Guaranteed interview

[Bellavida99]

I interviewed last week and one candidate had ticked box on application that they were eligible for a guaranteed interview but no other info. We interviewed him and he seemed good and to be honest we probably wouldn’t have otherwise interviewed him due to large distance away he lives. In the end another candidate was a bit better and we offered him the job. However I asked our recruitment team about this and they said they don’t ask which criteria he meets for a guaranteed interview. I wondered if people can just tick this box to get an interview in very competitive roles if it’s something that you can’t ask about?

What are the criteria for guaranteed interview?

Ex forces, care leavers and if you have a disability I believe

Why does it matter which criteria he fitted?

You interviewed him, he wasn’t the best person for the job, as long as you can justify why it’s a non issue

It doesn’t matter at all and I think it’s a great thing for companies to offer, and can be great for people who maybe don’t meet the exact job criteria but have other valuable assets which may not have been considered without an interview. I just wondered if this could be open to abuse if people were applying for a very competitive role they could tick box to at least make it through the first sifting

Where I work applicants still have to meet at the job description criteria. If they have a disability they're guaranteed an interview but they have to have the skills.

That’s interesting and definitely not the case where I am. I assume it would be different for some roles where you have to have a specific qualification

Where I work you have to meet the essential criteria on the JD to be guaranteed an interview. So it's not just tick a box and get an interview. You have to show in your application you hit all the essential.

I was thinking of job descriptions which have needed specific experiences, yes.

More generally, I'm not sure. The company do the usual we welcome disabilities etc but I'm a bit cynical about the reality of it all.

I would double check that they don't have to meet the minimum essential criteria OP as otherwise this would be unfair and absolutely open to abuse. Where I work we have guaranteed interviews for those that meet the minimum essential criteria as have every workplace I have worked.

I think it makes sense that they don’t ask detail of the criteria because actually people could still lie, so unless you are going to ask people to prove they are a care leaver for example at application stage, there is no point asking them to define on what grounds they are eligible for a guaranteed interview. And it would be wildly inappropriate to discuss it in the interview. What do you think the process should be?

Is location a reasonable reason not to interview someone?

The only thing that should guarantee you an interview is the skill set that you have that aligns with the role on offer

I've only ever seen this apply to people who meet the essential criteria too. So if you have a very long longlist of people who meet the essential criteria and you're whittling it down to a short list (eg people who have the nice to have criteria) then people who tick this box are automatically on the shortlist.
Seems like setting people up to fail if you're interviewing people who don't have the basic experience to do the job.

I wondered this. Does location affect ability to do the role?

Hmm not sure but they were literally the other end of the country. It’s only an entry level job (£30k) and although mostly home working they would be expected in a couple of times a month and maybe more initially. The train from Northumberland to London would be a few hundred pounds. We felt that this would cause problems and attendance would wane a bit as although home working, the contract states place of work is office so they couldn’t claim fares. I don’t know if that was wrong of us in the reviewing team

There is no legal obligation to share / disclose a disability so they can tick that box and ask for adjustments but not tell you the reason for these adjustments, not should you be asking questions about disability or health prior to job offer. Only for reasons such as monitoring, and even then its just 'do you identify as having a disability under the equality act".
edit: working from home / remotely on a full time basis can be a reasonable adjustment so you need to be prepared to justify why that is simply not possible. Is it a job that can literally only be done onsite or is it just a few meetings / showing face every month or so? If the latter, you may lose any claim he makes.
I speak from experience having made a similar claim.

The reason I asked is because I am applying for jobs at the moment and I'm not that local to them (not as extreme as your example). But I'm only at current address temporarily.

I think it's a really, really rubbish thing tbh. If your CV isn't good enough to get to interview then you're almost certainly not going to get the job. You might get lots of interviews (as they have no choice but to give you one) but you're not going to get a job. It's to make disabled people etc feel they're getting somewhere when really they're not. I have a son with ASD and he never ticks this box as he wants to get to interview on the basis that he's 'good enough' to get the job on the basis of his CV, he doesn't want to be wasting his time going to lots of interviews and not getting a job.

It's right up there for me with companies saying they offer 'reasonable adjustments' and are 'disability confident' and then it turns out all they offer is extra time. What use is that in a 90 minute interview?

He went for companies that actually had useful things in place for ND applicants. Their attitude to autistic people comes through pretty clearly in the application process and it's obvious which ones are just ticking boxes.

I think it's something that could be abused of course but then again people could lie on their CV so it's no different or more/less likely than that.

I would put down that you are willing to relocate or will be moving to the area shortly.

I think to be safe I’d put in supporting statement or covering letter “I am planning to move to Xtown in X month”.

Im interested why you wouldnt have interviewed him on distance?

I have always lived a county abd an hours drive away from my work place. Its never been an issue for me.

Plus they may be moving to the area.

Seems a strange thing to filter on

Most of my applications have been for civil service jobs and I don't think they see any personal information when selecting.

They could have a relative living nearby they could stay with.

In my workplace the applicant still has to have the qualifications and experience asked for in the person spec.
And then they tick the guarantee interview box if they meet the criteria. But people can't just randomly get an interview for a job they don't have the qualifications for.
Are you sure that's not the case at your workplace too?

Sorry, I haven't read all the replies, but that can't possibly be a 'thing'- to get a guaranteed interview without meeting the person spec.

Otherwise it'd be like- 'I'm going for that orthopaedic consultant job even though I'm not a doctor- just for a laugh'.
I mean.....protected characteristics PLUS person spec, yes.