Achi news desk-
Call it the spying senses of—a feeling that something, or someone, is risky or dangerous—or “Professional Proposal Cynicism;” when someone doesn’t feel right, they don’t “feel right.”
When you’ve been hiring as long as I have, you develop an innate sense that tells you when a candidate is exaggerating or outright lying.
Consider these scenarios as a hiring manager:
1. An applicant claims to be a progressive CPA. You ask them for their views on how blockchain can impact the corporate accounting and related staffing function. They look at you as if you have three heads.
2. A candidate’s cover letter promotes themselves as a lead generating digital marketer. However, when you Google them, you learn that they only have a few hundred X/Twitter followers, haven’t posted on LinkedIn in months, barely have any presence on Instagram, and that they are not on TikTok.
An experienced hiring manager will walk through an applicant’s digital footprint to determine if they are worthy of an interview. If judged to be, they will ask probing questions about their opinion on or a “tell me a time when you are” story to reveal candidates who are not what they claim to be, such as the non-leading CPA or the digital marketer not practicing what they preached.
I have interviewed enough candidates to conclude that many have an inflated sense of their skills and value to employers. “I have advanced Excel skills” is often incorrect when given a test to assess Excel skills. “I speak French fluently” often becomes questionable when I conduct the interview in French.
Fake applicants—applicants who grossly overstate their qualifications—are becoming increasingly common, prompting employers to scrutinize an applicant’s background more deeply than ever before.
Your oral responses and evidence of ability must be consistent.
Today, the hiring process of many, but not all, employers presents a Catch-22 to job seekers. In today’s job market, employers are looking for the “perfect candidate.” The search for a unicorn often makes lies more attractive than truths. Consider how many people are buying
into get-rich-quick schemes. People tend to believe someone if they can believe that they can serve their self-interest, such as making them rich.
Unethical attempts by candidates to tell hiring managers lie and exaggerate what they believe they want to hear, hoping to convince them they are the unicorn candidate, that’s why my spy senses are freaking out when a candidate is too polished. The saying “too good to be true” is one I live by. I can tell when a candidate talks straight to me or repeats the words that would sway an interviewer, says a self-proclaimed career expert. Having hired my share of Jekyll and Hydes, which are all hard lessons, I want to avoid a candidate who, once hired, is unrecognizable from the person they were during the hiring process.
As well as being too polished, my spider senses when a candidate is:
1. Not giving me simple, concrete answers.
Avoiding my questions or not giving straight answers is evasive, a big red flag. A candidate who avoids payment annoys me, sometimes to the point of ending an interview early. Apart from being aggravating, evasiveness makes me feel like the candidate is hiding something or unwilling to admit they don’t know the answer.
During an interview, you must communicate clearly, simply and, above all, honestly.
2. Not controlling their emotions.
For many candidates, their emotions or being easily triggered (read: offended) are their own worst enemies. During an interview, if a candidate cannot control their emotions or maintain their pressure, including nervousness, a sign of inability to cope with stressful situations, I wonder how they would handle an angry customer shouting.
An interview is not the place to bring up your financial and personal struggles. Instead of trying and hoping to make your interviewer feel sorry for you, focus on using examples and numbers to show why you’d make a great hire.
3. Unable to explain convincingly (keyword) why they intend to leave their job.
If you are currently employed, your interviewer will ask, “Why are you planning to leave your job?” My spidey senses go off if a candidate’s answer doesn’t feel right.
As someone who has changed jobs more than most, when asked why I intend to leave, I have given answers similar to:
· Company reorganization or a downward trend in the industry.
· Shorten my commute.
These are reasons everyone can relate to. When a candidate says, “I’m looking for more responsibilities and career growth,” I ask myself, why isn’t their current employer giving them more responsibilities? Why aren’t they promoted?
4. Unable to explain job changes.
As I mentioned, I have changed jobs often. Changing jobs to achieve career goals is often necessary, as when I wanted to gain experience working abroad. However, your job changes need to make sense. They need to be supporting an end goal. It’s up to you to connect the dots and create an overall career story in your resume, LinkedIn profile, and certainly during an interview. A candidate without a compelling career story makes my spicy senses cringe. I’m looking for candidates who are looking for a job that will contribute to their career story, rather than just wanting a paycheck.
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Nick Kossovan, a seasoned veteran of the corporate landscape, offers “unsweetened” job search advice. You can send your questions to Nick at [email protected].
The post What Makes My Spidey Sense The Problem With A Job Applicant appeared first on Canadian News Media.
