The interview can be held individually—one interviewer interviewing one applicant, but also more than one member of the company can asks questions to one applicant—otherwise known as a panel interview. The last one is a formal and organized interview arrangement that is often used in academia, government or for high-level executives. It is advisable before the interview to find out if it is an individual or a panel interview, and which from which departments are the interviewers. For example, the HR manager will be checking to make sure you are a good fit with the culture and the people working at the company; while the hiring manager will want to know about your technical skills or business know-how;and someone from accounting will want to know if you are savvy enough to operate a business budget.
In the past, interviews had no job description or person specification. The interviewers were looking for “someone who will fit” or “the right sort of person”. The interviewer had no prepared questions, took no notes and made no ratings or quantitative assessment of candidates. This is a typical unstructured interview and probably still happens quite often, but most large company employers have been forced to ask themselves if their selection methods are reliable, valid and fair.
In most structured interviewing systems, interviews start with a detailed job analysis, which ensures that the questions and judgements are job-related. Interviewers’ judgements are structured by rating scales and checklists that make the interviewfocused on the job being applied for, within the legal framework, and without intruding on much personal information. There are several structured interview systems in current use: situational interviews (developed from critical incidents of particularly effective or ineffective behaviour); patterned behaviour description interview (based on critical incidents but it looks back, focusing on actual behaviour that occurred in the past); multi modal interview (including eight sections and beginning from informal to a structured pattern); and empirical interview (the questions are empirically tested to distinguish poor from good performers). But there is also a downside of structured interviews. The applicants cannot fully express themselves when the questions are completely structured and they do not allow forfollow-ups.
STAR
One of the best interview techniques that can be used also in structured interviews is the STAR technique. The STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result) format is a job interview technique used by interviewers to gather all the relevant information about a specific capability that the job requires.
• Situation: The interviewer wants you to present a recent challenge and situation in which you found yourself. This is about setting the scene, giving a context and background to the situation. So if you are asked a question about time management, your reply would need to include the details of the project you were working on, who you were working with, when it happened and where you were.
• Task:What did you have to achieve? What was your target or task? You need to make sure that the interviewer knows what you were tasked with, rather than the rest of the team.
• Action: What did you do? The interviewer wants to know about what you specifically did, so use ‘I’ rather than team actions – otherwise you will not demonstrate the necessary skills the employer is looking for. Be sure to share a lot of details, the interviewer will not be familiar with your history, although remember to avoid any acronyms and institutional language.
• Results: What was the outcome of your actions? What did you achieve through your actions and did you meet your objectives? What did you learn from this experience and have you used this learning since?The result should be a positive one, and ideally one that can be quantified.
The STAR technique enables you to showcase your relevant experience with the interviewer in a methodical manner. It is recommended to do some in-depth preparation before the interview so that you can have some great examples to quote (e.g. situation where you have showed strong leadership skills, good time management skills, analytical skills etc.)
Sonja vos Ralevska
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