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I agree! Job candidates who pass interviews by using Web sites like the
one I cited are likely to perform poorly once they're hired. You don't
want to hire them.
And IMHO, behavioral based interviews *increase* the risk that such
candidates will get hired.
If you'll Google "behavioral based interview," you'll get an idea of the
extent of the problem. Most of the top results are similar to the one I
cited.
One amusing exception can be found at http://tinyurl.com/ty55x. Among other things, it says: "In fact, the
previously held view that an interview is an opportunity for an
interviewee to 'sell' himself is under considerable challenge. What's
taking the place of the traditional interview? The behavioral-based
interview..."
Irony #1: The site is itself a sales pitch, for a course in (you guessed
it!) how to conduct behavioral-based interviews.
Irony #2: As the Google results show, behavioral-based interviews have
spawned thousands of sites dedicated to helping candidates "sell"
themselves.
I think Jim Barrow had it right to begin with: The correct answer is
"Turtle Wax."
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Richard Lewis
> Sent: Wednesday, November 29, 2006 10:42 AM
> To: Dan Goldstein; techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
> Subject: RE: Future Trends in Technical Writing
>
> Dan:
>
> I really do not think that interviewees can "game" a
> behavioral based interview. People who are into "gaming" are
> going to be poor at knowing what proper behavior is because
> they also tend to "game" during their work hours.
>
> Richard Lewis
>
> > Dan Goldstein wrote:
> >
> > The correct answer is: "Cheating."
> >
> > Go to http://tinyurl.com/5d63w to see "Excellent Sample
> > Responses" to "109 of the most typical interview
> > questions (both traditional and behavioral)."
> >
> > In other words, at the same time you sent your HR
> > people to an expensive seminar to learn how to ask
> > Behavioral Interview Questions, your candidates were
> > busy learning how to game that clever system.
> >
> > ... because all clever systems can be gamed. It's a lot
> > harder to game an open-ended conversation about
> > professional topics with a variety of potential
> > colleagues.
> >
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