LAND THE PLANE

By Joanne Courtney

Have you ever been on a plane and just as it approached the airport to land either weather or air traffic caused you to get stuck circling in a holding pattern? After about 3 circles, your mind starts to scream, “Land the Plane.” Well that’s exactly how I felt sometimes during my job search. While I was blessed to have multiple job interviews, I really struggled with the number of job interviews that often came within the same company. Sometimes there were 4 interviews with one company. At one company I interviewed with 11 different people. I even had to create presentations and present like I already worked there. I have often wondered if they went on to incorporate those ideas? At another company’s third interview, I also have to give a presentation. I went all out! I created actual giveaways as if I was the lead of their kickoff meeting. While it was fun to challenge my innovative self to create material that would set me apart from the other interviewees, it was also mentally draining. I had many questions like, “What should I wear?” or “How much information should I put on each slide?” Then I coupled those questions with the task of looking up each person that I was going to present to so that I could find some personal fact that I could relate to either in the presentation or in the interview.

As someone who was laid off from a job, there was already a lot of pressure to find a job. And not just any job, but the “right” job with the “right” fit so I wouldn’t have to do this job-hunting thing again. Now when you add multiple rounds of interviews and sprinkle in presentations to a company you don’t even work for, it can really have a negative effect on a candidate’s mental state. To make matters worse, I didn’t get any of those jobs.

So, is the old adage about having too many cooks in the kitchen spoiling the stew true? I’m not saying that I was the best candidate for those jobs, but the skill set they were looking for I had been doing for 14 years at a Global Fortune 3 company. Despite all of the hoops I had to jump through in the interview process with all those companies, the company that ultimately ended up hiring me interviewed me once. Did you hear me… ONCE! I met with two people and I didn’t have to do any presentations. The hiring manager was not even involved. She was on vacation and trusted her staff enough to interview and hire me.

So, do you really need an army of interviews and interviewers looking at one candidate? If your interviewers are well trained and understand the qualifications of the job, I would say free up some of your team from countless interviews. Empower your employees to have a bigger role in the decision-making process, and train them on your needs and expectations for a successful candidate hire. Land the plane already, we’ve got work to do!