The structure of the phone call when scheduling an interview. Telephone interview

So how do you book a phone interview? The best way to arrange a date and time for a telephone interview is to call the applicant. At the same time, it is necessary to explain how long the conversation will take and why it is needed. Next, a convenient date and time for the interview is discussed with the candidate.

Often they do not agree on an interview in advance, but find out already in the course of the conversation whether the candidate is ready to devote 10-15 minutes right now to clarify and discuss some points regarding the vacancy and his resume.

This option is good because the applicant does not have time to prepare and in such conditions it is easier to find out more interesting information about him, as well as to evaluate his communicative qualities. True, for the applicant, such a spontaneous interview can be a serious stress.

Pros and cons

Obvious advantages of a telephone interview:

• candidates feel calmer than during a face-to-face interview, which makes it possible to obtain more relevant information. A relaxed person makes contact easier than a tense one;
• saving time for the employer and job seeker;
• the ability to conduct the initial selection of candidates quickly and effortlessly;
• low cost telephone interview.

Minus two:

• inability to evaluate a candidate by non-verbal cues which allows him to be insincere;
• the inability to assess the appearance of the applicant in cases where it is important for a vacant position.

Important! Another significant disadvantage of a telephone interview is the high risk of bias in assessing a candidate. If the interviewer does not have sufficient experience in remote assessment, he can easily make a mistake and weed out a suitable candidate at this stage.

Peculiarities

Almost all types of interviews can be conducted over the phone. Both biographical, and projective, and situational questions can be asked as part of a telephone interview. Therefore, the main feature of such an interview is versatility.

Another feature is that in the case when the applicant is not suitable, you can end the telephone conversation at any stage. With a face-to-face interview, this is more difficult, because it is problematic to finish it 5 minutes after the start.

When is such an interview conducted?

A telephone interview is indispensable in the following cases:

• territorial remoteness of the candidate;
• preliminary assessment for mass vacancies, when it is necessary to weed out unsuitable candidates, saving your and their time;
• professional testing of candidates for positions related to telephone sales.

Often a telephone interview is required, for example, if the head office is remote from the branch, in which it is necessary to conduct an interview with a candidate for a key position.

In many companies, for vacancies of telephone sales managers, telemarketers, call center specialists, a telephone interview is a mandatory selection stage. In this case, one of the employees of the employing company, for example, can play the intractable client, and the applicant is trying in every possible way to make a sale to him, working with objections. This is a great way to test the candidate in the field.

What is being checked?

If a telephone interview is the first stage of selection, then its task is to determine the formal compliance of the candidate with the vacant position. For this, information about education, past experience, reasons for leaving a previous job, degree of foreign language proficiency, if required, is clarified.

telephone conversation enough to understand how good the candidate is in spoken English. An opinion is also made about the communication skills of the applicant.

By asking specific questions, the employer can reveal the candidate's motivation, degree of command, degree of learning ability, basic inclinations and personal qualities, and much more.

Phone interview: how to conduct?

The employer can find out any information through a telephone interview and clarify the details of interest. These are details about work experience, education, marital status and everything else that turns out during a face-to-face meeting. The conversation algorithm is the same.

A telephone interview is convenient even if if the HR specialist has any questions while studying the resume. Talking on the phone will quickly clarify controversial points.

To make the interview effective and not take a lot of time, you need to prepare a questionnaire in advance. The list of questions is compiled based on the purpose of the interview and the reason why it is being held. Having prepared such a list and a resume of the candidate with notes on what needs to be clarified, you can proceed to the interview.

In the initial selection, the conversation might start like this:

Hello Stepan Stepanovich! Olga, HR manager at 101 Million. I'm calling as we agreed. Can you talk now? I’ll tell you a little about the company and the vacancy, and then I’ll ask you a few questions…

Examples of personal biographical questions:

1. Who are your parents by profession?
2. What school subjects were the easiest for you?
3. Who influenced your choice of institute and faculty?
4. Which of your current hobbies are directly related to your profession?
5. What sport were you doing at that time? And what are you doing now?

Examples of biographical questions related to the profession:

1. How long did you work at your last job?
2. What were your responsibilities?
3. Which of these did you like the most? Why?
4. What success have you had? What are your main achievements?
5. What's your education? Why did you choose this faculty? Do you want to continue your education?

Examples of projective questions:

1. What did you want to be when you graduated from high school?
2. Why? Did you succeed in the end?
3. Why didn't it work?
4. Why did you choose your current profession?
5. Do you think you are good (named current profession)? Why?
6. Why does a person choose a certain profession?
7. In what situations is lying justified?

Situational questions (cases), focused on testing skills are selected for each position individually. To determine the candidate's behaviors and values, the following cases can be proposed:

1. You find out that a colleague is talking bad about you behind your back, and this hinders the development of your career. What will you do?
2. You have learned that one of your colleagues systematically commits unseemly acts against the company. Your actions.
3. The ideal leader - what is it?
4. What is the ideal team?
5. Imagine that you received two offers from employers at the same time. How will you choose?

After the interviewer has asked all the questions of interest and received satisfactory answers to them, it is necessary to give the applicant the opportunity to voice his questions:

Thank you, Stepan Stepanovich, for the exhaustive information! What questions would you like to ask me?

It is better to ask questions directly, because when building the phrase “Maybe you have some questions for me?” many candidates get lost and forget what they wanted to ask.

The interview should end with a discussion of further interaction and gratitude for the time spent:

What time would you like to come to our office tomorrow or the day after to talk in person? Then tomorrow at 16:00 I'll be waiting for you. Do you know how to get to us? Please take your passport with you, as we have a pass system. Thanks for taking the time to chat with us today! I will be glad to see you tomorrow!

Average length of initial phone interview 10-15 minutes. When evaluating applicants for managerial positions, it may take up to 1 hour.

It is desirable for the interviewer to divide the interview plan into several stages - control points.

In the event that unsatisfactory answers are received on the questions of the first stage, it is not even worth moving on to the second. It is better to immediately end the conversation, thereby saving time for both yourself and the applicant.

How to prepare?

To prepare for such an interview, the candidate must follow most of the rules for preparing for a face-to-face interview and not let things take their course. A telephone interview is no less serious stage of selection for a vacant position than all the others. For especially charming outwardly candidates, this interview option may be more difficult, because it is more difficult to charm an interlocutor over the phone than in person.

To be prepared for an interview, a candidate must:

1. Reread carefully own resume and think about what points in it may cause recruiter questions. Choose concise and comprehensive answers.
2. Explore company website and publications about it in electronic media, to have a clear idea of ​​what the company does, who manages it, what its mission is, whether there are branches, how many employees are in the state. Based on the results, prepare several questions about the company to the interviewer.
3. Prepare a short story about yourself. Better even in 2-3 options.
4. Make a list of questions to the employer about the vacancy, think and write down, if any, your wishes and suggestions.

It is useful to ask the interviewer interesting non-standard questions in a telephone interview:

1. What do you expect from the person who will take this position?
2. What does a person of my experience and qualifications need to do to get a job in your company?
3. What do you personally like about the company and working in it?
4. What tasks will I solve in this position, and in what time frame?

At the end of the interview, it is necessary to thank the interlocutor and be sure to stipulate further actions, the timing of the response based on the results of the conversation, the possibility of a personal meeting. It is also advisable to ask a question about who the next interviews are coming up with and how many there will be.

The telephone interview is an independent staff assessment tool, but it cannot replace the standard face-to-face interview. In most cases, the impression of the applicant received during the telephone interview is confirmed during the meeting. But for this, the employee conducting the remote assessment must have a high level of professionalism.

And finally, we invite you to watch a video on the topic.

Are you curious to re-evaluate the value of the first 15 seconds of a familiar telephone conversation between a job seeker and an employer? In this case, we will draw your attention to an invisible, at first glance, problem: when making an outgoing call from an employer to an applicant, elementary rules are often violated, according to which it is customary to talk on the phone in a modern business environment. As a result, in addition to spoiling the first impression of each other and lowering the prestige of the caller's company, people sometimes do not even manage to agree on an interview.

Cause of the problem: despite the outward simplicity of a telephone conversation, trainings on telephone conversations are mainly conducted for sales specialists and management staff, i.e. for those whose success depends on business etiquette. But for the training of HR employees, the budget is often cut. Of course, if an ordinary employee is invited for an interview, the negligence of some norms of conversation on the part of HR will go unnoticed by the applicant. However, during a dialogue with senior managers and managers, the personnel officer runs the risk of showing himself to be a less educated person in matters of professional ethics.

To fill the identified gap, you can use the material proposed below. It will show you which structure of an outgoing phone call most effectively highlights the HR professionalism (or lack of it).

The manner of communicating on the phone when scheduling an interview is an important indicator of our professional level. Let's match!

An example text of a competent telephone conversation about scheduling an interview:

“Good afternoon, Irina! (pause). My name is Olga, the HR manager of company N. I'm calling to arrange an interview for the position of "Regional Representative". Can you chat for 2 minutes now?”

Message
“Irina, I propose to summarize: we will meet with you tomorrow, March 24, at 15:00, at the address: Cosmos, 4, office 3. Let me remind you again, my name is Olga. All the best!".

Outgoing call plan

1. Greeting + introducing yourself

Say hello and address the interlocutor by name
Introduce yourself: not only the name (surname), but the name of the company.

Meaning: from the first seconds, you need to set up the interlocutor for a conversation and create an attractive image of the caller. Forget about the expression: "You are worried"! - it is unlikely to cause pleasant emotions. Neutral phrases are much better.

Example:“Good morning, Alexey! My name is Alena - HR manager of Pero company.

2. Message the purpose of the call

Meaning:
let the person understand why you are calling, as the job seeker may receive many phone calls that are not necessarily related to the job search, and he may not immediately understand what you are talking about;

Give the person the opportunity to “switch” to a conversation with you, to postpone current affairs.

Example:“We received your resume for the position of head of the sales department. I'm calling to schedule an interview at our office."

3. The question of having time to talk

Surprisingly, this is the most frequently overlooked item! Although, which of us has not had a chance to pick up the phone at an inconvenient time: on the road, on the street, during operative meetings or negotiations?

Meaning: remove all obstacles to continue the conversation. Imagine, the applicant is at a meeting at the current job, and then you call to offer him another job, you understand ...

At trainings, people often object to this point: “If a person is uncomfortable talking, then he himself will tell about it, why ask him about it?”.

Think about the situation in which you look more solid:

When they interrupt you and say: “Sorry, I don’t have time now, call back”
- or when you manage the conversation yourself and ask yourself a question about the possibility of continuing the conversation?

Very important: you need to be interested not only in the presence of abstract time, but in specific minutes: “Anna, do you have 3 minutes to talk now?”. This gives both you and the other person a clear reference point.

Moreover, if a person refuses to talk, do not forget to find out exactly when it is better to call back.

4. Discussing the main purpose of the call

5. Summary + farewell

Meaning: to voice the most important outcomes of the conversation, to make sure that you understand each other, and set a favorable tone for a further meeting. This point can also be called a test of understanding.

There are cases when interlocutors misheard the time of the interview, the place of the meeting and other details. And a brief repetition of important points helps to avoid these failures.

Maria Bolokhova - business coach, HR consultant

A few interview rules

Rule number 1. The ability of the applicant at the beginning of the conversation to translate the topic of conversation into a dialogue format, and not into the “question-answer” mode, plays a role: take the initiative, ask questions.

Rule #2. Telling about yourself matters in 30 seconds. At the same time, self-presentation should be interesting: have an accent at the beginning and end.

Golden rule: you should not be late for a meeting with the employer; neat appearance.
However, the most important thing in an interview is your confidence. Smile! .. but do not overdo it.

There are only 6 types of interviews that can be used to some extent in companies:

1. Biographical interview (consists of a series of questions, the purpose of which is to establish the reliability of the information indicated in the resume and to obtain detailed information about the education, work experience and competencies of the applicant).

2. Case interview, or situational interview (is a dialogue between a consultant and a candidate, during which the candidate tries to solve a specific business problem).

3. Projective interview (based on the construction of questions in such a way that they offer the candidate to evaluate not himself, but people in general or some character).

4. Interview on competencies (questions are aimed at finding out the qualities and abilities that will be required to perform job duties).

5. Talking about nothing (questions are asked about vacation, family, pets and hobbies. Based on your answers, the recruiting manager can guess how you behave with colleagues, subordinates, identify the main character traits, etc.).

6. Stress interview (a task of a stressful situation, where you are tested for self-esteem and the ability to talk about what does not suit you.)

telephone interview

Punctuality comes first

Your chances of being among those “lucky ones” who have overcome the first barrier in the form of a telephone interview will increase significantly if you take this type of interview as seriously as you would an in-person meeting with an HR. Before calling back to the employer, prepare a short introduction about yourself, including a description of your professional achievements and the reasons for your interest in the job offered.

Before calling back to the employer, prepare a brief introduction about yourself.

PR, marketing, advertising consultant Penny Lane Alina Kotovich believes that a telephone interview helps to verify the truth of the information indicated in the resume. “Very often, a CV incorrectly reflects the skills and competencies of the applicant, and even more so, it cannot reliably testify to his motivation and personal qualities. In addition, it is not uncommon for candidates to slightly "correct" information. So, "free" English sometimes turns out to be colloquial, and even basic. Without talking to a person, you will not find out this information, - the expert notes. “While an experienced recruiter, already at the stage of a telephone conversation, can determine how interesting a candidate will be to a potential employer.”

The average length of a telephone interview is usually 10-20 minutes. With regional selection of personnel - from 40 minutes to one hour. If the employer indicated in the ad a time interval for calls, then, accordingly, the call time of the applicant will allow you to assess the organization and punctuality of the latter. If the period is not indicated, then it is better to call about work from 10.30 to 13.00 and from 15.00 to 17.30.

Invisible interlocutor

Penny Lane Personnel consultants attach great importance to how the applicant builds the conversation during the telephone interview. “If a recruiter has a psychological education, then psycholinguistic analysis is connected, which makes it possible to find out a lot of information about a person without seeing him,” says Alina Kotovich. - For example, then how the applicant is fluent, how builds proposals and how makes accents, allows you to determine the type of personality, preferences, basic motivational factors and much more.

If you forgot or did not have time to ask something, then it is not recommended to immediately call back and clarify.

The specificity of the telephone interview is the lack of eye contact with the interlocutor. On the one hand, there is no need to take care of the external presentation, on the other hand, you are deprived of the opportunity to shift the opponent’s attention to abstract topics, besides, it is a business suit and other details of appearance that give many people self-confidence. Telephone communication can distort the timbre of the voice, but cannot affect the intonation and manner of negotiating, so pay attention to the following important details.

Try to avoid two extremes on your first telephone contact with the employer: do not speak too fast, trying to keep within one minute in the process of conducting mini presentations, but at the same time, do not exaggerate your modesty, do not be shy when communicating with representatives of the personnel service. Do not interrupt the interlocutor at the other end of the wire when he, in turn, begins to represent the company and talk about working conditions. you didn’t understand or didn’t hear, do not be afraid to clarify, ask again. This behavior is much better than blushing at the re-interview, justifying that you listened to this part, and referring to the poor quality of the connection. Career development consultants advise standing on the phone interview. Such a psychological technique helps to speak louder and more confidently.

The main thing - do not get distracted!

As in any other interview, be prepared not only to answer, but to ask questions yourself, which will help convince the employer of your interest in getting a job in his company. If the applicant is aimed at a specific vacancy, then his questions will mainly relate to functional duties and criteria for evaluating his performance. “Do not hesitate to ask if you want to impress a strong candidate,” advises the president of the personnel association "Metropolis" Valery Polyakov. - First of all, these should be questions about the content of the work, tasks, resources. It is better to ask about wages and other compensations not at the beginning, but at the end of the conversation.

If you forgot or did not have time to ask something, then it is not recommended to immediately call back and clarify. Such behavior can lead the HR to think about your disorganization, absent-mindedness. The formation of an opinion about a candidate can also be influenced by various sounds associated with the living environment (a working TV, a barking dog, the voices of relatives, children), street noises (when you call from a car or from a cell phone). Based on the current situation, the recruiter, firstly, will assess how seriously the applicant takes this type of negotiation, and secondly, will draw up a psychological portrait of the applicant with a greater degree of accuracy. So, one employee of the personnel service cites as an example the case when a girl was interviewed by phone, and it was heard that a third person was taking part in the negotiations. It was her mother, actively prompting her daughter for answers to questions.

After the conversation is over, be sure to ask what your next steps are.

The HR interest in you as a potential employee of his company may fade if you are distracted by other things during the interview. For example, one of the applicants talks about a mistake he made: in parallel with a telephone interview, he checked e-mail. When the interlocutor asked about the reasons for the delay in his answers, he honestly admitted that he was simultaneously looking through the letters. There was no proposal for a personal meeting from this company.

If refusal, then polite

If the initiative of the call comes not from you, but from the employer, and at this moment it is uncomfortable for you to talk (it does not matter for what reasons: you feel unwell, a tense working atmosphere, business negotiations), or you are simply psychologically unprepared for an interview, then best to reschedule the phone interview. The answer can be formulated as follows: “Thank you for paying attention to my candidacy, thank you for the call. Your proposal interested me very much, but, unfortunately, I cannot talk now - I have to leave in five minutes. Will this be enough time to talk, or can I call you back at another time? In this way, you will clearly enough express your interest in the vacancy, honestly warn about the time you have left and agree on the date of the next call.

After the end of the conversation, be sure to ask what your next steps are: when you can wait for the result of the interview, and, in case of a positive decision, what additional materials and documents you may need at a personal meeting. If you know the email address of the employee who communicated with you, after the conversation, you can send him a short reminder letter in which, in addition to gratitude for the conversation, once again list your strengths as a professional.

If, as a result of a telephone conversation, you immediately receive a refusal or realize that you yourself are not interested in this position, then be sure to thank your interlocutor for a pleasant conversation and express hope for the possibility of cooperation in the future. The experience of conducting telephone conversations with the employer, like any other skill, is not acquired immediately. The more phone calls you make, the more confident you will feel from time to time and, therefore, make fewer mistakes. This is the same case when quantity inevitably turns into quality.

Call the phone “I'm sick of this,” Gina said recently in a singles class. - I leave my business card. I'm not stupid. I am cordial. I manage to be the way I want - frank without impudence, persistent without aggressiveness,