For most of us, interviewing is sketchy at best. This goes for both the interviewer and interviewee. When hiring people, there's a lot of hindsight after a hire is made. Usually something along the lines of it not working out as well as hoped based on the interview. It's not always easy to identify the right hire via an interview process. This means we, at times, are hiring the wrong people and passing on the best people. We don't usually notice or feel pain when passing on someone because our relationship with them is done after the interview. We can't hide from or forget the bad hire though because we likely see and interact with them on a daily basis.
People interviewing for jobs have the same but different problem. They are usually trying to sell themselves in a short interview and, if they're smart, using the interview to dig deeper into the company they are interviewing with. Just like interviewers can get bad reads during interviews, candidates can experience the same. Bad personal behavior and intelligence can be hidden during the interview process. The "real" company can be hidden too via superficial "grass is greener" discussions.
So how to interviewers and candidates find our which people, companies and positions are legit? Construction Pros can do several things during the interview process to bring the reality of a candidate or company into focus.
Push candidates (and companies) outside of their comfort zone. Just like most of us clean up the office or the house when we have leaders or visitors we want to impress, rough edges or downright bad things can be accounted for in a typical interview. Ask different and uncomfortable questions to get around this. Something like, "If you hiring for this role, who would you hire other than yourself?"
Ask about relevant challenges. Interviewers can ask the construction pro to explain their solution and thought process to a jobsite problem - "How do you calculate the concrete needed for a pour and how many trucks an hour will be required to make production?" Construction pros can do the same thing with a company but focus on their perspective. A question might look something like, "What kind of training and support is provided for two holing wall pipes?"
Ask scenario and behavior focused questions. These questions often have several variables and no 100% clear solutions. A construction pro might ask the interviewer, "Can you describe a time where you or your company successfully coached an employee to improve their performance instead of letting them go." A company interviewer might the construction pro what they would do during a concrete pour if they had a significant form blowout half way through.
Even with these questions and more, interviewing can be a bit of a crap shoot. A construction pro might show up to a newly accepted position and quickly find out it isn't as advertised. Construction companies often struggle to get people to fit when a construction pro interviews better than they build. A good idea is to make the interview process a couple of steps or more long and use a variety of questions (see above) and mediums (phone, e-mail, group interviews and even text messages) for communicating with candidates.
At the end of the day the interviewing and hiring processes are a bit of a gamble - look at your cards, make your read, get a little more info, make some more reads and then play your hand the best you can.
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