Job interviews
Job interviews allow you and your potential employer to assess how your competencies align with the company’s needs. Furthermore, they allow you to meet with prospective colleagues who help you gain insight on whether the job is the right one for you. The most effective job interviews assess skills, knowledge, abilities, and job related personality traits. However, traditional models of job interviews do not effectively assess a person’s job-related personality characteristics. This paper is an assessment of a job interview I did and an elaboration of how job simulated interviews and self-report measures are more effective for these types of interviews.
I recently did an interview to become a cash register attendant at local department store. The interview was conducted by the personnel manager. As a cashier, one would require background knowledge on how to operate a computer. This job also requires that one has the ability to use spreadsheets and have the proficiency of using Microsoft excel. Additionally, qualities such as showing up to work on time and obeying the clock were also commendable. The personnel manager was quick to observe such competencies since he had worked with various cashiers. However, he was not aware of who I was and was merely using prejudice to decide whether I was capable of doing the job.
I would say that the job was fairly reliable in assessing my job-related personality traits. The validity of these traits were subject to the interviewer’s bias. He assessed my qualities based on his experience with previous employees. I think this method was uncertain because as human beings we are very unique creatures. We do not all ascribe to a particular type of thinking. He might have judged me by the way I dressed which had nothing to do with my job-related personality characteristics. A more effective way to test these traits would be through a job simulation exercise.
Self-report measures are methods where interviewees provide information about themselves through questionnaires which assess their personalities. I think this method would have been more effective in assessing my job-related personality characteristics. This is because every individual knows themselves better than a stranger seated across the room who is subject to prejudice. Additionally, personality self-report formats are based on personality type indicators which are works of professional psychologists such as Myer Briggs (Lumen, 2020).
Job simulation exercises are tasks done in an interview that have been designed to give an accurate preview of what the job entails. This method could have been far more effective in assessing my job-related personality characteristics. In this type of interview, I would have been subjected to the pressures that come with the job and my competencies would have surfaced. I would not have been subject to bias and other unnecessary prejudice. Furthermore, my skills, knowledge, and ability would have “spoken” on my behalf.
The job interview process does not only benefit the interviewee but it also benefits the company. A company running successful job interviews will likely have a strong workforce who are aligned with the company’s goals and needs. Today’s world is diverse and people are free to become whoever they choose to be. In this sense traditional ways of conducting job interviews are overrated. A job interview should focus on realizing the competencies of the individual and not just how they present themselves in the interview room.