Interviewing: More Than Just Words

Business advice columnist Allison Green exemplifies why I am a fan in her answer to a question regarding how a company should follow up with a job candidate who fails to show up for an interview.

What I find interesting is not so much her answer to the question, which is straightforward and reasonable, but the larger lesson she sees and expands upon. Green, aware that some companies send reminder emails to interviewing applicants, goes on to say why that is a bad idea:

[A]bsolutely do not send reminder emails the morning of the interview. You do not want to hire anyone who needs a reminder email for something as important as an interview--not unless you also want to send reminder emails about work each day while they're working for you. People are on their best behavior during hiring processes and they're not likely to get more responsible once they have the job.

If someone would forget the interview without a reminder, that's hugely important information that you want to have about them--possibly more important than anything you'd learn in the interview. So please tell your business development manager that you want to screen out people who aren't reliable and can't manage their own appointments.

Remember, there are all kinds of ways to learn valuable information about candidates during your entire hiring process--it's not just about their cover letter, rèsumè, and references...

Although Green doesn't explicitly say, "Remember what the purpose of a job interview is, and apply it to all aspects of the process," it is easy to start thinking in that vein when reading the answer to her question because she demonstrates what that looks like. On top of that, I am sure I am not alone among her readers to realize that much of her advice, on top of being sound for business, is not that difficult to apply to other areas in one's life.

-- CAV