How to interview for technical positions

Submitted by Patrick Grote on Sun, 09/19/2004 - 2:40pm.

Interviewing is an art form and not a science. Your goal is to determine not only if the candidate can do the job, but if they can work in your environment.

In our environment we're responsible for the systems performance in multiple sites across the country. This leads to stressful times when systems don't function or changes are made that affect our production.

I came across an article that discusses the interviewing process in a technical environment. It walks through the experience of college seniors, but it's applicable to others as well.

Key in the article is this quote:

It is a truism of the new economy that the ultimate success of any enterprise lies with the quality of the people it hires.

This is more true today that it has been in the past. If you look at the productivity of the average employee over a long enough time line you'll realize we're doing more with fewer.

The article continues to discuss that your first impression is typically what you'll end up doing. I'll admit that this has happened with me as well, but doesn't that seem contrary to logic?

THE GOALS
Our goals when hiring someone are the following:

1) Do they have a strong customer service ethic? Even though we provide systems support our focus is on exceeding our customer's expectations.
2) Do they have the maturity to handle the position? We rely very heavily on ensuring our team members can manage themselves most of the time. Our work is usually self-paced and is driven by the customer.
3) Can they bring a skill or talent to our team? We each play an important part on the team and we always look for someone who has a unique skill or talent that will make us stronger.
4) What experience have they had in other positions? We look for people who have owned their own business, have a consulting background or have been customer facing.

What is missing in this list? Technical skills. It's not our primary focus as we believe you can teach technical skills, but you cannot teach the innate customer service ethic we need.

OUR METHOD
Here is our method of hiring team members. After each point we stop and look at how the candidate has done:

1) Initial resume review. We look for attributes such as business ownership, consulting or customer facing experience. We look for where they have worked and what they accomplished while they worked there. Action speaks louder to us than time.
2) Phone interview. This is the time where we prequalify the candidate to ensure they have an interest in the position and we can meet their salary requirements. Prequalification is critical. We outline the position with the good and bad attributes. Call it truth in advertising, but we want to ensure the candidate understands what is required of them.
3) In person interview. We have them come to our site for a tour and a chance to meet the team. An attempt is made to have a few team members speak with the candidate. This is important as it includes the team in the decision. Additionally, if the position warrants it, we'll have a few members of our customer's management team meet with the candidate.
4) Technical interview. Separating the pretenders from the contenders, the technical interview is grueling. We have the candidate come in and meet with four of our local team members. On a conference call we have four or five other team members from the other sites. We move in round robin fashion asking progressively harder technical questions. Our goal is to find out how much they know as it relates to what we do, but it's also how they handle themselves during pressure.

Through this process we determine who is best for our team and who will serve our customers best.

RESULTS
So how have we done with this process? We've been using it for five years now and have hired 21 people. Out of those 21 we've had 2 who have been failures after we hired them.

In both of those cases there were circumstances that existed in our interviewing cycle that should have pointed out the issues with the candidate. We failed to see them.