As a QA I took part in many recruitments, both as the recruiter and candidate, this led me to the point, where I worked out my recruitment style and developed some expectations related to these. Below I’d like to go over different approaches to interview, this article has no point in defining which way is wrong or right, please treat it as some perspective you can agree or disagree with. I hope you will find it useful.
Dear recruiter
The interview itself is a vast and very complex process. Companies worked out different approaches, starting from very long and detailed recruitment processes consisting of many steps on the one hand and processes that consist of one step on the other hand. All of these have some pros and cons. I will not dive deeper into the process, instead, I will focus on the key points that I find very important.
The right mentality, it’s the most essential value/feature for me, I always repeat that you can teach anyone technical skills, but changing character and attitude is beyond the capabilities of both the candidate and the company. What exactly hides behind this right mentality term? I would divide it into something you can measure and something you can feel, both of these factors matter because silver tongue or the right preparation of a candidate might mislead you. Let’s start with something you can “measure”, there are plenty of open questions which could be asked to understand the reaction of candidates in different situations, not to extend this article I will put a list of questions I like to ask during the interview in the following article. The second part, the feeling, is something, you just understand on the level of your subconscious, so things like the first impressions, if you are having a good time discussing different matters with the candidate, and so on.
Red flags, if there is anything that triggers my internal warning system I consider that, trusting my intuition was always important.
For the technical part, instead of putting a list of questions related to theory, I like to put a candidate in a situation, where he extends his creation and approach. What I mean here is: I do prefer to send very short challenges, up to 2 hours long, that the candidate creates in advance, then during the interview, I can ask the candidate to expand it or ask questions related to that. I’ve seen candidates that could answer every single question related to theory, but when asked to apply this knowledge in practice, all you could get was silence.
Dear candidate
I still remember my first interviews when I was very stressed. I made mistakes I still feel cringed about. I went through all the stages, starting from, I know nothing, then, I know everything, to the point where I understand I need to learn constantly. Like above, I would like to share with you what I expect from myself during the interview.
Be yourself and be true to yourself, I could not imagine a situation where I put some masks just to pass the interview, this would lead to frustration for all the parties involved, if you don’t know something admit it openly, there is a high probability that one day you will receive a question that you don’t know the answer to. Showing your ability to assess your strengths and weaknesses is very important.
Don't forget that you aren’t one man army, usually what you have achieved wasn’t only your merit, most likely there were other people involved. Don’t get me wrong, being proud and voicing your accomplishments is something important, although, there is a very thin line between showing achievements and being cocky, even ignorant.
Choose your strengths over the desire to impress, When you get some kind of challenge and you can present it either in a framework that the company you are applying to is using or the framework you know the most, choosing the one you feel good at, could be a better option, you also show the level of understanding the tools you know the most.
Understand yourself, this is the hardest part of everyone's career. What is the reality? What are the true levels of my skills? What did I learn over the last year? What did I do to improve the way I work? How fast do I learn new things? all of these are very important questions I always ask myself.
These points I have realized after many years of trial and error. Every recruitment process adds, removes, or modifies something on my list. I would like to hear your thoughts and approaches related to that matter, maybe together we can create some book of knowledge that can help all of us :)
Top comments (1)
Great article!