Why you should treat your interview like a first date
Relationships don’t last as long as they used to. I am old enough to remember the idea of a committed, long-term relationship and was in one myself for almost 15 years. Now people boast stints from 12-month to a couple of years.
Of course, I’m referring to the relationships we create with our employers, not our loved ones. Increasingly, the two are becoming difficult to differentiate.
Since these business relationships keep getting shorter – temporary jobs appear to be on the rise – the amount of time we spend “dating” potential employers increases in frequency. Longer-term business relationships now get celebrated in public ways.
LinkedIn, for example, notifies users when a contact’s business anniversary comes around. I’ve yet to see if an appropriate gift should accompany these anniversaries but it certainly inspires many to offer their congratulations. What’s next – a professional version of Valentine’s Day?
Laugh if you will but that line between business and personal relationships gets frequently blurred and chemistry plays a major role in the hiring process.
This chemistry does not necessarily suggest a romantic relationship but as social animals, we gravitate toward those we enjoy spending time with. By my count, full-time employees likely spend twice as many waking hours with co-workers than with their spouse.
In many ways, that ever-so-critical first interview should be regarded as a first date. Increasingly, employers want to know whom they figuratively get into bed with when they hire and personal questions often find their way into an interview.
I know I’ve asked many potential employees to name their favorite website, which made the Glassdoor’s Top 50 list.
Other popular questions on the list include “What makes you uncomfortable?” “What are your hobbies? and “What was the last book you’ve read for fun?”
Each sounds like your stereotypical blind date conversation starters to me.
While we may think that professional accomplishments will land us that next role, an employer may subconsciously be coming to a decision based on attributes beyond our control.
“Despite a surge of research on employers over the past 30 years, our knowledge of hiring remains incomplete … much of what drives employer decision making is still a mystery to scholars,” wrote Lauren Rivera, an assistant professor of management and organizations at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management in the American Sociological Review in December of last year.
Ms. Rivera interviewed 120 employers at elite professional service firms and discovered that evaluators “hired in a manner more closely resembling the choice of friends or romantic partners than how sociologists typically portray employers selecting new workers.” That means, many preferred candidates who shared their leisure pursuits and personal style and this sense of a shared culture often outweighed productivity concerns.
One female evaluator in the study likened the hiring process to a date, saying, “you kind of know when there’s a match.”
The idea that companies – or rather hiring managers – look for cultural fit when evaluating a potential employee is nothing new but it’s importance may have been previously understated.
“Both competency and likeability matter and both are used (when hiring) but what my research shows was that if you look at the joint effect of those two criteria, likeability wins at the margins,” observed Tiziana Casciaro, associate professor of organizational behavior at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management.
“When faced with the choice of a competent jerk and loveable fool, most choose the loveable fool,” she added.
First impressions aren’t only important for a company, but for potential employees.
As with any blind date, most people Google their matches ahead of time and employees are no different. According to one study, individuals formed preconceived ideas about a company from their website before even stepping into the interview.
Even eHarmony, the online dating website, sees the importance of chemistry to business relationships and reportedly plans to launch into the job search space this year by matching employees with individual supervisors.
If chemistry plays such a strong role in our professional lives, it poses an inevitable question – how does one romance a potential employer and can you fake it?
Sarah Vermunt, a business and career coach in Toronto, advises against it. “Whether it’s on a date or in a job interview, there’s no point in presenting a fake version of yourself only to disappoint in the future,” she said.
“It’s very much like dating in that regard. No sense telling him you’re an expert outdoorsman if the only time you spend outside is on your walk to the mall. The jig will be up eventually, so it’s best to simply be honest and see if there’s a fit or not. No sense in wasting anyone’s time,” she added.
Category: Women on the Inside, Women@Work
