First impression bias is the primary cause of most hiring mistakes. Why? Because when we feel good about someone right away, we tend to ask easier question. And, when we feel negative right way, we ask more difficult questions. In other words, we (often subconsciously) look to confirm our first impression.
This is the primitive friend vs. foe reaction taking place every day in the interviewing room. As a result of focusing on the candidate's presentation over their performance, we often hire people who underperform and avoid hiring people with weaker presentation skills who are top performers. This double negative impact is summarized in the grid below.
So, how do you fix this? Start by switching the decision process from presentation to performance. In this case, the red arrow is horizontal rather than pointing down. You’ll be amazed at how simple it is to make this change, and how important. Here’s how you do it:
1. Script the opening of the interview to increase objectivity
When starting an interview, don’t make a yes or no hiring decision for at least 30 minutes. This overcomes the tendency to ask people we like questions to falsely confirm their ability and people we don’t like questions to falsely prove their incompetence. The Appendix to The Essential Guide for Hiring and Getting Hired has a complete set of sample scripts that cover the first 30-60 minutes of the interview.
2. Measure first impressions at the end of the interview
Whether the impact of first impressions is important for on-the-job success or not, it’s important to assess it when you’re not being seduced by it. At the end of the interview, ask yourself objectively whether the person’s first impression will help or hinder on-the-job performance. If you can wait that long, you’ll discover that in many cases your negative reaction to a candidate is due to the person’s temporary nervousness or something unimportant. As important, in just as many cases you’ll discover there isn’t much substance behind those you initially perceived to have a positive first impression.
3. Conduct a phone interview first
Bias is reduced dramatically by avoiding the visual impact of first impression. A phone screen naturally shifts the focus towards work history and major accomplishments. As part of the phone screen find out why the person changed jobs and if the change was successful, and dig into the projects and the teams the person was assigned to and if these teams or projects are growing in scope and importance. If the above is positive and you invite the person for an onsite interview, you’ll be less impacted by his or her first impression.
4. Shift your point of view 180°
Assessing team skills before individual strengths is another way to minimize the impact of first impression bias. You can do this by first conducting a work history review and asking this team question followed by the fact-finding questions shown:
Can you please describe a major recent team accomplishment?
- Who was on the team and what roles did they play?
- When did the project occur and what was your assigned role? How did this role change during the project?
- How did you get on the team and did you select any of the team members?
- What were the objectives of the team and were they met?
- What was your biggest contribution to the team? How were you recognized formally for this?
- Who did you influence the most? Did you coach anyone? Did anyone coach you?
- Did you receive any formal recognition for being on this team like an award, promotion or being assigned to a more important team?
By itself, this type of question and fact-finding reveals a lot about the team skills of the person being interviewed. If you ask a similar question for a few other major team accomplishments over different timeframes you’ll be able to observe the growth rates of the person’s team projects.
This trend provides tremendous insight about the candidate. Growth in the size, scope, scale and importance of the teams indicates the candidate is respected and trusted by senior people in the company. How and why the person got selected confirms work quality, reliability, cultural fit, the ability to deal with customers, vendors and executives and if the person has developed a cross-functional and strategic perspective.
Delaying the yes/no decision for 30-60 minutes and asking everyone the same questions will help increase objectivity and reduce hiring mistakes. As important, by assessing team skills first you’ll quickly understand if the candidate is a top performer or not and why. This is how you confidently avoid hiring people you shouldn’t and hiring those you should.