There Are Two Sides To Every Coin

As a candidate I always felt sorry for myself having to go through the job search process. Creating resumes, finding positions, applying, phone interviews and then in-person interviews. Rinse and repeat for weeks and months. The process is hard for regular job seekers. With a career gap that most people in the hiring world dont know how to navigate, it becomes all the more harder. So no doubt the job seeker is a hard gig! But only after I started interviewing I realized that the interviewer has an equally hard job. I am here today to present the other side of the coin- the interviewer’s side.?

Being a student of product management the biggest skill I have gained is to put myself in the customer/ user’s shoes. This has helped me not only become better at my job but I also use this every chance I get in life. Applying empathy to the job search scenario- let us put ourselves in Mary’s shoes who is playing the part of an interviewer in our scenario. In product management we call it “persona” development.?

Step 1: Let us build a world around our interviewer Mary Hawkins

Mary is a full time employee, a wife, mom and also interested in doing community outreach. She loves painting, but seldom gets any time for it. At work she has been with the company for 6 years and has been in several different roles. Currently, as the head of Product Management she is focused on launching 2 new products but is also recruiting for 2 positions in her team.

Step 2: Let us come up with her goals and some challenges she faces:

In addition to several meetings related to the launch she is working on she has to come up with a job description which takes several rounds of back and forth with her team and her boss.?

She then gets it across to the HR somehow on time after the budget passed.?

She will then figure out who all from her team will be interviewing and make sure they have their calendars up to date. This process keeps repeating for several candidates that they have to meet with. Aligning calendars across everyone soon becomes a huge roadblock.?

Finally Mary and her team start receiving resume bundles with at least a 100 resumes that they have to sort through before starting to schedule interviews in the next 2 weeks. Going through 100s of resumes in such a short time means she has to rely on scanning it to sort and whittle it down to a handful. Even a list of 5 potential candidates means at least 5 working days that need to be dedicated towards the interviews at the very least.?

Then set aside time every week in your schedule to meet, amid their core roles and responsibilities. They have a very small amount of time to make these decisions.?

There is a huge churn involved in interviewing a candidate. We haven't even gotten to getting a final candidate and ready to hire, where negotiations happen.

Why am I sharing this??

• To spread awareness around the churn involved in the interview process.
• Because I wasn't aware that there is a monumental amount of preparation that goes in interviewing candidates. I figured it is just me who is spending their time preparing. But it wasn't until I started to interview candidates for roles in my organization I realized that the interviewers don't have it easy either.?
• When you go into the interview, show empathy and ask questions about their day. Be armed with enough information to carry out the discussion by doing prior research. This will give you an insight into what they are going through. Be thankful for their time in person and via email.
• So you can make it easy for everyone by being memorable- When they can only afford 30 mins to figure out who to move forward with- be that person who gets talked about in that meeting. Tell them stories and something they can relate to.?

I hope I am able to share the interviewer’s side of the story. They want to hire you as much as you want to be hired. Make it easy on them by being authentic, turning the interview into a discussion and being memorable. And if you do all of the above and it doesn't work out, let us chalk it up to not a good fit for each other.