This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
A reader writes:
I wanted to share an interview experience I had yesterday, which connects to a suggestion or request I have for hiring managers.
One of the most annoying things about the way Covid has changed the workforce, at least to me, is the fact that now hiring managers seem to want to skip past phone screenings and jump straight to Zoom or video interviews — or, even more annoying, when they want to use Zoom/video conferencing FOR the screening conversation.
Before Covid, first round interviews were almost always over the phone, but now they seem to be exclusively video. I recently was contacted to interview for a position that I’m really interested in. They only gave me two days notice to schedule the interview, and in my current role I am extremely busy so it’s difficult for me to take time off under any circumstances (one of the big reasons I’m looking to leave), but especially on such short notice. I also don’t really want to take an entire day off for a 30-minute interview even if my schedule was flexible enough to allow that. I already had appointments for all of the interview times that she offered me, except one — I had an appointment right before and another right after, but the actual interview time she offered I was free. I also live about an hour away from my workplace. There was no possible way that I could get back home in time for the interview without inconveniencing all of the other people I had meetings with that day.
I also didn’t have a lot of other options of places to interview. My office door closes, but it’s basically a fishbowl with glass walls and very little sound muffling. If I had interviewed in my office, my colleagues and boss would almost certainly have overheard me. Other places on campus (I work at a college) were also not very private and had the added bonus of terrible internet connectivity. My college is in a very rural area so my data signal is usually not great outside of my actual office, and the wi-fi here is notoriously spotty. Faced with very limited options, I did the only thing I could think to do: I took the interview from my car in the McDonald’s parking lot.
From the very beginning, the committee (especially the hiring manager) seemed taken aback that I was in my car. The very first thing the hiring manager said after the initial hello was, “You’re not driving, are you?” I clarified that I was parked, apologized for the location, and explained that I had to fit the interview into my busy workday and there weren’t really any private locations besides my car. She said “okay” but with a very skeptical tone of voice. Then, at the very first question, I got kicked off the McDonald’s wi-fi for a second and my video froze, and the hiring director kind of freaked out (evidently she didn’t realize that I could still hear her even if she couldn’t hear me) and said something about how she told me to make sure I had a good internet connection.
Once my connection was restored, we ended up shifting to a phone interview, but by then the damage was done. I think I still gave a solid interview and maybe changed their initial perception of me, but I feel like we got off on the very wrong foot. When we were talking about next steps, she mentioned that the next stage in the process is a longer, half-day interview which would also be virtual, and said, “You would really need to make sure you have a good internet connection for that!” I stated that of course I would take the day off if I was moved to the next stage, but that this just wasn’t possible for this date because I already had a pretty full day by the time she had called, and thanked her for her flexibility and understanding. She said, “Of course, I know life sometimes happens” but I still got a vibe that she was annoyed or thought I was less than professional.
So my request is this — PLEASE stick to phone interviews for first-round interviews that will last less than an hour. It just isn’t reasonable to expect someone to take an entire day off work for a 30-minute interview, and it’s so much easier to fit a phone interview into a busy workday when you don’t have to worry about a data connection or the locations you have available to you. If it had been a phone interview, they would have had no idea that I was in my car, and I’m confident that they would have been very impressed with my interview without those problems clouding their perception. If you want the whole team or search committee there, you can still do a conference call (or even Zoom but tell candidates they don’t need to use video!). Obviously video conferencing has a lot of advantages on the hiring end, but at this stage in the process I think the disadvantages to the candidate outweigh those advantages — and you can always bring video conferencing in at a later stage to reap those benefits with less stress and inconvenience on the candidate. If for some reason you absolutely MUST use video conferencing for a screening conversation, please understand that candidates may not be able to interview in a desirable or strictly “professional” location if they’re already employed. Their car is a perfectly fine alternative if no other spaces are available to them.
Amen. People too often default to video without thinking through issues like the ones you’re raising here.