How to Interview Fresh Graduates as a Recruiter or Human Resource Personnel
Due to the lack of experience of fresh graduates, you cannot depend on their job skills, recommendations, or even job history.
As human resource personnel or recruiter, there are tips you must follow when you are interviewing fresh graduates. These tips will help you see their prospects.
It is vital to note that the interview is an essential part of the hiring process. In a bid to hire the best-qualified candidates, recruiters and human resource personnel have to be well informed on the best way to conduct effective interviews.
This article will offer you a general view of diverse interviewing techniques that are both unstructured and structured. Prospective employers must note that there are some fundamental guidelines for interviews to follow.
These guidelines will enable them to avoid bias in hiring and some questions to avoid asking job applicants. With very cautious preparation, recruiters and human resource personnel can make the most out of employment interviews.
They can attain every data that they will need. Understand that, interviewing is a vital step in the employee selection process.
If it is carried out effectively, the interview will allow the prospective employer to determine if the applicant’s experience, personality, and skills meet the demands of the job.
It will also assist the employer to assess if an applicant will most likely fit in with the corporate culture. Additionally, preparing for an interview can assist in clarifying the responsibilities associated with a job role.
More so, since the interview process will lead to the hiring of the best candidate, it can assist in containing the long-term turnover cost of the company.
The applicants will benefit from a good interview as it will help them determine if their employment interests and needs will be met.
Types Of Interviewing Methods
Before we delve into how you can interview fresh graduates as human resource personnel or recruiter, it is best to have an idea of the interviewing methods.
To implement an accurate and unbiased selection technique, the prospective employer will select from diverse interviewing techniques.
However, the choice will be dependent on considerations like:
- The nature of the job role being filled
- The company
- The corporate culture, and;
- The type of data the prospective employer seeks to attain from the applicant.
Understand that, interviewing techniques can either be unstructured or structured. The major purpose of structured interviewing is to point out the job skills that are vital to the position.
Note that, the interviewer will ask some specific questions for a certain job role. This approach will make it much easier for the interviewer to compare and fairly evaluate the applicants without any bias.
Some interviewers ask questions in a predetermined order. Though others will not follow up on a strict order, they will however be sure of addressing all of their planned questions.
Furthermore, structured interviewing offers the interviewer the data they need to make their hiring decision. Also, it can be vital in defending against any form of allegations of discrimination in the hiring and selection process
This is because all the applicants are asked the same questions. As for the unstructured interview, the interviewer has no strict agenda but enables the applicants to set the pace for the interview.
The questions asked tend to be quite open-ended. And, this will allow the candidate to disclose more than they should if they were asked closed-ended questions that demand brief answers.
Additionally, questions in the unstructured interview can be tailored following the skill and experience level of the applicant.
Nonetheless, the overall absence of structure may make it hard to rank and compare applicants as they have not been asked similar questions.
More so, the most vastly used types of interviews are:
- The telephone pre-screen interview
- The direct face to face interview which takes a competency-based or even situational approach, and;
- The panel interview.
Interviewing Fresh Graduates
Are you an interviewer seeking to add fresh views to your company but finding it difficult to select the ideal candidate? If yes, this article is for you.
Understand that, picking fresh graduates is quite difficult for interviews as they have no job experience or history from prior employers.
However, most of these fresh graduates are the brightest mind and what you will need for the company. The reason for this is that they are tech-savvy, ambitious, updated with current trends, and quite affordable to hire.
For those who do not want to miss out on them, you can try and see their potential using various methods when interviewing them.
Some of the things to keep in India when interviewing these fresh graduates include:
- Provide them with a clear directive
As the recruiter or human resource personnel interviewing these fresh graduates, you will need to help them during the interview. To make everything simpler for both of you, offer them a clear directive
However, this directive you will be offering will be reliant on your approach and job description for the position you seek to fill. You can let them know how best to respond to the questions.
To do this, you can let them know that when you ask them a question, they are to provide examples from prior experience or anything they learned in class.
- Try making use of follow-up questions
Since the fresh graduate may be anxious and confused during the interview as they barely have any experience, you should be ready for vague or incomplete answers.
It is vital that you do not get annoyed when such answers are given to you. Rather, ask them to repeat the answer or give them another chance by making use of follow-up questions.
- Embark on investigating their time management and organization skills
Time management and organization skills are vital for successful projects. If your prospective employee has the knowledge to do a thing but lacks the organizational skill to arrange their time, then they are not ideal for the job.
To find out more about this, you can try to investigate by asking them general questions about life. It will help you have an understanding of how organized they are and how best they prioritize their everyday tasks.
- Ask them about their problem-solving skills
When you are asking about their problem-solving skills, you should make use of certain problem-solving interview questions. There is some work experience that can be quite handy when you make use of problem-solving skills.
However, as they are fresh graduates, you can concentrate on their internship experience and academic projects that demand this skill.
- Try not to judge their communication skills swiftly
The fact is that a fresh graduate may have excellent communication skills but feel too afraid during the interview. You are to try and assess their communication skills by making use of certain communication skills interview questions at the end of the interview.
This will help as the candidate is already relieved of the initial stress and can now clearly express shim or herself. You should pay close attention to the details like if the candidate is taking time to think or needs lots of time to process your questions.
- Assess the candidate’s motivation
It does not matter how great the academic performance of an applicant is, he or she will not be of much use in your company if they are not motivated to work for the company.
You can try your best to see how motivated the candidate is. Understand that, motivated graduates will learn all they need to know faster and make use of their skills completely to complete the job.
Conclusion
On a general note, as you interview fresh graduates, you must keep in mind that even the ones you do not end up hiring at the time can be among top professionals in the future.
This is why it will be a smart decision to keep them in your talent pool. To do this, you will need to break down the fact that they did not get the job to them in a manner that will ensure that you have a powerful employer brand.
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