| Many people will agree that there are some aspects | | | | radio. Don't rush to interject a comment just to fill the |
| of a job that lend themselves well to telecommuting. | | | | void. Give the other person the time to finish thinking |
| But they will also tell you that other aspects do not. | | | | through whatever they were going to say. Continue to |
| Near the top of that list of "difficult tasks to perform | | | | talk and act comfortably so the other person knows |
| virtually" for all but the most experienced of | | | | you are not judging that silence. |
| telecommuters is the job of interviewing a potential | | | | - Without the body language to interpret, you might |
| employee or team member. | | | | have a harder time judging the comfort level a person |
| Well, you can probably guess where I'm going with this | | | | has with particular questions you ask. So you need to |
| article. | | | | be a bit more explicit in how you ask them. For |
| I do agree that in general there is a lot of benefit from | | | | instance, if you ask the candidate if they're |
| a live, face-to-face interview. You can learn a lot from | | | | comfortable managing a customer escalation and they |
| the other person's body language, eye contact, etc. | | | | pause and say yes, you can't tell if they really are. So |
| And this information can be valuable in determining the | | | | ask them how many escalations they've handled in the |
| person's comfort level with the topics they are | | | | past, or ask them to describe their most difficult |
| discussing, as well as their general social skills and how | | | | escalation and how they handled it. Or if they tell you |
| well they interact with others. | | | | they're comfortable learning a new technology |
| However, I will say that even interviewing potential | | | | independently without much assistance, ask them to |
| team members is something that can be performed | | | | describe the process by which they would teach |
| effectively by phone if need be. I have participated in | | | | themselves. |
| many such interviews myself due to the globally | | | | Of course, if you're interviewing for a job where the |
| distributed nature of the team I work on. In fact, we're | | | | candidate needs to have really good people skills, and |
| so comfortable with this mode that we often even | | | | or exceptional phone skills, you shouldn't have to do |
| interview local candidates by phone rather than | | | | any extra work to put them at ease or help interpret |
| coordinating schedules to have them come into the | | | | their comments - they should do all that work for you. |
| office. | | | | And if they can't, they're probably the wrong person |
| So what are the best ways to deal with interviewing a | | | | for the job. |
| candidate by phone? | | | | However, performing interviews by phone is not all |
| Well really, it's not much different than any other | | | | downside. In fact there is one big advantage I've come |
| important interaction that, as a telecommuter, you must | | | | to discover. Often when there's a couple of us on the |
| handle by phone. | | | | phone interviewing a candidate together, we'll use |
| - First, when you start the interview, if the person | | | | Instant Messaging (IM) to communicate during the |
| seems uncomfortable with the lack of face-to-face | | | | interview. We can suggest follow-up questions to the |
| interaction you can take a couple minutes to chit-chat | | | | team member who is talking, compare thoughts on |
| and break the ice a bit. A small chat about the big | | | | how the candidate answered a particular question, |
| game last weekend or the local weather can give you | | | | even lead each other a bit on the direction we want to |
| both a few minutes to warm up to each other. | | | | go with the interview as we learn more about the |
| - Don't be bothered by the silences. Interviews can be | | | | candidate. It can be quite useful and help make the |
| uncomfortable, or downright awkward for some | | | | limited time we may have with the candidate that |
| people. When you're face-to-face, a pause in the | | | | much more effective in learning what we need to |
| conversation can seem pretty natural. But on the | | | | know. |
| phone it sounds as awkward as dead air time on the | | | | |