Some weeks ago I was speaking to a group of Directors about to undertake interviews for a senior sales position within their business. They had collected a great list of candidates to interview.

Don’t lose the ideal candidate to the competition
After reviewing the characteristics of the ideal candidate they were looking for, the competencies that were needed to meet the job and the results expected I asked, “And what questions do you expect to be asked by the candidates and how have you planned to respond”.

I was met with a stony silence. The interviewers considered that they were in a prime position as having a job to offer with jobs being so difficult to find. That was until I observed that they might be upset if they found the ideal candidate, who then chose to join their competitor’s business because they did a better job at “selling” the attractions of working for their firm, it’s career path, benefits and culture to their ideal candidate.

To help I shared the video on the questions a candidate should ask the interviewer that we made a few month ago and it’s shared here. There followed a review of the information being given to the candidates to make the company more attractive to the “ideal candidate” they hoped to attract to them.

“This firm sounded much more attractive”
Yesterday, I heard that their ideal candidate had confessed to his new boss that he had been interviewed by their competitor and had been offered a similar job. The reason for not taking the competitor’s offer was “because this firm sounded so much more attractive to work for”.

Questions you should ask the interviewer