Can I Ask an Employer For Interview Feedback?

Well, that explains it... (iStockphoto.com/kasahasa)

A week ago you interviewed for a job with a local technology company. You spent three hours answering and asking questions with interviewer after interviewer. You figure you did pretty well, so you're surprised to find the following message from the company's recruiter in your email inbox the next day:

"We appreciate your interest in our company and thank you for the time you spent interviewing with us, and giving us the opportunity to learn about your skills and accomplishments. However, we have identified a more highly qualified individual for the role. We wish you the best of luck on your job search and your future endeavors."

You thought you nailed the interview. And, there's nothing of value in that rejection letter that provides you any insight into the company's decision to cut you loose. Is it okay to reach out to the recruiter or the hiring manager to ask why they took a pass on you?

Absolutely, you can ask for feedback. Just don't expect a meaningful answer.

Or for that matter, any answer at all.

Why don't companies usually share useful information about the interview with you? There are several reasons:

• Potential liability: Employers wish to avoid providing job seekers with anything that could be used against them in a discrimination lawsuit. Even interview feedback provided with the best of intentions could turn out to be damaging, so it's not unheard of for companies' legal departments to implement and enforce a "no-feedback" policy for this reason.

• Goodwill: Yes, it hurts not to know where you went wrong in the process. A saccharine reason like, "we have identified a more highly qualified individual," can be puzzling, but also reassuring, planting the belief that you were this close to getting the role and that a more qualified candidate showed up. Many companies are very conscious of their image as both an employer and as a brand owner. If they hurt your feelings by telling you that your interview skills were terrible and you weren't qualified for the job, would you want go back for another round of interviews should you be called for another job there? And would you keep buying their product?

• Time: Let's say a recruiter is working on 25 open jobs. They've interviewed 5 people for each open position. Doing the back-of-the-napkin math, that would be 125 interviewees with whom the recruiter would need to spend time providing - and explaining - interview feedback. At an estimated ten minutes per conversation with each interviewee, it would take more than 20 hours to communicate feedback to everybody. Add this to the recruiter's other job responsibilities, such as sourcing and screening candidates, producing reports, and attending meetings, and it's easy to see why the recruiter would opt to send you a form letter generated by their candidate tracking system. Such conversations take a great deal of time; think back to your last performance appraisal - do you remember how much time and discussion you had with your manager around each little detail?

• They've made up their mind, and you can't change it: Employers have a great deal of latitude in terms of their hiring decisions, and they don't appreciate being second-guessed. By taking your call, and by having a conversation about the interview, company representatives are opening themselves to a potential disagreement over how things went or were perceived. The recruiter may tell you that you were too light in a key skill for the role, but you points out that you have over 10 years experience and clearly meet the job requirement. It puts the employer in the position of having to defend their position to support their decision. And oh, by the way, the other candidate who interviewed already accepted the offer and is scheduled to start on Monday.

So what do you do if you would still like to get feedback on your interview?

Ask for feedback. Nicely. Email the company recruiter or hiring manager thanking them for their time, indicating that while you were disappointed that you didn't get the job and that you hope they'll keep you in mind for future opportunities. At the end of your message, tell them you'd like to continue to develop, and that any feedback they could provide would be very much appreciated. Don't push it, and don't ask multiple interviewees for their input. If they want to share anything with you, they will. Be gracious in accepting any feedback they provide you (or be equally gracious if they tell you they can't provide you any feedback), without argument. Then let it go. You'll come across as professional and mature.

Polish your interviewing skills. Work under the assumption that you could use some more polish in your presentation. Conduct mock interviews with a coach or a friend. Pinpoint your areas for development, and work on those. Then you'll be ready the next time an employer calls.

The lack of feedback may leave you feeling unfulfilled and disappointed, but it's important to preserve your professional brand to an employer, so don't push the issue.

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Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, and career coaching services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercs.com.

Tagged: interviewing, interviews, career, background checks

6 Common Interview Mistakes - And How To Avoid Them

"So, there I was at Hot Topic checking out the Nickelback t-shirts..." ((iStockphoto.com/ImageegamI)

An interview is all about giving a potential employer the opportunity to evaluate you.

And judge you they do! You're going to be held to a very high standard of performance by your interviewers. Here are some common interview mistakes - and how to avoid them.

1. Showing Up Late. If you arrive after your appointed time, it's pretty likely that you won't get the job - even if the interviewers still agree to meet with you. If you're late, the interview team will elevate their expectations of you that much higher. They will expect you to "wow" them; anything less will be failure because you'll already have a major demerit in your column to overcome.

Solution: Leave early for the interview, allowing plenty of time for traffic snarl-ups, road closures, or other delays. Don't believe Waze, even if it tells you you're going to get there in plenty of time – the unexpected happens; it's better to allow extra time to sit in your car listening to Nickelback on the radio before heading up to the interview rather than cutting it close.

2. Dressing Inappropriately For The Interview. In doing your research about the company culture, you find out that everybody there wears jeans to work every day. You show up to the interview in your dungarees and a polo shirt. When you arrive in the lobby, you spot some other job seekers wearing their finest suits. Whoops.

Solution: Always, always, always wear a suit to the interview. Don't assume that because it's a casual work environment that the interviewers will judge you any less harshly for your unprofessional attire. If you get there and the interviewer tells you take off your jacket and tie, then of course, feel free to shed them. But unless the person setting up your interview specifically tells you not to wear a suit to the interview, dress to impress.

3. Failing to Acknowledge All The Interviewers. You'll likely meet several people during the interview. Directing your attention toward one interviewer and ignoring another could inadvertently send the message that you're playing favorites, and might tick off an interviewer who feels neglected.

Solution: Treat everybody who interviews you (or greets you, for that matter) with the utmost attention and respect. If it's a panel interview (they're all around the table evaluating you), make sure you make eye contact with and speak to everybody. And when you're sending out "thank you" notes afterward, make sure everybody gets one. Even the receptionist.

4. Answering Interview Questions Poorly. Perhaps you don't understand the context of the question, and you give a wrong answer. Or you fail to give enough detail in your response. Or you just don't know what to say, so you wing it. The interviewer is, suffice to say, unimpressed.

Solution: Be prepared, bring a page of notes of topics to discuss. If you don't understand the question, ask for clarification. If you're caught off guard, ask the interviewer for a moment (literally, a few seconds) to gather your thoughts - they'll usually comply and think no less of you. Most importantly, know how to tell a story; interviewers ask behavioral interview questions (which usually start with, "Tell me about a time...") about your past experiences to see how you'll handle similar situations in the future. Be prepared to walk the interviewer through your story using the STAR Interview Model (it's an acronym): Explain the SITUATION you encountered, then the TASK you had to address, the ACTIONS undertook to deal with the situation, and the RESULT of your actions. It's best to give stories that have a happy ending, and if it's not a happy ending, add a LEARNING from the negative situation. And do your research on the company, this is when it'll come in handy.

5. Talking Too Much. You answer the interview question. Then you keep yapping. The interviewer's eyes glaze over. Then he looks at the clock. And then his watch. Trust me, he's grasping for something to say that will end the conversation.

Solution: Be aware of the length of your answers - if you're spending more than a few minutes answering a complex question, check your interviewer's body language to see if he is actively engaged in the information you're presenting, or looks like he's trying to politely hide his frustration or boredom. As a rule of thumb, if you'representing a detailed story such as in a behavioral question, 3 to 5 minutes should be plenty for you to get the story out and leave time for followup questions.

6. Not Asking Questions. This is a deal killer. Not asking questions during or at the end of an interview tells the interviewer you either don't care, or weren't paying attention. I've seen candidates ace an interview, only to lose the interviewers' interest when they say they've got no questions ready.

Solution: Make sure to get a few questions in. They don't even need to be brilliant. Try, "What does success in this role look like?" or "What are the biggest challenges the company faces in the next year?" Leverage your research on the company to ask a pithy question about their business.

This article appeared on Find My Profession - https://www.findmyprofession.com/career-advice/6-common-interview-mistakes-and-how-to-avoid-them

Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, and career coaching services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercs.com.

How Corporate Recruiters’ Performance is Measured – and Why the Metrics Matter to Job Seekers

Come performance appraisal time, you get evaluated on your productivity. How many widgets did you process? Did you meet your goals?

Corporate recruiters are no different. They have goals, too. And if you know the standards they are held to, you may be able to better position yourself as a successful candidate. Here are some sample metrics toward which recruiters must work:

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Metric: Cycle time, as measured by the number of days it takes to fill a job.

What it means, and Why it matters:  While a company will usually wait to identify the best fit for a job, the faster a job is filled, the better. The longer a position stays open, the more pain it causes for a hiring manager and his or her team who are covering the work. As a candidate, if you can help bring the process to a prompt closure by not only demonstrating that you have the right skills but can also provide prompt closure (prompt start date, ready references, etc.), you may be able to tilt the process in your favor.

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Metric: Cost per hire, as measured by the actual dollars spent to fill a job.

What it means, and Why it matters: Recruiters may have several resources to fill jobs at their disposal, including job boards, job advertising, dollars to relocate a candidate, and the use of staffing firms. All of these cost money. A cost-effective hire is defined as one who brings the most value for the least cost. So, if you’re a candidate who lives near the office, and your recruiter didn’t need to advertise to get your resume, and you meet the criteria of the position, you may be able to position yourself as a cost-effective hire for the company.

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Metric: Quality of hire, or how good a fit the person is for the job in terms of performance.

What it means, and Why it matters: This metric is a bit more difficult to gauge, because the results often lag behind the hire. It could be measured by ratings on the next performance cycle, or through a post-hire manager survey, or through the percentage of terminated employees hired during a period of time. Either way, these results show up long after the hire has been made. As a candidate, you can put a recruiter at ease by demonstrating a strong history of past performance – strong references and performance appraisals are a great place to start.

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Metric: Offer accept rate, or what percentage of job offers are accepted by candidates.

What it means, and Why it matters: A job offer declined by a job candidate is a wasted offer in many ways – the copious amounts of time spent interviewing, the potential mismatch in terms of salary and other expectations between the company and the candidate, and the opportunity cost of having spent time on a single candidate rather than on having hedged bets with other candidates. The more you and the company can agree on terms up front, the less time either of you will waste on a doomed interview process.

By no means are recruiters evaluated on just these metrics. There are countless other ways companies may opt to measure their recruiting function. But the more you know, the more you can streamline your own interview process.

Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. He is a Human Resources professional and staffing expert with almost two decades of in-house corporate HR and staffing firm experience, and is a Certified Professional Resume Writer (CPRW) and Certified Professional Career Coach (CPCC).

Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, and career coaching services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercs.com.