Search committees should be soul-search committees: A better approach to interview questions

 

Photo by Victoria Borodinova

I have been through a lot of interviews during my recent job search. It may not surprise you to learn that many of the search committees ask the same questions over and over. I assumed that there must be a manual that everyone is working from, or at least an authoritative website, but I checked, and I can’t find one. A number of HR offices have, however, created guidelines for search committees to use. The University of Mississippi, for example, has on its website a 41-page list of possible questions to ask. Other institutions are more modest in the range of options they provide. There are also a few consultants out there who are willing to help a committee with the search.

It strikes me that most of the people on these search committees, well-intentioned as they are, don’t really have a clear set of goals relating to these questions. They might want to know what my leadership style is, or what I might hope to accomplish in the first six months, but they don’t seem to know how that fits with their institution’s plans. This makes answering questions a challenge—are they trying to fit me into a pre-existing mold? Are they hoping that the new person will be a catalyst for change because Lord knows, they have tried everything and nothing has worked? Are they just looking to be entertained, or to size up candidates as potential friends or supervisors who won’t be too hard on them?

I propose that any question that a search committee intends to ask its candidates must first be answered by the committee members, both for themselves as individuals and then again for the institution itself. I don’t say this out of a desire for vengeance—“yeah, how do YOU like it?”; rather, I think having to answer those questions might help the institutions think through what they are really looking for in a new dean or provost or whatever. I mean, you have to walk the walk, right? Search committees should also be doing some soul-searching.

Here are a couple examples of what I am talking about. Take this question:

“Please give us examples of two of your strengths, and one area where you might need to improve.”

Do you, as an individual, know what your strengths are? Think about it for a moment. Notice how your gears are turning as you are sorting through possible answers to the question—not just what you say, but why you chose those examples of strengths, and how you will describe them. In your response, are you supposed to brag about your strengths or pretend to be humble? Are they really your strengths after all? How would you know? Would others agree? What if you are wrong, and it turns out that your strengths lie elsewhere? And what do you think others will know about you when you reveal your two strengths? What if what you chose isn’t interesting? (For instance, your strength is that you are “nice.”) Likewise for the weaknesses. Gone are the days when you could say something like “I work too hard” or “I have too much empathy for my coworkers.” Everyone is onto that ruse. So what do you say? And when you say it, what do you think it communicates about you?

Even more crucially, how would you answer this question on behalf of your institution? Can you name two strengths of your organization? I know, you’re tempted to say “the people who work here.” But what is that strength? And is it even true? Think about that guy in IT for a moment, or that woman who has worked in Finance for 32 years—these people are not unique, and probably are not a strength.

Let’s take another question that committees sometimes ask: “How do you determine priorities in establishing a budget or setting goals?” Honestly, I would love to know the answer to this one before I take a job. As individual committee members, you might have a good response to this for yourselves. But are you all in sync? Should you be? If not, how do you reconcile your differing or competing approaches? And we all should definitely be required to think about the institution’s own answer to this question. What’s the official policy for the institution’s annual budget? Is anyone thinking about how to balance continuity with innovation? Does the budget have any connection to the strategic plan? Are we updating our technology as often and as strategically as we should? (Probably not.) There may be right answers here, but it would be great if we all had given this some thought beyond the day when we were interviewed for the jobs we currently hold.

Here are a couple of others questions that an institution should be able to answer:

·        What is your interest in this position? Why you, and why now? (I don’t mind this question, but have the committee members thought about how important this role will be, and where it will fit? What priority will the institution place on this role? And why now?

·        How have you demonstrated your commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion? (I get asked this question a lot, often by all-white committees. Is the implication that I, as another white guy, will be the one who will be solely responsible for this? Or are you just hoping we don’t get more people like us?)

·        Can you describe your approach to collaboration? (How many micromanagers, procrastinators, and authoritarians do you have working at your institution, and do you allow them to be themselves?)

I don’t believe that interviews are the best way to find a great employee, because we often let people tell us who they are rather than showing us. Perhaps if the interviewers themselves knew firsthand how shallow the Q-and-A approach to hiring really is, they might consider alternatives—or at least ask better questions.