a short space of time. When I interviewed her there were two very close candidates. I’m sure the other would’ve been a good hire too and it was a tough choice.

We don’t do this but we get feedback from what they were like to receptionists and anyone else they interact with. We’ve had a few people be dicks to the reception staff and people taking them on tour and they are not ever hired.

Ours is usually interview scores and how they managed the task. The task is usually a fairly obvious indicator as to whether someone can actually do the job. We would never give a role to someone who didn’t seem to fit in with the team either though no matter how well they scored. So on those occasions we don’t recruit anyone and go out to advert again.

If two people scored similar then it would go on personality and fitting in which the wider team/ ethos of the company .

Team fit can be code for "not like us" but should be about rounding out a teams skillset. One team may need someone diplomatic, another may need someone strict to herd cats. The role Im recruiting for right now needs someone independent and enthusiastic, as the team isn't keen on expanding (but the business needs to).

We use a scoring method and also make notes on each answer to justify our scores. Sometimes there is a stand out candidate and the decision is easy, sometimes a few candidates score very close to each other and you go through a moderation process. We will look again at scores and notes and make a joint decision.

For those saying team fit, how do you avoid bias influencing the selection?