Recently a reader in an email asked me a pointed question: How do you assess a job opportunity? He has been giving thought to his career and has decided that now is the time to move on to another firm. He has a couple ripe opportunities (lucky guy in this recession) and wanted some guidance in how to make the choice.
Before I answer the question, I need to lay out some career development assumptions. You should be thinking three to five years ahead. Admittedly, in this recession that seems difficult. Still you have plenty to gain from the process and a lot to lose if you don't develop some kind of career strategy. I also assume that if you have been in a position more than three years, have learned everything possible from the work and the people in that situation, can't move on within the company, then it's time to start looking. Continuous development is the rule, not stability. Successful careers are always messy.
I think it's important to attempt to work with talented people, those who have more brains and ability than you, if possible. However, it's still more important to work for a firm that has a number of cutting-edge processes in place and has demonstrated its strategy success with its financials.
Find out as much as you can from organizational filings (if they're public corporations), web info, trusted colleagues and industry reps. Vendors, however, are often the best source of information regarding firms. Not merely because they know a lot about their customers, but importantly because it's to their advantage to ingratiate themselves with potentional employees of a firm. If they help you, they'll expect repayment in the form of business and contacts. Vendors are nearly always a win/win for information.
So what kind of questions would I ask to surface the information I need from the interview? Let's suppose that I'm being recruited for an HR training position. Here are the kind of issues that will give me decision information:
- Does HR sit at the executive table? How is HR brought into the strategy decisioning?
- What is the training relationship between HR and line managers?
- What vendors does the firm use for training materials?
- What proprietary training does the firm regularly provide?
- Describe typical training offered to the various organizational levels?
- How is training success measured?
- How do they prioritize training programs? And who prioritizes the programs?
- What training over the past five years has worked exceptionally well?
- What training needs to work a lot better?
- Who has input to training needs, and how is that input gathered?
- What are your training expectations over the next five years? And why are they important to you and the firm?
- Why did the last three training directors leave the firm, and what are they doing now?
- What training programs has the firm actually developed over the past five years? Describe their strengths and weaknesses?
- Where would you like organizational training to be in the next three years?
- How do the various organizations of the firm perceive HR training? Which organizations have a relationship with HR and which do not? Why?
- What kind of support has management given to HR training? How is that support demonstrated?
- How do decisions get made in the firm? Walk me through a couple important decisions.
That's probably ten hours of discussion, but after they've interviewed me, I could readily pick and chose the important questions?
FYI: I suspect budget responses are meaningless, however I'd want to know how the recession impacted the training budgeting, and how budgeting was cut in other functions.
With this framework of issues for HR, most would be able to create a similar framework in IT, Finance, Marketing, R&D, etc. The tough issue is understanding the responses to the questions. So you'll need to ask them to explain their answer, give illustrations, be specific about data, etc. Tone is always important, supported by warmth, a lot of listening and a bit of obvious smarts. Some of these questions will be threatening, but your livelihood is also important. I'd be ruthless about getting answers to the important questions--but I'd do it tactfully and with a smile. I've found that it really pays off to be direct, but supportive, clear and almost demanding of information, and fairly transparent.
This all sounds very tough, callous and demanding. However, any hiring manager will describe an interview with me as direct, but a lot of fun, a lot of laughter and even teasing. But I've all my antenna out as I insert relevant questions. And that's the model that I've found works best. It may sound contradictory to the questions, but it's very complementary.
FYI: Gen-Yers need to get a lot of interviewing under their belt. Take every possible opportunity to interview. You need to build that skill for your future. You have nothing to lose in fumbling when you're not especially interested in an opportunity, but you've got a lot to gain from developing the skill.
FYI: The hiring manager never makes a decision alone. There always other people giving input to hiring decisions. Depending on the level and the importance of the decision, there could be as few as three decision makers, and as many as ten or twelve. You want to work the hiring manager so that he/she wants you to interview with the decision makers. That's his role.
Remember: No interview is a life or death matter.