10 Mistakes Job Interviewers Make

#11.

Informing people you are interviewing that you don't have that many positions, anymore (when you are interviewing people during a job fair where multiple positions are being filled). Trying to make people think this is the ONLY job in the entire company, so they take the position quickly, just looks silly when they know the hiring manager is contradicting what's actually going on (that they are filling a number of open positions).

#12. Informing someone who attends an elite academic institution that had they majored in something frivolous, like "fashion merchandising," they could perhaps move into something higher up in your company, but since they picked something much more academically rigorous, they shouldn't get any ideas about applying for promotions later on. Now, you've got an insulted graduate of a top-ranked academic institution who spends NO MONEY with your business, later, when they are happily employed elsewhere where the hiring manager told them there was, indeed, advancement opportunity for non-frivolous majors.

That's a major mistake a job interviewer can make, not thinking "long-term relationship building," as in, gee, you attended such a top-ranked institution and picked such a solid major that you might just spend some of your money here if we don't immediately attempt to turn you off about your qualifications for advancement within our company.

Who trains some of these interviewers, anyways?

Have seen BOTH of those things done in a job interview, someone totally contradicting the fact that they were running a JOB FAIR, and also, trying to insinuate that a serious undergrad major had no future, post-graduate potential because they didn't pick the idiot academic major (good way to get those grads to come spend money with your division of the company when they happily work for someone else, right?).

If trying to impress job applicants, try putting insecurities about your own job aside; chances are, the applicant has zero interest in your particular job, anyways, so no need to immediately try to discourage them from getting any ideas about advancement possibilities. At the same time, think about the money you might LOSE from a ruined potential long-term client relationship with that applicant.

People accept jobs quickly in a lame economy, BECAUSE of the economy. But when they move on, if you depend on business growth for your business to survive future recessions, the last thing you want to do is totally insult and turn off the future graduates of rigorous academic programs in elite academic institutions. That's just plain bad business.

Companies need to move these inept types from the front lines and replace them with better long-term thinkers, lest it cost them more business every time some clueless interviewer offends the applicant who attends the best state school in the state, or one of the top private schools in the state. That's just plain dumb.

Elite2011 of IL 3:36PM September 19, 2011