Interview Skills Training - DOC

							                One day Interview Skills training Programme

It is critical that staff who sit on Interview Panels on behalf of the University
of Limerick are up to date with the University of Limerick Operating
Procedures for the Recruitment/Appointment of Faculty/Staff, know what
is expected of them and are familiar with the legal framework within
which you must conduct interviews. Many people who conduct
interviews have not attended any formal training on interviewing for many
years. It is very important that people who sit on any interview boards on
behalf of the University are completely au fait with all of these key areas
within which interviews must operate.


Programme Objectives
The objectives of the one-day Interview Skills training programme for
Selection Board Members are that by the end of the session the
participants will:
         o Be familiar with the legal framework surrounding the interview
             process.
         o Be clear on the University of Limerick Operating Procedures
             for the Recruitment/Appointment of Faculty.
         o Have clarified the role of each person on the Selection Board,
             and what their specific responsibilities are.
         o Be clear on how to conduct an evidence-based interview,
             and what exactly that means.
         o Have explored the questions that can be asked in interviews
             that will help establish the evidence that people need to
             gather in relation to suitability.
         o Have identified the type of questions that should not be
             asked in the interview process.
         o Be clear on note taking in interviews and familiar
             with guidelines for best practice in note taking in interviews.




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Proposed Programme content:

   Overview of the context in which interviews occur today in all
    organisations

   The University of Limerick Operating Procedures for the
    Recruitment/Appointment of Faculty/Staff
       o What exactly is in the procedure
       o What are the critical elements that all board members need to
          bear in mind when operating as a member of a selection board
          for the University

   The legal framework surrounding the interview process –
       o Key areas that all interviewers should be aware of, and ways
          that these can be breached.

   Standards that the University of Limerick wants applied to any
    interviews conducted on their behalf –
        o The University of Limerick Recruitment pack
        o The key issues outlined in the pack
        o The key messages that all board members’ need to take on
           board from a review of the material in the pack.

   ‘Recruitment criteria’ in the recruitment process
       o How to use recruitment criteria when advertising the job
              The lessons learned from previous adverts and how
                selecting the right criteria for the adverts are critical to the
                success of any recruitment process.
              The key things to remember when deciding what criteria
                will be included in the job advertisement.
       o How the recruitment criteria are used for short listing candidates
       o How recruitment criteria are used to determine the questions to
          ask during an interview
       o How recruitment criteria are used to choose the ‘right’
          candidate for the job.




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   Good practice in selecting the recruitment criteria that should be
    searched for in the interview

   Identifying the recruitment criteria required in a role – How to go about
    it

   Identifying the performance standards for each recruitment criteria
    identified
                         Why you need to do it
                         How you identify performance standards
                         How performance standards are used in the
                          interview process
                         The consequences of not identifying
                          performance standards

   The limitations of a selection interview as a method of recruiting staff
    and how evidence based interviews can overcome some of these
    limitations

   The traps that traditional interviewing methods and interviewers fall
    into, and how costly these can be

   Evidence based interviewing
       o What it is and why it is the only method that you should use

   How to prepare for an interview
      o You – the best practice guidelines for preparing yourself as
         interviewer.
      o The environment – what you need to do to prepare an
         environment that is conducive to a candidate performing to
         their best in the interview itself.


   The ideal candidate – comparing potential candidates against what
    you have defined as the ‘ideal’ candidate, rather than comparing
    them against each other




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   Establish how to use the interview like a detective story, what are the
    clues that you look for

   The role of questions in the interview process

   How questions should be viewed

   The questions that you should ask
                 Developing behavioural based questions
                 Developing a set of questions that will be asked of all
                    candidates, tailoured around their CV/Application form
                 Using the questioning cycle
                       o Scene setting questions – why you use them
                       o Past performance questions – looking for
                          evidence against your criteria
                       o More detail questions – probing the information
                          people have given on the past performance
                          question
                       o More detail – how – asking for information about
                          ‘how’ exactly the person approached the issue
                       o More detail – why – establishing the persons
                          motivation behind the approach they took
                       o Probing – how long to keep probing the issue

       The questions that cannot be asked - The legislation that surrounds
        the interviewing process

       The benefits of having an interview plan

       The skills required by the interviewer
                How to establish and maintain rapport with the candidate
                Listening – using active listening skills to really hear what
                    the candidate is telling you, and utilising the answers in
                    your probing questions.
                Empathising with the candidate – why you need to do this
                Helping the candidate to ‘sell’ themselves




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   How to come to a decision on a candidate – scoring a candidate
    against the criteria
          Challenges people face when scoring others
          Good practice in coming to decisions on scores for
              candidates as an interview board

   Scoring people on the evidence presented
             o Good practice in agreeing the scores candidates
               receive on the evidence they presented during the
               interview
             o What is taken into consideration when deciding on the
               score a candidate received
             o What to do with information that one of the
               interviewers knows about a candidate that has not
               come out through the interview process.

   FOI and its implications on interviewing and interview notes
    The legal framework
   Key learning outcomes from the workshop




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Programme Methodology

Throughout the programme the emphasis will be on a practical
approach.

The programme will be highly participative, using a mixture of:

            Lectures                          Discussions
            Case Studies                      Questionnaires
            Exercises                         Self Assessments
            Simulated interviews              Cctv and review

All of the above will be designed to increase the amount of experiential
learning that will take place on the programme. The participants will
have some opportunities during the programme to practice all of the skills
that we are exploring.




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