1 job, 11 interviewers

Being in introvert, and faced with either unemployment or giving a powerpoint presentation to a panel during an interview, I chose the presentation. After it was over, I realized how much easier it was to present to a group, rather than go through a series individual interviews. Giving a presentation allowed me to answer most of the general questions they would have asked me concerning job history, tech skills, and work ethic, and I didn’t have to repeat myself or sell myself over and over. One important thing to remember, is to keep the presentation to bullet points on screen (or on a handout). You don’t want them reading when you’re trying to talk. All in all, I would gladly do a panel interview over a traditional one.

Panel interviews seem to be pretty much standard, at least in my experience. They seem to be most often used in public service and financial sector divisions.

Oddly – well, maybe it’s not that odd – the HR representatives on the panel seem to ask the most inane questions that have nothing whatsoever to do with the job.

A few real-life examples (and I swear I’m not making these up):

“If you were a vegetable, what vegetable would you be?” Ummm… carrot?

“Describe yourself in one word.” Idiotic for agreeing to this interview.

“Where do you see yourself in five years?” Vice President in charge of eliminating the HR department.

“Star Trek or Star Wars. Which is better and why?” I dunno. Beam me outta here and away from these meathead HR folks, Scotty!

Panel interviews certainly have their place, but more often than not they’re used by HR departments, not to get the best candidate, but to try and look indispensible to the boss.

Excellent article! I particularly support your recommendation to “know your interviewers”. It is perfectly acceptable to call ahead of time to get the names and titles of your interviewers. Not only is this also a great opportunity to ask how to spell their names (for your post-interview thank you cards) but also the correct pronunciation of their names. There is no better way to make a positive impact during an interview than to correctly pronounce each interviewer’s name, and no quicker way to undermine your success than to mispronounce an interviewer’s name or completely miss their name.

By getting their names and titles ahead of time, you also have the chance to research each interviewer, looking for potential relationship links. These could include alumni colleges, universities, high school or organizations, prior employers, associations, sports, volunteer work, or other personal facts that you could work into your interview to build subtle or direct links to each interviewer.

Mark Cummuta
CIO Job Search: A Real Life Chronicle

When I hired on with Motorola back in the 90’s, the interview process took all day and I had to talk with 6 people in succession.

It was one of the best interview experiences I have ever had. I took notes with each interviewer and used them to learn more from each. By the end of the day I was asking them about things they couldn’t answer. I knew a great deal about the project and the entire team at the end of the day.

The Iridium project didn’t turn out quite as expected but it was a turning point in my career. My panel interview was a great experience.

I have been seeking a job for the last few months in IT software development management, and I recently had the experience of a panel interview. Many of the points in the article are the way that I approached the situation, strong and confident, and things went well from my side of the interview. On the other side, there seemed to be some pre-interview miscommunications. Several times individual members of the panel made statements in response to my questions for clarification about the position and it’s duties that directly contradicted the position “as advertised”. It happened often enough that I came to realize what was being billed as a management position was nothing more than a senior developer position with minimal management. I later found out that the company had been unable to fill the position billing it as it really was.

I have recently accepted a position at the level I was looking for. A day later the panel interview company offered me their position, which I thankfully declined. I was very satisfied that I had asked the questions I did and found out what I really would be doing had I accepted the position.

It seems to me that a panel interview can be very much to your benefit, as it was in my case. If I am ever seeking a position in the future, I will welcome the opportunity to get informatino from different people, perspectives and levels in the company. For those of you currently seeking positions, make sure you ask the hard questions of your prospective employer. I learned my lesson, things aren’t always as they seem.

As a hiring manager in a start-up my co-managers and I used to conduct panel interviews, though much smaller panel, 3 to 4 of us, this just moved the entire process very efficiently and we usually made our decisions within an hour after the interview. We all got a chance to interview many and pick only the best. And most importantly, we all were able to assess collectively, at the same time, if this person fit into the company culture.

This process seems fairly new in the US, but this method has been prevalent in India for decades and it works great. Especially with a lot of competition for one job and where interviewers have to go through many more applicants, sometimes more than 400/500, this si a great way to go with the best match.

In addition to academia, panel interviews are frequently used in government. I’ve known people on university hiring committees using the panel method who still made mistakes hiring – no one method is 100% foolproof. Best, from my point of view, would be a small panel combined with several 1-on-1s on the same day.

Candidates need to use public speaking techniques during panel interviews – take a breath before answering, make appropriate eye contact, project enthusiasm in your tone of voice, and avoid being monotone. Use short stories to provide a concrete illustration re. how you solved the problem.

Above all, use the interview to demonstrate doing the job.

Marsha
http://mintresumes.wordpress.com

Let’s face it: anything outside of our comfort zone makes us skirm! We all work in teams and have meetings at our current jobs (or previous ones) with a group of people around the table. Panel interviews give the interviewers an idea of what it would be like to have you sitting around that table as part of their team. I had various panel interviews in the past. As much as I never liked them, I understand why they work. I’ve gone to interviews where they didn’t have me on the calendar (set up by a headhunter) and didn’t show up (after I’ve flown half a day to get there). I’d say that was the worst!

Panel interviews are fair game, and if there were a university “banning” companies that conducted panel interviews, they would find themselves blackballed by potential employers.

Interviewing practice from decades ago are antiquated.

Even if the panel is politicized, this is the environment you’ll have to work in.

I used to work for the federal government and participated in panel interviews. Most of what was said in the article applies, but I wanted to give a few tips on interviewing for the federal government. First, government interviews involve specific criteria. They are usually written in the job announcement. So it is important that you answer the questions specifically. People will be taking notes and be using the notes in the discussions and to document their decision. These notes are important. So you will get less eye contact than you would with other interviews. Working for the government is great by the way. Obama says he is making it cool again. And they often have panel interviews.

I was interviewed by a small panel for a temporary administrative assistant job with the corporate office of a prominent construction/housing management company in my area. The panel consisted of the HR manager, the assistant whom I would be replacing, my immediate supervisor, and the manager of my company division.

I was already nervous enough for the interview (and late, due to a diverted route), and when more people than just my potential boss started filing in, my stomach just dropped.

Of course, it didn’t go nearly as badly as I’d thought. I was asked questions by each person, and answered each one individually, while glancing at the others to include them. I asked a couple questions of my potential immediate boss, and then the HR manager gave me a tour before I left.

Apparently, I did all right, because they hired me!

Panel interviews can be a great thing for applicants, too. For my last job, I went through a panel interview with about 15 staff. I enjoyed that the interview was so interesting. I especially liked having the opporunity to get a solid sense of the kind of people I would be working with, to make sure I would fit in well with the team and enjoy my working environment.

Provide answers to the questions asked that shows you have experience (a short work story can be helpful)

Panel interviews could be useful, but I would hesitate to say they should be the norm. Three or four people should be the maximum questioners and it would be fine to have others sitting around listening. It is not fair to a candidate to have too many people in the room. There are just too many political dynamics going on with that many people. (Wholefoods is a special case.)
Of course, if it is only one of a few interviews and some of the others are one-on-one with supervisors and managers, I can see how a final interview with multiple people could be done.
BTW, I was told to walk out of any interview where multiple people were interviewing when I graduated from college. The college folks said they would ban any company from interviews if they did that to graduates. I don’t remember the reasons since it was many decades ago.

American Airlines reservations agents in Tucson AZ had to go through this 15 years ago. It was extremely difficult in that NOT only were there several interviewer but several applicants all trying to outdo one another with thier answers.

I got hired only to quit at the end of my 6 month probation. They came in and announced “good news none of you are going to be let go, but bad news NO raise” The pay was too low to justify the work expected and lousy benefits made the decision for me to leave very easy.

Eleven interviewers, a little overdone.

It’s important that your Human Resources Department is involved in the panel interview process to ensure, among other things, that illegal questions are not being asked of interviewees.