Would I Hire Me Based On My First Care Interview?

Since about November 2018 one of my primary focuses has been on recruitment, selection, onboarding, induction and supervision. Working in a sector that usually has a high turnover of staff, Castleford House was typically ahead of the curve and I felt that we had a good record of retention for "core" staff. Our problem lay in staff starting, being inducted and then leaving after a few weeks for various reasons.

As part of our change in interview process I now no longer interview alone - I try to have a two or, ideally, three-person panel so that we can have a variety of opinions. There is one girl who works as part of our Lifestyles Coordinations team who is a very good judge of character and I usually get her to sit in a lot of the interviews. Since CQC rated us Outstanding this girl has taken the rating very seriously. She frequently says that, when considering candidates, she assess whether they are "outstanding". I honestly don't know her criteria for "outstanding", but she is an extremely difficult person to please in interview. I will want to give someone a chance; interviews can be daunting and people might freeze or panic, but she will shoot me down and tell me "we don't want people who don't come across well. We want people who are outstanding and panicking/freezing isn't outstanding." In her defence, where I have hired people that have her approval they have genuinely been "outstanding" members of the team.

The first of our revamped interview questions is "why did you want to/why do you work in care?" And she absolutely DETESTS what she calls the "grandparent answer". If anyone answers that first question with a variant of "I helped look after my grandmother/father" then they are already fighting a losing battle to gain her approval. She refers to this answer as a "cop out" and wants people to "give us original answers for wanting to be a care assistant".

Her attitude towards hiring people often makes me think back to my first interview for a care assistant position. I said in my previous article that the idea of me working in care about fourteen years ago was laughable. It truly was.

I won't give you my life history, but you need to know a bit about younger me. In school I was a perennial underachiever. I genuinely lacked application and made almost no effort in anything that wasn't related to football. The biggest problem with that was that I didn't actually start liking or playing football until I was about ten and by that time I was so far behind everyone in terms of ability that I wasn't very good at it.

In secondary school, as I got older, the more they pushed the idea of university and higher education on me the more I resisted. I did not have a plan for my life and instead I opted for subjects that I found easier. I liked to read and write, so I took English Literature. I liked using computers, so I took IT and Business Studies. I liked the look of Psychology and so I started the course for Sixth Form, but the amount of homework in that first month was so terrifying that I dropped it immediately. I would have done PE if not for the fact that football appeared to feature very little in the curriculum. My parents went through a divorce when I was about thirteen and I think that was one of the reasons I lacked effort. My dad moved away and then my mum also moved away. Rather than move with them I opted to stay in the local area with my grandparents and great-grandmother. That was another reason for a lack of application and effort - I had everything done for me and nobody pushing me. Why get a job when you don't have to pay rent?

Before my mum moved away I worked with her as a shop assistant in Woolworths for a year when I was sixteen and hated it, so I left after a year. I then briefly moved out of my grandparents and rented a flat with a friend when I left school and to finance that I worked in a warehouse. I also hated that and he was not a very good roommate, so after eleven months I was fortunately made redundant when the warehouse closed down and I moved back in with my grandparents rather than get another job.

It was, surprisingly, football that changed the path of my life. I started playing for a local team and loved it, but had to pay my way and that meant I needed to work. I applied for sixty jobs in one day - pretty much everything in the local area. The only one I remember was something like "spectacle arm repairs" in a Specsavers. The first job that got back to me was Castleford House Nursing Home.

I genuinely expected this job to be a doddle. Serving tea to a bunch of old dears sat around a fire, reminiscing about the war? It seemed like easy money. I had no idea what was involved. I went to the interview with no preparation - I didn't think I needed it. It was 2006, I was young (18) and looked younger (probably about 14) and knew how to respect my elders. I thought that my looks and charm would be more than enough to get the job.

I was one of the people who "copped out" and gave the "grandparent answer". I shudder, thinking back, how my Lifestyles Coordinator would react if we had to interview eighteen-year old me right now. It wasn't just that answer. It was all of it. How I helped provide conversation for my grandparents and how that makes me a suitable candidate for the role. How I am a team player because I play football. How I show initiative because I was one of the first people in my year at school to drive a car (after my grandparents paid for my lessons and bought the car for me!). I've been part of interviews that were worse than mine, but not by much.

I was extremely lucky. Back then, I had two things going for me at Castleford House and I thank the grace of God that I did. For one they were desperate because they had just lost three full-time care assistants. And for two a schoolfriends' grandmother, who I knew quite well, was the cook at the home (which I hadn't known prior to the interview) and she kindly asked the manager to give me a chance. And so it was, about two hours after that interview when I was sat in my bedroom at my grandparent's house honestly not that bothered about whether I got the job or not because "something will come up soon", that I recieved a phone call from the manager of Castleford House to tell me that I had the job and needed to come back tomorrow with ID and names and addresses of two references.

As a manger I want that phone call made to someone to tell them that they have the job to be one that causes them excitement. I want them to want to work here. I can say, honestly, that I was not excited. I was indifferent. I had faith if I hadn't been accepted for this job then I would get another from the sixty or so that I had applied for. None of them ever got back to me.

To answer the question in my title: no, I would not hire me based on my interview. Even though fortune favoured me and I took my opportunity, we live and work and care in a totally different time. People who interviewed like I did are the ones who, I would estimate that 90% of the time, start the job and leave after a month at most.

I was nearly one of those people...