Treat Prospective Employees like Prospective Clients

I just heard a story from a friend of mine who recently came back from a terrible job interview. He, a senior executive who is well known in his industry, showed up at 9:50 for a 10am interview and checked in with the receptionist. At 10:25, he checked with the receptionist and asked, “Are you sure that [the interviewer/president of the company] knows I’m here?” The receptionist went to check and came back 10 minutes later, saying, “She’s requesting that we move the interview to a day next week. What works for you?”

My friend said the same thing I would have said (“It doesn’t.”) and left. By the way, my friend came highly referred from an important customer of the company he was interviewing with and I am sure word has spread through the industry.

Clearly, this is a worst case example of a company’s interviewing process. But I have heard many not-as-dramatic stories that really make me scratch my head. Examples include:

• Making the candidate wait for 30 minutes over the set interview time.
• Picking up the phone while interviewing a candidate.
• Checking email during the interview.

I don’t know about you, but I feel that we are competing more for talent (even with nine percent unemployment) than we are for clients. I want prospective employees to have a great experience during the entire interview process so that they really want to work at NY Report and we have the option of choosing.

Danny Meyer, founder of the Union Square Hospitality Group (Union Square Cafe, Gramercy Tavern, The Modern), the king of hospitality, said that you take care of your employees and they will take care of your customers. I started my career at Arthur Andersen, which at the time had the reputation of being the place to work in the accounting industry. At Andersen, everyone involved in the interviewing process, including partners, were told that interviewing candidates was among the most important thing they did. Candidates were not to wait and you weren’t to be interrupted during an interview.

As a fellow business owner, I implore you to make employee recruitment a top priority at your company and show candidates the respect they deserve.