Behavioral Interviewing... What's it all about?

Many companies, including Pinnacol Assurance, use Behavioral Interviewing techniques when they meet with candidates. You may be familiar with the term but every company seems to practice their own version of Behavioral Interviewing so I thought I'd share some insights as to how we use it with our company.

The purpose of our interviews is two-fold:

• Allow us to get to know who you really are
• Allow you to get to know who we really are

...with the purpose of determining if there is a close fit. A lot of 'How To' books on interview prep seem to focus on preparing the candidate to manage their upcoming interview to their own advantage. Sometimes this means portraying yourself as the "perfect" candidate and when that happens I think these prep books do everyone a disservice. Ultimately there is nothing worse, from both the candidate and the company perspective, of placing someone into a job they are not really suited for, or into an organization that doesn't meet the needs of the candidate. Employees tend to stay with Pinnacol for many years so fit is really important and the more you help us see the real you the more you help us to determine if there is a match.

We know what our job is and we also know what the key competencies (skills and abilities) are that would make someone successful in that role. Our goal in the interview is to determine if candidates have those key competencies. We do that by exploring what candidates have actually done in their prior jobs. Behavioral Interviewing is based on the premise that what people have actually done in their past is the best predictor of what they will do in the future.

The questions we'll ask you basically have four parts:

1. We'll ask you to describe a particular situation or task that you have faced at work
2. We'll then ask you to describe what you actually did - what actions you took and why
3. Outcomes matter - we'll then follow up by asking what was the result or outcome and what impact your actions had. We'll also likely ask what you learned from that situation or task

You can go out on the internet and find lots of practice questions and many of the 'How To' books encourage you to come to an interview with prepared responses. My recommendation is different. You can and should prepare for an interview but I'd recommend that instead of practicing for specific questions (which we may not even ask) you spend your time getting familiar with giving concise answers that follow the flow described above -

1. Describe a specific, real-life, job-related situation or task you have dealt with
2. Describe what you actually did in this real-life, job-related situation or task and why you did what you did
3. Tell us what the outcome was and how what you did made a difference. Then tell us what you learned from the experience

We don't expect you to have an automatic instant reply to our questions. In fact, candidates who respond too quickly are telegraphing that they are giving us a canned, prepared answer. Our Behavioral Interview questions should make you think, and that takes time, but by giving thoughtful answers you really are sharing the type of information we need to determine a match for our position.