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A guide to job interviews

Startup for Startup

2022-04-12

6 min read

Getting hired at a new job is a process that may feel long, exhausting and confusing, even if you succeeded in getting a call back from the HR department in a certain company. Before you is an interview process that will require not a little work and planning of you that may frequently be accompanied by stress and natural concerns.

For this reason, we wanted to detail the job interview process here at monday, stage by stage, so that you can learn and adequately prepare for it.

Shir Yahav is one of the veteran and most experienced recruiter at Monday. Over the past year, she has been functioning in the company as a HR Business Partner. We asked her to explain the process to us that every monday candidate experiences and how everyone can better prepare themselves for each stage in the process.

 

Stage I – Telephone interview – connecting the resume and the person

The telephone interview is short, focused and generally lasts between 15 and 20 minutes, and our purpose is to conduct a screening that is extremely initial and basic. We also want to confirm that the contents of the resume are accurate and correspond with our requirements, as well as to ask questions that are slightly more in-depth. The goal being to understand how a candidate worked, the size of the customers they handled or type of companies with which they worked, to confirm their knowledge of professional terminology and that they know what they are talking about. Everything that can’t be strictly seen on paper.

For example, different companies define different positions differently, or require extremely different experience from another company. We therefore want to confirm with the candidate that we are both on the same wavelength, that the position in which they performed their previous work truly corresponds with the position we want to fill, that their experience or skills that they are bringing are relevant to the position.

Need tips on writing a resume? We have an article about this.

What to remember? That the interview is brief and focused. There is no need to discuss the start of your career ten years ago. Pay attention to what they are asking you and give relevant answers.

Tip: Be nice and generous. If the time is not right for you, ask for more time so that you can dedicate yourself to the conversation.

 

Stage II – Professional interview, get a glimpse of the position

Once we have confirmed that we are synchronized with the candidate, we can move on to the professional stage.

If the headhunter is the person who conducted the telephone interview with the candidate, this part will generally be managed by employees from the department that is screening the candidate.

At this stage, we want to gain a more in-depth familiarity with the candidate and begin to review their professional background with them. We want to understand their experience in the profession, the tools they are bringing from their previous places of employment and what abilities they have accumulated.  Our aim is to understand the professional knowledge of the candidates, as well as their practical competencies.

This stage can involve three parts:

 

  • Professional examination stage – in this stage, we want to see the work of the candidate themselves. This stage can resemble a home exam or any examination during the interview itself. We take content from the position and give it to our candidate to see how they solve problems and build projects on their own. This is the stage in which candidates can also gain a better first-hand understanding of what the position to which they applied involves. Our goal is to examine the professionalism of the candidates and to determine how they cope with large tasks that are taken directly from everyday work. Note – during the process, we occasionally request two professional tests, one that focuses more on the daily work and the second on strategy and broader thinking, depending on the specific position they are applying to.
  • The professional interview stage – in this stage, we perform with the candidate a review of the task they submitted. We will try to understand why they chose to prepare the task as they did, will ask them about the challenges they faced while they worked on the task and try to analyze with them what did and did not work in the task they submitted. Here, too, we can try to review extreme scenarios and to see how the candidate coped with these types of scenarios in the past and how they approached the problem to solve it.
  • The managerial interview stage – the candidate meets their potential manager of the department to which they are applying. In this stage we can discuss subjects that are High Level of the position they are applying to. We can discuss strategy and how they perceive the position, and where they want to take the position in the future.

What to remember? You can help by learning about the company and what the company’s challenges are. You can play with the product and try to enter the head of the position you are applying for.

tip: During the interview stage – when you examine the review of the homework, there is no need to defend your assignment at any cost. Try to understand the criticism and conduct a dialogue with the interviewer instead of trying to prove to him how right you are.

During the homework stage – try to strike the right balance to complete the task: on the one hand, there is no need to overload the homework and it is better not to write every thought that goes through your mind in the assignment. On the other hand, make sure you do not submit an assignment that is too sparse. Your investment will be tremendously important in our examination of your professionalism

Additionally, try to think about extreme circumstances and how you can cope with them. We want to understand how a candidate works not only daily but also during unexpected events.

We want to know what the recruitment process appears from the time lead angle? We have a chapter about this.

 

Stage III – HR Interview. Review of employee-company compatibility

Once you complete the professional stage, you will return for another stage with the headhunter. The purpose of this stage is to determine eligibility for the position, the company and the potential team. During the interview, we study the candidate, learn about their career development. We compile signs throughout the interview that we use to predict eligibility. For example, where do you sit on the scale between work as a soloist and desire to work on a team? How do you float problems that arise during your work?  How did you cope with mistakes you made in your work in the past and how do you learn from them?

What do you need to remember? Occasionally, one can reach this stage with a burning desire to persuade the headhunter, and to forget that there is a headhunter who is asking completely different questions, making the interview less reliable and can cause the headhunter to raise question marks and suspicions.  You should be with them, pay attention and notice what they are asking you. Do not come to sell yourself but to conduct a conversation about yourself.

Tip: Plan the message you want to relay in the interview. Before the interview, organize the issues in your head, list what you do every day, what is important, what is less important, and how you clearly relay this to the person before you. Once the interview begins, remember that you are in a discussion and are trying to sell not only yourself but are trying to explain to the interviewer how you can be a match for the company and the team.

 

Stage IV – Recommend. There are more people who want to praise you

We are nearing the end, and this is where to finalize the details and move on to recommendations:

We occasionally think that this stage is simply a rubber stamp. It is not. This is an integral part of our recruitment process, and references play a huge role in the process. The goal is to verify the facts raised in our interviews, and to examine any concerns we may have.

Tip: Call your references, tell them about the good news that you reached such an advanced stage, and ask them to be available and to respond to questions from strangers to them. It is better that they know that they are to be contacted in advance so they can prepare.

 

Stage V – The Offer. What do you say?

It's not over till it's over. You have passed the references stage. The headhunter will contact you with an offer. Many people wait to hear how much they will earn a month and make a decision accordingly, and this is definitely a significant and key component of the offer you are to receive but it is not the only component. Let the headhunter tell you what the company is offering you – including expenses, vacation, sick days, various bonuses, services offered by the job, all must be part of your consideration.

You are about to receive an employment contract. If you don’t understand anything in the contract, this is the time to ask the headhunter anything you need to make you feel comfortable with the terms and contract you received.

What to remember? You are about to receive an employment contract. If you don’t understand anything in the contract, this is the time to ask the headhunter anything you need to make you feel comfortable with the terms and contract you received.

Tip: think about what is more important and what is less important to you in a job, what is more important to you and what you can prioritize as less important.

Signed? Congratulations! You can view our article on the Onboarding process to understand what your orientation process will entail.

 

In conclusion:

As you can see, the interview process is long and complex. One can perceive it as an obstacle that needs to be overcome but it can also be perceived as an opportunity – you can, with its help, understand the message that you are relaying, how you are perceived in the job interviews, what the various positions entail and what you need to emphasize in order to highlight this in your studies, so that you can ultimately get the job you are seeking.

 

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Want to take part in knowledge sharing?

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