values job interview Archives - Job Interview Coaching

February 15, 2022February 19, 2022

How to Interview for a Job

The interview is the wall blocking the path to career success.

Knowing how to interview for a job helps to break down the barrier, giving career professionals the upper hand in the recruitment process.

This article will explain:

How an employers perceives an applicants suitability
How to prepare for job interview questions
How voice and content create high scoring interview answers

In short, this article will help job candidates get interview ready.

Are you seen as employable during the interview?

The goal of any job interview, from the applicant’s perspective, is to be seen as hirable.

Showcasing one’s suitability is the objective, but the question is what does suitable look like?

A bottom-line approach would say that the applicant who best meets the listed essential job criteria would be offered the advertised position.

By ticking that an applicant has X qualification, or X experience doesn’t result in the best hire. This is because employers value creative problem-solving skills, innovation, and work ethic, among other things – these are all hard-to-measure qualities when using a tick sheet approach.

Employers overcome the tick-sheet hurdle by requesting ‘example’ interview answers. The example, when delivered well, showcases personal qualities and skills as well as duration in the industry and sector-related qualifications.

Many hiring managers also look a ‘fit’ – asking ‘will the interviewee’s temperament fit within the current team and company culture?’

The searching for a good ‘fit’ has resulted in a new style of job interview; strength based interviewing and values job interviews.

In all job interviews; behavioral job interview, situational job interview, unstructured recruitment processes and values interviews, suitability is based on two key elements: The applicants perceived level of industry knowledge and experience and their level of confidence during the job interview.

The combination of a career professional’s level of perceived knowledge/experience vs their level of confidence creates one of sixteen job interview identities.

A strong (highly suitable) interview identity is created by the confident communication of competencies through story-telling, facts & figures, stating sector models, the use of industry jargon and acronyms, and highlighting relevant skills and experiences.

Weaker interview identities are formed from a nervous applicant who uses excessive filler words, self-discloses weaknesses, fidgets, mumbles, and gives answers that don’t reference the job criteria.

What is your interview identity? Take the test here.

The interview start

How to interview for a job starts at the beginning, the interview introduction:

A highly skilled career professional was running late for his job interview. The traffic was a nightmare: horns beeping, drivers shouting and all traffic lights turning red. After a few detours and maneuvering, the interviewee arrived just on time, flustered, stressed but on time.

Running through the entrance, he announces himself to the receptionist. After making a few notes, the receptionist starts making small talk, asking about his journey and the weather. The flustered interviewee wearing a well-fitted pinstriped suit is dismissive to the receptionist as he checks his documents in preparation for the forthcoming interview.

The receptionist, a tall blond lady, takes a sip of water, looks at the man, and attempts to engage the job applicant in conversation. After another curt reply, the receptionist takes the man upstairs to the interview room, where she introduces him to two hiring managers. To the man’s surprise, the receptionist sits down next to the hiring manager ‘she must be taking notes’ the man thinks to himself.

As the man takes a seat and straightens his tie, he smiles at the interview pane. Just then the receptionist starts the interview by explaining that she is the CEO and that she likes to meet all new candidates at reception to get to know them better, informally, before the interview started.

The job interview starts as soon as the candidate walks into the employer’s building.

First impressions are hard to change. This is why the appearance of an applicant; their clothing choice, handshake, body language, and voice, is an important factor.

The applicant’s appearance and all the underlined ‘appearance’ categories create an unconscious bias, which at a generic level is based on likability.

If an employer, based on first appearances, ‘likes’ the candidate, the candidate has a smaller upper hand at the interview start. This is because humans search for evidence to back up their beliefs, meaning that at a subconscious level an interviewer who initially likes or dislikes a person (through unconscious bias) will look for evidence that proves this opinion to be true.

A positive initial impression is easy to create by using the advice below, but some hiring managers may be ageist, sexist, racist, or any other ‘istems’. An employer with a strong negative association towards any group will be a hard person to influence, as their prejudices create an invisible barrier.

To be seen as more likable:

Wear a clothing style that suits your body shape
Possess strong eye contact – this can be practiced in advanced
Hold your head high, shoulders back and don’t slouch when sitting down
Use a firm handshake and smile
Have a well rehearsed introductory line
Think of a few ‘small talk’ questions to ask while walking to the interview room

In the interview room

Each company is different, but in the main, a hiring manager will introduce the interview panel, before explaining the interview process: The duration of the interview, the number of questions, and the interview rules (that you can ask for a question to be repeated). Any additional tasks; presentations, assessments etc, that may be required as part of the recruitment process and when the candidates will be informed if they have been successful or not.

In most cases, you will be given a glass of water. But as a back up take a bottle of water for this interview hack.

When asked an unexpected interview question, it will put most job applicants on the back foot, resulting in them waffling on about an unrelated subject.

Instead, whenever your brain is too slow to catch up with the curveball question, take a sip of water. Interviewers expect applicants to be nervous and to take sips of water (to wet a dry throat). These 3 seconds of sipping water allows the mind to search for a suitable interview answer.

After or before the introduction to the interview panel, you will be asked to sit down.

It is important to be seen as a confident person. Humans are drawn to confident people. We believe confident people will be a good fit and possess excellent social skills.

Confident people will:

Relax in the chair while having good posture
Possess strong eye contact, looking at all members of the interview panel
Gesture as they talk and become animated in their voice (lots of vocal variety)

The job interview

A number of interviews are now conducted online. The virtual interview requires additional advice that can be found here: how to interview virtually.

For a traditional face-to-face job interview, employers preference the ‘structured’ job interview process.

In short, a structured interview is a set of interview questions asked to all candidates (unlike an unstructured jo interview which is an open conversation where different candidates are asked different questions based on the discussion) which are scored logically based on the job roles essential criteria.

As an example, for a job role that has 30 essential criteria’s an employer will create 8-10 interview questions.

Each interview answer, for each question, to score high must reference several of the 30 essential criteria. This can be in the form of:

Stating a sector related theory or model
Giving an example or story
Listing facts and data
Physically presenting data
Through the applicants persona for essential criteria relating to personal skills

Job Interview Questions

The average number of questions asked in a job interview is eight.

Commonly, the opening interview question is: ‘tell me a little about yourself’ and the final question is: ‘do you have any questions for us?’

In between these two questions will be 6 competency-based interview questions. Questions that ask for evidence that highlights if the applicant possesses the essential criteria.

A full list of interview questions and answers can be found here: questions and answers for an interview

One of the best approaches, to create a high-scoring answer, is to split the answer into two sections. Section one will state the process/theory/model relating to the interview questions, and part two is an example of using the said process/theory/model.

This two-part job interview answer will cover a large number of essential criteria.

As an example, if asked ‘give me an example of being prioritizing tasks’ the answer would start with an explanation of how to prioritize tasks using, as an example, the time management matrix theory before an example of being organized and planned is given.

Its not what you say, its how you say it

One mistake career professionals make is focusing solely on content to their interview answers.

Any good public speaker will tell, ‘it’s not what you say, but how you say it that is important.

Inflection, as an example, can change the meaning of a statement. The statement ‘I could do that has a different meaning depending on how it is spoken.

I could do that – I can do that and I am happy to do that
I could do that – You want me to do that?
I could do that – I don’t want to do that!

Watch this video for a great example of inflection

The voice is a powerful communication tool, to engage the interview panel:

Using vocal variety
Reduce the amount of filler words
Pause before a key point
Increase pace when excited
Slow down pace when making a powerful statement
Show emotion through your tonality

To pass a job interview, the three rules are:

Identify the job criteria as this allows an applicant to predict the job interview questions and to practice high-scoring job interview answers
Be a self-promoter – talk about skills and experiences relevant to the job role, the essential criteria
Use confident communication to engage the interview panel

January 9, 2022January 13, 2023

What Will a Job Interview in the Metaverse Look Like?

On 28th Oct 2021, Mark Zuckerberg announced the rebrand of Facebook to Meta, signifying to the world the importance of their investment into the Metaverse.

The Metaverse will be a crucial element in the future of hiring staff, requiring career professionals to understand what a Metaverse job interview will look like.

The Metaverse will be an interconnected online experience that merges work and life across a wide range of platforms, from VR headsets to AR implementations.

The Metaverse won’t just look like a virtual reality computer game where everyone communicates via their avatar, instead, it will be a mix of a physical and virtual world, with its own economy and users will be able to take their avatars and goods throughout the metaverse.

This video is an example of how the online and real-life workspace could interact.

Is the Metaverse a fad?

Skeptics say that the Metaverse could be a fad, and that Zuckerberg launched Meta as a ploy to divert attention from other issues.

No matter what the reasons were for Facebook to change to Meta, those who are looking at what is happening in the tech world know the Metaverse is coming and coming soon.

Facebook won’t own the Metaverse, instead, it will be open-source, just as one single website doesn’t own the internet.

Many large tech giants; Microsoft, Apple, and large gaming companies are investing tens of billions of pounds into the Metaverse. In a recent CBSNews article, they highlighted how tech companies have been working on virtual reality tech for several years:

Google Cardboard might be the most successful VR project in history
In 2015 Microsoft announced Holoens mixed reality glasses

During Zuckbergs Meta launch, he explained how the Metaverse could open up the global job market: “..giving people access to jobs no matter where they live..”

Verdict looked into the future of AR and VR, saying: “This could be just the beginning. While the AR market was worth a fairly restrained $7bn in 2020, Global Data estimates that it will generate revenues of $152bn by 2030.”

The article goes on to explain how workplaces will and are evolving into the virtual world: “One of the biggest trends in the AR and VR space in 2022 will be the use of immersive technology and VR in the workplace”

In an article on Reworked, they talk about the potential of VR in onboarding new staff: “VR has huge potential for the digital workplace as a training tool for remote workers and onboarding new employees”

This is because avatars will be able to mimic facial expressions, gestures, and body language.

It is the development of avatars that can mimic a hiring manager while testing the applicant’s competencies that will see a move to recruitment in the Metaverse.

While discussing online staff training, the Reworked article explains: “These VR modules can use video recordings or animations to simulate tense scenarios for managers to practice their handling and ability to navigate through the issue successfully.” This same tech could easily be adapted for an assessment job interview.

RCP mag, talking about Facebook and Microsoft, two tech giants who are keen to have a big presence in this future territory, said: “(Meta and Microsoft) just announced that they are partnering to integrate Microsoft Teams with Workplace by Meta (formerly Facebook Workplace), which will allow Teams users to live-stream video into Workplace groups, and to view, comment and react to meetings in real-time without having to switch between apps.”

Virtual Reality in Recruitment

In a recent article, Employment King said: “The metaverse will bring enormous opportunity to individuals who want to work from homes and employers will be able to test how the employee would work remotely (and in the metaverse) and collaboratively on projects.”

Virtual reality recruitment and training is already here.

Deutsche Bahn, the Berlin-based mobility and logistics company, in 2015 needed to hire 10,000 new employees. To help with recruitment, they would take VR headsets to assessment days and career fairs, allowing candidates to virtually observe a train electrician and engineer doing their job. The result was a massive increase in applications.

A Forbes article talking about AR and VR trends explained how Walmart used tech to train 17,000 staff in compliance and customer service. While going on to discuss the US Army’s deal with Microsoft to use Hololense technology in military training.

Metaverse Recruitment

Recsite design, in July 2021, discussed the increase in VR recruitment: “According to a study carried out by the Employment Law Advisory Services, 43% of companies that employ VR use it to help introduce new members to their existing teams.”

The British Armed Forces saw a 66% rise in applications after using a Samsung Gear VR headset to let candidates experience driving a tank.

Recruitment is as much about the applicant finding a suitable employer, as it is about an employer finding a suitable applicant.

The Metaverse will help applicants and employers find their match.

It is highly likely that future job fairs will be held virtually. Initially, in-person job fairs will use VR tech to allow future employees to view what it would be like to work at the organization by having them view the workplace with a VR set.

The natural evolution will be a live screen, via a VR set, of the workplace. Before long, the candidates will be meeting current employees, take part in a workplace walk around to better understand the company culture, and try out company benefits such as ‘cinema rooms’ or ‘skill training’ sessions all via the Metaverse.

Job Interviews Conducted in the Metaverse

It is predicted that staff recruitment, staff training, and staff onboarding will be some of the most commonly used functions, for employers, during the early days of the Metaverse.

Candidates, in the metaverse, will be able to ‘show off’ their competencies. Interviewees avatars can manipulate objects, create images, write and interact with other avatars.

Being able to physically move around (in the Metaverse job interview), applicants will demonstrate their skill set, from a retail candidate dealing with a simulated customer complaint to a surgeon demonstrating an operation in real-time.

Sounds farfetched? VR for training surgeons has been around for many years: “In 2009, a Halifax-based professor of neurosurgery, Dr. David Clarke, performed the first-ever virtual reality (VR)-based simulated surgery to remove a brain tumour”

Many recruitment processes, for high-skilled positions, have an assessment stage. Now, VR will take this one step further to help a hiring manager predict the job performance of a candidate through human and AI observation and interaction.

Scenario-based simulation exercises will test an interviewee’s skills and competencies, reducing any job interview deceit, white lies, or extensions of the truth, as increasing levels of complexity will be tested throughout the assessment, checking the level of each candidate’s abilities and knowledge.

Part of the recruitment process will be observed and assessed by humans, but as AVIs – Asynchronous Video Interview continue to be ever more popular with employers, AI bots will continue to play a large part in the hiring of new staff, reducing time and money employers spend on staff recruitment.

The 5 Stages of a Metaverse Job Interview

Much research is showing an increase in the number of stages of interviews for a high-skilled position, and the increasing use of artificial intelligence in the recruitment process.

The result of AI robot interveiwers, and the required interview stages to check the candidate’s suitability, will create a blended AI and human recruitment process in the Metaverse.

Metaverse Interview Stage 1

The initial interview stage is likely to be a short screening interview via an AVI – Asynchronous Video Interview AI bot.

Job applicants will enter the companies metaverse recruitment room and be given a short introduction to the AVI.

The AVI will last for around 15 minutes, and job candidates will be able to choose their own date and time to conduct the interview – ideal for career professionals applying from countries with different time zones.

The AVI will ask 3 job interview questions to check suitability. The questions will vary, but in the main, they will focus on the essential criteria for the job role.

During the interview, the AVI will ask each question in turn. Currently, interviewees have 60 seconds to digest the question before recording their interview answer which has a limited time capacity of 2 minutes.

As AVI technology advances, it is highly likely that the candidates will answer the interview question in real-time without a time limit attached to their answer.

Once the duration for conducting for all applicants to have completed the screening interview, the AVI AI bot uses a complicated algorithm that could include analyzing facial expressions, tonality, gestures, and body language to predict a persons temperament, will make a decision of which applicants will progress to the second stage of the recruitment process.

Metaverse Interview Stage 2

Staff retention is a big issue for many employers, as younger generations don’t consider a job for life and are more likely to job-hop at a moment’s notice. The great resignation is evidence of this new attitude.

To improve staff retention, employers will focus part of the recruitment process on selling the benefits of the organisation to increase demand for the position, allowing the employer to increase the number of first-choice applicants accepting the position.

Stage two of the Metaverse interview will be a virtual walkaround of the organisation. The virtual walkaround will be miles away from a simple VR walk-through of an office. Instead, interviewees will be able to visit, in live-time, the employer’s Metaverse workplace.

The walk-through could consist of visiting work-stations, observing meetings, attending auditoriums, lecture halls, and checking out the company benefits: relaxation rooms to de-stress after a hard day in the office, or a creative space for generating ideas. Companies will also have game rooms and specialist areas of increasing skills such as a brainteaser room or access to hundreds of volumes of industry-related books, academic research papers, and company history.

The main focus of the walk-around will be to showcase the company culture and its values. Employers, by highlighting how they conduct business as usual, their vision, and current projects, can attract career professionals with a similar attitude, helping to create high-performing teams.

Metaverse Interview Stage 3

From an employer’s perspective, the recruitment process is designed to predict the potential job performance of each applicant, resulting in the hiring of the (potentially) best performing interviewee.

Currently, assessment centers use standardized tasks that gather relevant information about an applicant’s capabilities.

In the Metaverse the assessment stage of the interview will go one step further. Imagine, in the near future that a high proportion of work-related tasks are completed partly or fully within the Metaverse.

AI will be able to replicate a previous project in the Metaverse, including the personalities and potential reactions of team members. Interviewees will then be asked to complete the task which is assessed on two levels. Level skills and competencies, and level 2 how the applicant would fit (or not) within the current team.

Employers will be able to observe the interviewee’s actions, but also compare the outcome from the tasks with the actual outcome from the original completion of the task in real-life. It is this comparison that can help a candidate to stand out.

Tasks that will be assessed will be the main duty for the job role, and could include:

Project planning meeting for a project manager
An operation for a doctor
Customer service scenareo for a retail assistant
A high risk situation for an air traffic controller
The delivery of a lesson for a teacher

In the future, large employers won’t hire for a particular role. Instead, global companies will have a constant recruitment program, via the Metaverse, to search for and hire exceptional career professionals.

For these exceptional professionals, job roles will be created for them.

In the assessment stage of the recruitment process, the assessment of a task will increase in difficulty to test an applicant’s ability allowing the human resource team to find the right role for each successful applicant.

Assessment centers will test for:

Creative problem-solving
Leadership
Communication
Stress indicators
Values
Temperament
Industry knowledge
Strengths vs weaknesses
Attitude and work ethic

Metaverse Interview Stage 4

The first three stages of the Metaverse job interview will be designed to reduce the number of applicants who are put forward for a human delivered structured job interview.

A structured job interview, research shows, is currently the best predictor of an applicant’s job performance. This is because each candidate is asked the same interview questions in the same order with answers being marked against a specific scoring system on the interview scorecard.

The human interview will also be conducted in the Metaverse, as the Metaverse will be part of day-to-day life.

Some interviews will be conducted by the employer’s hologram or their avatar, depending on the job sector.

Interviewers are quite likely to receive an ’employability suitability’ report prior to the interview based on the previous rounds of interveiwers, created by AI big data program.

Applicants will be asked 8-10 job interview questions by a member of the human resource department – a trained interviewer.

Questions will be a mixture of strength-based job interview questions and Metaverse related job interview questions:

Why did you choose that particular avatar and what does it say about you?
How do you decide what tasks to complete in the Metaverse and which duties to complete in the phyiscal work palce?
Give me an example of collaberating in the Metaverse?
What percenatge of your working week do you expcect to spend in the Metaverse?
How do you monitor your motivation and stress levels?
Give me an example of how you priotise Metaverse tasks?
How do you keep work orgnaised when working in the Metaverse?
What Metaverse ‘skills’ do you have?

Metaverse Interview Stage 5

The final round of job interviews will be only available to 5 successful candidates.

To be offered the position, the final job interview round will be conducted by the applicant’s future line manager – an expert in the job role/industry.

The interview questions will be focused on the business as usual tasks and the candidate’s sector knowledge.

Interview questions will include:

What do you expect the daily tasks to look like?
What is your approach to (task)?
Describe the theory for (task/process)?
Give me an example of doing (task)
If (problem) happned what would you do?
How you would you handle (X) situation)?
What would you prioritise first (X) or (Y) and why?
Give me an example of collaberating with stakholders?

The job interview process is evolving.

Over the past 12 months, there has been a significant increase in AVI – Asynchronous Video Interview and ATS – Application Tracking Systems with over 98% of the top fortune 500 companies using recruitment automated software.

And where large companies lead, small to medium size businesses follow.

Progress in creating recruitment tech that can be used in the Metaverse as well as applications for completing work-related tasks virtually is happening all the time.

It is clear then that the future of job interviews will involve the use of AR and VR technology.

Job Interview Coach and Author of ‘what is your interview identity’

Chris Delaney

Chris Delaney is one of the leading job interview coaches in the country, helping career professionals to successfully pass job interviews. Delaney is the author of several job interview reference books including ‘what is your interview identity’

January 4, 2022January 4, 2022

5 Most Common Types of Job Interviews

The recruitment process is changing due to issues such as the great resignation and the global job market.

Since the start of the pandemic, career professionals have been reflecting on how their employers have treated them.

The great resignation is an economic trend that started in the United States which saw a large number of employees resign from their job roles.

With a high number of vacancies on the increase: 2.4% of job roles were vacant in quarter 1 of 2021, career professionals are feeling confident when it comes to job-hopping.

Depending on the employer, businesses are being affected in various ways.

For small to medium-sized companies, the advice is to shorten the hiring processes as the number one choice applicant gets bored and quits the application when it is long and slow.

This ‘quit and jump’ strategy is a big problem when it comes to filling a position. Indeed state that the average number of days a job is live is 30 days and other sources indicate it is more like 42 days, which has led to employers having to sweeten the deal by increasing salary and company benefits.

Global brands are on the opposite scale with businesses receiving a record number of applications for an advertised role that has led to the increase in automated recruitment processes.

One reason for this is the global job market. With advances in technology and remote working becoming the norm for employees, career professionals living in one country can apply for a position in a second country.

Technology is set to change the workplace with tech giants like Mark Zuckerberg investing in the metaverse – a digital environment where multiple people can interact in a 3D world, which could lead to a future where many jobs take place in the virtual world, from the comfort of your won home.

In an article on Microsoft, they stated how they received over 7 million visitors to the career section of their website.

As global brands see a year-on-year increase in the number of applications they receive for each job vacancy, many of them are turning to automated recruitment options such as asynchronous video interviewing and application tracking system software.

The great resignation and the global job market have resulted in employers testing new job interview processes.

Top 5 Job Interview Processes

Below is an outline of the various and most common job interview stages an applicant may have to attend to land their dream job.

Depending on the organisation and role, job applicants are likely to have to attend between 2-6 rounds of job interviews.

Preperation is key to a successful job interview. To prepare, career professionals must understand the various steps in the recruitment process.

Asynchronous Video Screening Interview

Global brands, big businesses, and high-paying employers are receiving record numbers of applications.

The extremely high volume of applicants is simply too much for a human to contemplate. Rather than hiring additional human resource staff to read and interview each career professional who has shown interest in the vacancy, organisations have turned to technology.

AVI – asynchronous video interviews are used as a screening process.

The AVI interviewed won’t be scheduled on a particular date and time. Instead, the applicant can choose a time most suitable for themselves (as the interviewer is an AI programme, not a human).

Each AVS lasts for around 15 minutes.

During the 15 minutes the interviewee has time to prepare themselves; check the voice and video systems are working correctly, take a practice interview test, before being interviewed by the AI programme.

The actual interview takes around 10 minutes, with an average of three job interview questions being asked.

The interview question will appear on the screen and the candidate will have one minute to prepare for their answer.

After the minute is up, the video recording takes place. During the recording, the interviewee has only two minutes (on average) to answer the interview question, before the recording stops, in readiness for the second or third interview question.

As the 2 minutes are coming to an end the AVI will let the interviewee know that there are 30 or 10 seconds left to go.

For more information on AVIs click here: what is an AVI

Values Job Interview

The days of a job for life have long retired.

Employees, more than ever before, job hop, resign out of the blue, and are approached online by recruiters and employers if a suitable vacancy is available.

Global problems such as the bank crisis and Covid19 have shown how a business one year is a success, but the next year is making redundancies.

No job is safe.

Employers, to help recruit the most suitable and ideally long-lasting employees are turning towards a new way of recruiting based on the values of the organisation.

The ‘values’ job interview is designed to hire staff members who are likely to 1) go above and beyond for the company and 2) improve staff retention as the job interview asks questions about the applicant’s own values before cross-referencing their answers against the values of the company.

In the main, the interview questions will be about the company values:

Can you name the 7 company values?
Which of our values would you say in most important to you?
When working in a team what is your main priority?
What does success sound like to you?
What motivates you to get out of bed on a Monday morning?
How do you know when you have done a good job?
How would you (value) when working on a project?

Research is required for a values job interview. Without an awareness of the employer’s company values it is unlikely that any of the job interview answers will state enough relevance to gain a high-scoring mark.

For more information click: what is a values job interview?

Strength-based Job Interview

A number of employers are embedding strength-based job interviews into their recruitment processes.

Similar to the ‘values’ job interview, the strength-based job interview is looking at suitability from the perspective of the ‘company fit’.

Each strength-based job interview question is about the employee’s preference – the way they prefer to work, their natural motivators and are crossed reference against the company culture.

There is an obvious cross-over with company culture and values which is why a values job interview and a strength-based one are similar.

In the main, but not always, the questions are asked about preference:

Do you prefer to work independently or as part of a team?
What is more importnat to you starting or finishing a project?
Do you like variety or routine?
How do you work best, when you are woking on one importnat task or when you have to multitask?
Choose a statement that best suits you: I prefer creativity or I prefer following processes and procedures?
When do you excel when being told what to do or when telling other people how to do things?

For more strength-based interview questions, read this article: Strength-based job interviews

Behavioural Job Interview

The final two job interviews that will be discussed are both from the structured job interview family.

Both the behavioral and situational job interviews are well-known and well-used recruitment tactics.

Previously, employers, especially in small to medium-sized organisations where the interviewer is the potential line manager, not a trained HR interviewer, the interview panel asked a mixture of behavioral and situational job interview questions.

More recently, employers are understanding the importance of how they frame a job interview question, as the frame can influence the type of answer an applicant gives.

This understanding has led to organisations using a specific structured job interview: Behavioural or situational. Amazon, as an example, is known for asking behavioral job interview questions and even going as far as referencing this on their career page.

“Behavioral job interview questions are questions framed in the past tense. The idea being, that past behaviors predict future actions – a zebra cant change it stripes”
Chris Delaney author of What is your interview identity

Behavioral job interview questions sound like this:

Tell me about a time when you were faced with a problem that had a number of possible solutions?
When have you learnt from a mistake?
Describe a time when you took the lead?
Tell me about a time that you collaberated with others?
Have you ever gone above and beyond?

Situational Job Interview Questions

Situational job interview questions are future-based scenarios.

Behavioral job interview questions are ideal when an employer is recruiting a highly experienced and skilled employee, someone, who must demonstrate their work experience.

On the other hand, many roles are suitable to a qualified individual without the need for several years experience:

Graduate positions

College jobs

Internships

Newly created roles/job sectors (as no one will have direct experience) created through the advancement of technology, politics, and globalisation

Situational job interview questions sound like this:

What would you do if you were working on a project and (X) happened?

If you were hired as a team member what would your first priority be?

How would you go about solving (X) problem?

How would you motivate your team?

What do you forsee the problems to be?

Other Types of Job Interviews

Technical Job Interview

Technical interviews assess the candidate’s technical ability to complete a certain technical task.

Some technical interview questions look at skills required for the technical role: problem solving or numerical reasoning, with some questions being in the form of a brain teaser.

Common in engineering, science, and IT roles.

Group Job Interview

Team to group interview tasks are common during full-day assessments.

As part of the recruitment process interviewees will be put in groups to complete a simple task.

Several interveiwers will observe the groups and mark each person on their communication, leadership, and teamwork skills.

The task normally lasts around 30 minutes.

Role Play Interview

The use of actors and/or hiring managers acting a part and situation that the interviewee has to deal with while being observed and marked by additional interveiwers is very common in leadership and high-paid positions.

The idea is for the employer to see in real-life (or as near to as possible) how the applicant will react in the (common) situation.

The person playing the part/situation will often be having a problem or being disruptive, and it is for the interviewee to show their professionalism and skill set to find a solution to the problem.

The recruitment process is changing.

There will be an increase in automated job interviews and resume/CV selection.

Large employers will continue to see an increase in the number of applications per vacancy.

Competition (for many roles) will be global.

Technology will continue to change the jobs on offer.

Many employers will use multiple stages of interviews to help recruit a high-performing team.

Hiring managers will ask more interview questions around company values and culture.

Employers will continue to adopt the structured job interview process as it has been proven to be the best indicator of a candidates job performance.

It is highly likely that recruitment will be completed in the metaverse or as part of a virtual reality interview process.

December 18, 2021February 22, 2023

What is a Values Job Interview?

A large number of organisations are choosing job applicants not just based on their experience and knowledge, but also on their personal values.

More importantly, employers use ‘values’ interviews to review if the candidate’s values, their behaviors, and their likelihood to fit within the company culture.

The values interview is very similar to a strength-based job interview which asks questions on the interviewee’s preferences – how they best like to work?

Both, strength-based and values job interviews are often part of a longer recruitment process. Either used at the start or end of a 3-4 stage hiring process the idea behind the values interview is to help avoid recruiting an employee who may be, at worst, disruptive or simply not a good fit within the team.

How to prepare for a Values job interview

Value interview questions, in the main, are asking – do you embody the company values?

More specifically, the vales job interview questions ask – how do you embed the company values into the day-to-day operations?

There are two approaches to asking value interview questions:

Asking direct vaue questions
Embedding value questions into a structured job interview process

An obvious first step to prepare for the values interview is research.

Any organisations adopting this job interview strategy will showcase the company values on their website.

Some businesses will have a dedicated values page (often an indication that values questions will be asked at some point direction the hiring process) or on the ‘about us’ page.

Once armed with the company values, the career professional must understand their own values. As each interview value question will be about how the applicant’s values match the employers.

Values are the drivers of motivation – you are motivated to action because of your values.

An example of value motivation is working overtime. One employee will work overtime because they value money (the additional pay for the extra hours) whereas a second employee may value customer satisfaction (the overtime results in a completion of a task on time that makes the customer happy).

Career professionals all value different things. There are no good or bad, right or wrong values, instead, it is (often) an unconscious trait that motivates that person.

Values can include:

Quality
Quantity
Finance
A job well done
Being quicker/better/more knowledgebale than others
Praise
Fame
Caring for others
Independence
Collaberation
The end result/finishing a task
Professionalisum
Trust
The bigger picture or specfic detail
Processes and procedures

Values are often viewed in the behaviors of colleagues and the language they use within the workplace:

Detailed value: “I like to cross the Ts and dot the Is”
End result: “Lets fisish what we started”
People: “Look how happy they are with (product)”
Finance: “One more sale and I will have made my bonus”
Praise: “I know my (manager) wil like that I did this”

Carer professionals can identify their own values by asking:

What five things are important to me in my job?
Which is more important A or B? (ask this for all 5 values)
What motivates me in the workpalce?
What demotiavtes me?
What makes me the most fulfilled?

Which sectors use value interviews?

There has been an increase in the use of value job interviews, as more employers are taking steps to hire long-lasting employees.

The main driver for change in the recruitment processes of organisations is the data that is showing the increase in job-hopping from one employer to another.

By hiring a career professional whose values are in line with the organisations values (and their vision) the new employee is likely to be happy, and therefore stay, with the employer.

The following industries are adopting the values job interview:

Healthcare
Sales
Education
Animal care
Science
Finance

Job Interview Structure

As mentioned, there are two types of value job interviews – direct value questions, and embedded questions.

A direct value job interview is when the employer asks questions based on their company values.

Direct value interview questions can include:

Can you name the company values?
Which of the company values most resinates with you?
What are your personal values and how do they relate to the company values?

Other direct questions ask about the implementation of the value into business-as-usual tasks:

An example of this is when an employer values quality. The interview question may be: “How would you ensure the quality of (product/service) while increasing the number of outcomes?”

Or, as a second example, an employer who values integrity, could ask: “Describe a situation where you have demonstrated integrity?”

The hiring manager in a direct values job interview will ask one question for each of their list of company values.

Indirect job interview questions

Embedded value interview questions are hard to detect.

Hiring managers ask standard job interview questions:

“Tell me about how you would fit this role?”
“How do you make a decision?”
“How do you manage conflicting deadlines?”
“Tell me about a time you have made a mistake?”
“What would you do if a client gave an unrealisitic timeframe?”

On the face of it, the questions seem to be one of the most commonly asked job interview questions. The difference is, the employer is making note of the job applicant’s values, preferences and motivations.

The framing of job interview questions

Clues to what an employer is looking for, what will score high, is leaked by the structure of the interview question.

An employer who asks: “Have you ever gone the extra mile to satisfy a customer?” is quite likely to value customer satisfaction.

Whereas an employer asking: “how would you say no to an unrealistic customer demand without running the customer relationship?” may be more quality or process-focused.

Employers who ask: “Are you willing to work overtime?” would only ask the question if they require flexibility in their workforce.

Value job interviews often last for around 30 minutes and are conducted by a trained HR practitioner.

Remember value questions can be, and often are, embedded within a behavioral or situational structured job interview.

Chris Delaney