VANNOY:

Hi, everyone. Mike Vannoy, vice President of Marketing at Asure. And today, a really important, I think tactical topic for, for all employers interviewing applicants and the, and the questions, how to avoid these legal questions and how to select the best candidates. The HR legislative compliance landscape is changing and what you can and can’t say and do, and what you must and must not share in, in the screening process, the interviewing process, the application process. There’s legal framework to this that’s, that’s changing. But then there’s just good practical advice, best practices how to get the best candidates. And in a world where the, the war for talent has hit Main Street all of us are looking for the best qualified people that we possibly can to join our teams to help get behind our mission. So you know, my guest today Mary Simmons regular guest of the show Mary’s the Vice President of HR Consulting at Asure. She’s a CER SHRM certified professional. For the last eight years, she’s been an adjunct professor at New York Institute of Technology. Prior to that she was the director of HR consulting for a 55 year old HR consulting firm in New York. So highly qualified and helps to be a pretty cool person. So thanks for joining today, Mary.

SIMMONS:

Thanks, Mike.

VANNOY:

Okay, so let, so let’s jump into it. I think one of the first questions people might have is just like, who should be involved in the whole job interview process? Is, is there some best practices around just the hiring manager? Do you do panels? How many interviews do, do you take ’em through? Where is the law of diminishing returns? <Laugh>

SIMMONS:

No, I, I love your last comment because the, look, the interview, and right now, we’re all begging for candidates, right? So this should be a great topic for you because I’m going to invite all of our listeners to look at interviews like you’re marketing the organization, right? Because that’s the position we’re all in. We need to market our, our organization and, you know, to a certain extent, the physician. And, you know, even if you don’t hire that person, we are all selling a widget a service, you know, something. So you want each candidate, whether you choose them or not, to walk away with a positive feeling about your or organization. So, who interviews is very important. How they interview, which is what we’ll, we’ll get into is very important. So it’s gonna be different for each organization, and we’ll go over some examples, but certainly the direct manager, supervisor of the individual should interview the candidate.

Sometimes you go up a level depending on the the position, right? So, you know, the higher up the organizational chart, the person is, you know, they may interview their direct supervisor and the supervisor of the direct supervisor, but I always think it’s a really nice thing to do to interview a colleague or to have a colleague interview your, have a conversation with, with one of the colleagues. Because a really important piece to an interview is a really clear, realistic job preview, right? So every interview could include, this is what the job is like a day in the life. I, I have organizations like that go so far as to have a salesperson go on a sales call with somebody, have a marketing person hand in a marketing presentation for one of the products of the organization, right? And I think that’s a great idea.

Look, the better we have the individual select out themselves, right? We do ourselves a favor as an organization. They know themselves better than we know them. And if we give a realistic right, you can’t sugarcoat the position, right? If you know they’re gonna deal with difficult clients or, you know, they’re, they’re, you know, you as a manager, you know, are very particular in your deliverables or your KPIs. Tell them what those KPIs are, right? Yeah. But definitely the way you interview has, has something to do with your culture. It has something to do with the position. So choosing an individual or a panel interview and how many interviews is important, but everybody should be keeping in mind that you are marketing the organization, that everybody should be professional, that’s, that’s interviewing them, right? And giving, you know, the positives, you know, trying to discuss that employment brand and the positive culture on the interview. Because at this point, you know, we are in the position of wanting that candidate or needing that candidate a little bit more than they need us in, in the current environment.

VANNOY:

You know what’s so interesting? You took, you took the spin, and I’m having some flashbacks, so this is something I’ve done myself. It, it’s funny cause like I’ll, I’ll be, I’ll be like stupid transparent with a, with a candidate saying, and just say, Hey, I am now shifting from the interviewing you to the selling you mode, because I think you’re awesome, and I think you potentially would be a great fit here. I think we still need to vet this out. But, and then, and then I’ll tell ’em, Hey, I would like you to interview somebody who would potentially also my team who would potentially be one of your peers. And you can ask them anything. Ask him from a great boss, a terrible boss, what are my strengths and weaknesses? And I don’t be afraid of any question because I want, I, I want you to join the team, but I, I only want you if you’re gonna be happy here, and this is a good fit. And people are just flabbergasted by that kind of transparency. And, and I think that kind of opportunity to kinda peek behind the veil, if you will, right? Because a

SIMMONS:

Hundred percent,

VANNOY:

I mean, wizard of Oz, right? What is really behind the curtains? They’re leaving <inaudible> in this, in this great resignation era, but it’s easy to jump out of the pan and into the fire. You, you just don’t, so, so say, right? Say more about these these peer interviews. I, I, I love this concept.

SIMMONS:

Yeah. And I, I do, I do the same thing on my team and I coach the clients that we work with to do the same thing. When we’re working on a strategic interviewing process, you know, I really dive in and I say, so where are you getting the candidates? When are they turning you down? Are they turning you down immediately in the, you know, initial interview? Right? So some, you know, organizations will say, I just, I can’t get anybody to get on a second call, or I can’t get anybody, you know, to, you know, after the second interview, you know, they’re gone. Who’s doing that second interview, right? And I think it speaks to culture. When you let them interview a colleague, you know, they know that that colleague’s going to give them some good information, some dirt. And, and I think that that empowers this person immediately, right?

It speaks to, to, again, your culture and what they’re getting into. You know, that they’re gonna be able to maybe interview somebody. And I, and I think it tells your, your current employees a lot about the way your leadership and the way the company is run, right? Because you’re empowering them, right? And what I’ll say is, look, you’re not in a management position, but this is a great learning tool. I’d like you to interview this person that’s gonna be your colleague. It’s great training. Obviously, you’re gonna give them some assistance and training and coaching on how to do that, that interview, but it is more of the other person, you know, the candidate asking the colleague. But it goes really far, like you’re saying, your candidates get really ex excited about it. I’ve had that experience and so have our clients.

VANNOY:

Yeah. So I I, I, I loved where you began the conversation. I suspect most people listening today came to hear one of the illegal questions that I shouldn’t ask. You know? And, and we’re gonna get there. That, that, that’s really important. You know, part of our job is to share the information to, to help people stay compliant, right? But I think a lot of people don’t think about they think about an interview as them trying to sell us on why we should hire them. But I mean, unemployment rate in the, in the, in the mid threes we’re, yeah, job participation rates below pre pandemic levels recession maybe. So, but you wouldn’t know it by the labor market, right? Yeah. The, the, the war for talent is very real. It’s, I I say more about how you think this is us selling them and putting our best foot forward as it is them selling us.

SIMMONS:

It is both. And, you know, it is selling, but it, but I do caution, you know, our listeners to make sure that they’re being realistic, right? Because as I said, you want those candidates to select in or select out, you know, and, and I’ll even say, you know, when I’m coaching and doing interviewing, training for our clients, I’ll say, I’ll say, you don’t wanna convince a a candidate. You don’t wanna talk somebody into the position. You wanna give them that realistic preview. Are you selling the position? Sure. Because I’m working here cuz I love it here. And you know, the organizations that I do they’re training for, I say, why do you love working here? Why are you here? Right? Obviously, I’m gonna give them some help, right? So I set some parameters, right? We talk about their employment brand because some of your managers might not know what that employment brand is.

 But so selling, yes, you have to be able to say, well, why they should work for your organization. That why is key to the candidates, to the, to the generations that are the majority of our candidates right now, why matters, right? And we have to react to economic changes, right? We’re, we’re not in a position to be like, well, if they don’t wanna work for me, tough luck. Don’t work here. We’re really not in that position <laugh> right now. And, and it’s your responsibility to tell them why, why they should wanna work for you.

VANNOY:

Right? Right. You know, and, and, and I’ll, I’ll, I’ll maybe slightly walk back my question, the way I phrased it is selling them. There, there’s there’s persuasive sales, but I, I think the be, you know, pe people’s BS meters are really good, right? In, in the very best form of selling you can do is just to share the information, right? Share, share the facts, and people will draw their own conclusions and make the best decisions that are a fit for them, right? So so, so I love, I love that approach. Maybe last thing on this topic of, of who should be involved in the job interview speak of, I know that, you know, there’s not necessarily a single best practice. Like, hey, it needs to be three interviews. It needs to be hiring manager, then a peer, then a panel, but maybe speak to, to what some of those models might look like. And ultimately, I do wanna li land on, I think there’s this law of diminishing returns where more information isn’t more helpful. Speak to those different models and, and, and how much, and what type of information should we really be mining for in these interviews?

SIMMONS:

So I love that question and I’m gonna pack a lot of information into it, and then we will talk more about it later. But the first thing that I wanna caution employers is no one should do an interview without coaching and training. No one, not only for the compliance side, but because you don’t want to blow up that interview, right? You, you don’t wanna have that candidate screaming and, and, and, and running for the hills. And I think probably around three to five is the best number for let’s say a middle manager position. Once you get north of five interviews, you should be paying the candidate <laugh>, you know, and, and, and I, you know, I help my candidates do interviews, right? I do this for a living and I’ll have people say, I’m out. They interviewed me five times. If they don’t know by now whether or not they wanna hire me, I can’t work for this organization, right?

So if you as an organization know that there are seven stakeholders in for that candidate, right? And, and realizing that as you go up that organizational chain, right? If you’re looking for a C E O or a C F O, it probably is seven interviews, right? But that’s when you might wanna work in that panel interview, right? And the other reasons that you wanna do that panel interview, save time, right? And if you had somebody, you know, was doing present presentation, so salespeople, people who are doing marketing presentations, even my HR consultants that are on my team, we’re doing training every other day. So sometimes I will do a panel interview. Cause I wanna see even virtually are you giving eye contact? Can you compose your thoughts when you’re asked a question? Right? A difficult question when you’re in the middle of a presentation, how are you reacting to the audience?

How do you modulate your voice? Right? All of that is important and that’s another reason to use that panel interview. But when you get north of five interviews, you, there’s no question you’re turning that candidate off, right? And, and there are times where I’ll coach, you know, the organizations we work with, and they’re like, no, Mary, there’s like eight people that, that really have to interview, okay, let’s work in a panel interview. Yeah. Or can we at least have a meeting with the first five and those other stakeholders and everybody take their interview logs, cuz you’re gonna have pre-written interview questions and discuss the candidate as a group. And then you can also ask the candidate, Hey Mike, you’ve interviewed these five people. Would you like to interview with the CFO or, or whomever is on that

VANNOY:

List. There’s a, there’s another topic for you and I to to, to unpack. One day is just question planning behavioral. And there, we’ll, we’ll say that for another day. I think, you know, it’s interesting from the, from the hiring side we, we might think, Hey, we have this really methodical process. We only want people who are a great cultural fit, but too many interviews you could be unintentionally signaling to, to the, to the prospective candidate that we are an overly bureaucratic company. We we’re indecisive. We don’t really know what we want. Oh, the person I was interviewing originally with, they didn’t actually have the juice to make the decision. If I’m gonna work for them, can I really get stuff done in this organization? Gotta be really careful about the unintended consequences your process may have on the perceptions of the candidates,

SIMMONS:

Right? And, and I think we’d be ignorant to think that they’re only interviewing with us. So if the other organization, you know, five, you know, over five interviews is gonna take a long time. Conceivably, that alone could take five weeks, right? That candidate’s interviewing someplace else and they make their decision sooner. They’re gone. You’ve just lost

VANNOY:

<Crosstalk>. Cause you can overreact to this problem, right? And say, Hey, war for talent. Our, our five i interview process, we keep losing candidates before they get to interview number three. Cuz they’re accepting a job somewhere else. Screw this. If we like them, we’re hiring them. What, what, what are the problems that exist? If, if you overreact in, in under interview,

SIMMONS:

I would never do less than two interviews. Never. and I rarely say never, you know, you’ve probably never heard me say that before, but you know, even somebody that’s done this for 30 years I can still miss something. And it’s funny what happens with the candidates. Sometimes they’ll tell you one thing they interview with you first and then they think about it and all of a sudden they were asking for 90,000. And then they come to me and they’re asking for, you know, one 10, right? It happens all the time, right? They have that first interview, they talk to friends, they talk to family, or the other physicians offering more money. Things change. You need to have two individuals minimally interview the person. I wouldn’t make snap judgements. But I, I think, I think the other thing that I don’t wanna miss saying is, as an organization, when I go through this strategic process with my clients, I say, why are each of these people interviewing the candidate and what are they looking for? And if you’ve got two people on that list that are looking for the same thing from the candidate, then either put them on the same call with the candidate or, or knock one of those people out, right? Because again, it it, we are in a war for talent right now.

VANNOY:

Yeah. I is, is there, is there an approach that you would just say, Hey, if you don’t have a methodology, here’s just my boilerplate recommendation. Obviously it should be tailored based on the level of the job, the skills required for the job type of company market. There’s a million variables. What would be, if, if you just met an an owner of a business, 25 employees, they’re gonna hire for a mid-level position, what would be your boilerplate recommendation for an interview process?

SIMMONS:

Oh boy. We could be here all day, but just as an overview, when I start my conversation about strategic hiring with and, and just talking about the interviewing process I would look at their organizational chart. I would see who they report to and if they have any direct reports, right? So let’s assume that’s a middle manager. They do have direct reports, right? And there’s probably two levels above them in an organization that’s small at most, there’s two levels above them to that c e o or that, that owner. So in my mind, that’s three interviews, right? If you want them to interview. And sometimes when they manage, I have them interview one of the people that they’d be managing very important, right? In a small firm, firm like that they would interview their supervisor and then, and then maybe the supervisor’s supervisor or that c e o owner, cuz there’s only 25 employees that owner’s working with. Everybody probably hands on. That’s where I would start. And then we, and then there’s a lot more to it as you know, and we’ll talk about some of that.

VANNOY:

So, so let’s transition for beyond, you know, how many and how many people should be be involved. Let, let’s move to how to actually run the interview. And I think, and we’re not gonna go, we’re not gonna go into behavioral interviewing and the actual questions you ask necessarily that, that, I think that’s an hour, that, that’s 10 hours, but that, that’s an at least an hour topic for us right there. So we’ll save that. But just give us the, give us the framework for how to run the interview.

SIMMONS:

So, as I said before, and, and this is gonna be a reoccurring theme, is that we have to train every single person who is interviewing that candidate. Again, they are marketing the organization either so that they take that job or so that they have a positive impression of our organization. The next thing that I would do, and maybe included in that training, is if we are doing a virtual interview, it’s important that our interviewers are professional. So, you know, are we saying things like, make sure you turn your phone off. Make sure that you, you know, have a clean background or the company, you know, background up, right? So they understand how to do that virtual interview and you’re doing the same housekeeping for an in-person interview. Every little thing that we do matters. When we do an interview, again, we are still marketing the organization when we’re doing an interview.

I ha I had one employer who had really hard time finding people very compe, always a competitive market in their industry, even before the great recession. And we went step by step. And it really came down to the interview. They were very disorganized. Their managers weren’t trained. So the managers were like literally talking about the weather, right? They no job preview, no pre-arranged questions, no interview sheet that they could all come together and discuss that candidate. And you know, the candidates, you know, because I had the opportunity to interview some of the candidates. Well, you turned us down. Would you mind just spending five minutes with me and walking through it? And they were like, it was the most unprofessional organization. I would never wanna work there. So you have to understand that they’re interviewing you, right? Think of yourself when you go on an interview, right?

You’re looking at that organization amongst probably other organizations and saying, do I want to work there? Right? And you’re on the fence, right? It’s our job to pull them over the fence, not push them, but pull them over the fence and say, yes, you do wanna work here, but we have to tell them why. So, you know, we did, we gave Chach good every interviewer, right? Because, and Mark and Mike, you know, this, you know, this is important, right? Even if I give a coffee mug with a shore to it, and that candidate doesn’t take the job, my logo’s going with that person every time they tuck that coffee mug. So, right? To me, that’s a, that’s a win-win, right? So we changed the structure of the interview. Instead of interviewing at cubbies, we reserved the conference room, right? We made sure the conference room was clean, that they had a glass of water available and we offered them coffee.

We gave them the prospectus for the company. All of that goes into the brain of that candidate and helps them make the best decision. It also might help them say, Ooh, this is a little too organized for me. I wanted something a little more laid back. Good then don’t work here. It’s not right. All of it, all of it is important. But there has to be a process, just like everything you do in your business. This is not to be done haphazard, Mike. It has to be done with proper interview questions and, and the interviewers being trained and the entire environment tied into what we’re doing with that interview.

VANNOY:

You know, I interviewed a lot of hundreds of salespeople over in my career. And so salespeople are, you know, you, they’re pretty good at doing right? Because they’re used to pitching, right? So to me, the number one criteria, probably the number one criteria that would get people kicked out is if they didn’t come. So I would have my questions if they didn’t have a prepared list of questions for me, at least in their head, but hopefully on paper to ask me gigantic red flag. Because that told me that they were all about them. They weren’t about their prospect. Cuz how they’re gonna sell to me in the interview is how they’re gonna sell our products and services, right? And so are they gonna ask questions to mine for pain and, and problem solve and, and, and come up with solutions for clients?

Well, they’re gonna do the same thing for me, right? So again, I love, to me, I’m taking two messages here. Number one, be prepared, be thoughtful. Have your list of questions. And if it’s more than one of you and now you have a framework to compare notes, hey, I’m gonna ask these three questions. You asked those five questions, we’re gonna kind of triangulate around the competencies here and figure this out. Or maybe you ask the same questions because you just simply want, wanna compare answers. I don’t think there’s a right or wrong approach here, but the, the, but it is be prepared. And then the other side of this coin is we are trying to make a great impression on them and our level of organization, our level of thoughtfulness. How, how a lot of times, if you might reveal to the candidate, boy they don’t really have this role figured out yet, am I gonna be set up to succeed? Yeah. Right. Because they’re pretty nebulous about how they describe this thing to me. Right?

SIMMONS:

Right. A hundred percent.

VANNOY:

Yeah. Okay. What about the use of applications? So we’re not talking about hiring CFOs and senior managers here. We’re talking about frontline employees, maybe supervisors. How, how important is it to use a job application in the year 2022?

SIMMONS:

So, you know, look, it’s not mandated and I’m gonna give you some pros and some cons. One thing that everybody has to remember, and, and I know I say it all the time and I’m gonna continue, is when we talk about human resource we are and how you practice human resources in your organization, consistency is the key word. So if we’re using an application for our factory workers, very often, I’m gonna tell you to also use it for the C F O, because if you’re, you, you don’t have to if you break it down in job group. So you could just say, oh, only my factory workers fill out an application, but let me break down why I might use it. Number one, the application asks for things that a resume doesn’t, right? So a resume has my jobs on it and I might just have years, right?

So I might say, I worked here from 2010 to 2012, right? And then the next job is 2012. Well, there could be a 10 month gap between those two jobs, right? An application says, list your last five jobs or jobs you’ve had in the past 10 years, you know, depending on the application in chronological order. So you’re gonna catch those two jobs that they were at for 10 months. Because at the bottom of every application that I provide my clients, it has their signature that says, I attest to all of this being true. The other thing, and I just had this with an employer, some employers are gonna need to ask certain things on an application. For example, your federal contractors to have a federal contract and to work on that federal contract, the employee needs to be a US citizen. Now, I don’t want anybody to mis hear me because when you have an application, and 90% of them, Mike, that I look at from my clients, are not compliant. 90%. That’s why I wanted to talk about applications. So if you’re not a federal contractor, you cannot ask if they’re a US citizen. You can ask if they are eligible to work in the United States so that they satisfy the I nine. But I see that all the time. But if you’re a federal contractor, you can ask that right now. If you only

VANNOY:

Have a, and there’s just a perfect, perfect example where language matters. Yes. Then no one is accusing anyone of, you know, God forbid being a xenophobic racist or anything like that. That’s just, that’s probably what people mean when they say, are you a US citizen? Because they interpret that, Hey, are you legal to work here? That they could, they could care less about all the other stuff. But just the way you phrase it is illegal, right? So a really matters

SIMMONS:

A hundred percent. And look that, you know, as you said, I, I teach a SHRM class at a local college that is on the SHRM exam every time for HR professionals. So if it’s something that we know, you know, we feel it’s important to ask at our level. Of course employers are getting getting it wrong. They don’t know what they don’t know. That’s why, that’s why, you know, they, they need our help, the oth And then there’s other things that applications can and cannot ask, right? I see over and over and over again that they ask for the social security number. First of all, as an employer, you shouldn’t be asking for a social security number before you hire the person, right? You don’t need it yet. And I would not wanna be responsible for that application, either virtually or a paper application with people’s social security numbers. God forbid that gets stolen. You’re in trouble. There are information acts out there to protect you know, when you can and cannot ask for a social security number. Safe to say, I wouldn’t ask an applicant, okay? And, and remembering that everything I’m saying there could be, you know, exceptions, especially for some of those federal contractors. And then some of the, you know, if you’re hiring a truck driver, you have to know if they have a CDL license. Some I was

VANNOY:

Gonna say, yeah. I mean, right?

SIMMONS:

Some positions, your

VANNOY:

Truck driver has to have a cdl. Your hairstylist has to be certified by the state board. I mean, there, there are certain, certain things that can help you to, to ask the, the, the kinds of questions that you don’t have to waste a much time in an interview process. Hey, if they’re not licensed, if they don’t have these credentials, if they’re not eligible to work here, if they can’t do such, if they don’t own, own their own if they don’t, I was gonna say own their own car cause that probably doesn’t matter. But there’s a way to phrase illegal,

SIMMONS:

Illegal question.

VANNOY:

Yeah. O okay. So we’re gonna get to it. But ability for transportation will unpack the specifics of that one. There are, there are things that do belong on an application and an application can be useful. That’s right in those cases,

SIMMONS:

Right? It can definitely be useful. So this topic I just wanna caution employers and I would say that this is one of the first things I look at. We look at that onboarding paperwork, you know, pretty early on when we’re working with our clients, we do a HR assessment and I say, show me what you’re using, right? And again, you don’t know what you don’t know. A lot of them are like, oh, I’ve been using that application for 30 years. And I’m like, well, hmm, anything you’re using for 30 years, you probably should review. But you know, again, that’s, that’s why we’re helping them. So there are good uses to it, but make sure that we are reviewing it for you. If you’re working with us or an employment attorney or who, whoever has HR knowledge that is assisting your organization, is looking at that application if you’re using it.

VANNOY:

Yeah. Okay, let’s, let’s use, use my faux pa because I like to think I know this stuff and I just screwed up, right? Just like most employers do, cuz you don’t know the specifics of the law. We’re gonna come back to the questions you should ask, but what are the questions that you can’t ask that are illegal that, that people, like I just did fall into this trap.

SIMMONS:

So we, we were doing an HR assessment at a client and the re one of the reasons they brought us in, you know, it’s it’s typical family business and the 20 something year old son is starting to take over the business. So they really want me to work hand in hand with him, you know, on the HR side, right? Because the parents are like, you know, we, we did this, but we realized the landscape of the world has changed. You know, covid, you know, it’s even just a small part. So in my conversation with this 20 something, I, I’m gonna say he’s like 27, 28 years old, you know, brand new owner, you know working in the business probably for 10 years though, right? On and off during school. I say, all right, let, let’s start with the interviewing process, right? Look at the application. Lots of things that I had to change there. So of course we gave him a new application. What, what questions do you ask? And he said, well, my first question is, how old are they? That’s first I call them. I’m like, no, you can’t ask that. And he’s like, why we’re air conditioning and heating organization? I need to know how old they are because, so I need to know whether they can crawl around vents.

I took a deep breath like I am now <laugh>. I said, alright, project number one, we’re doing interviewing, training, right? So, you know, any, so the best way that I can describe what you can ask, and this really is goes along with consistency, is everything we do in the HR realm should have a business reason. So every question you ask, there should be a business reason. So a lot of times I’ll have employers say to me, oh, well I think it’s a great idea to figure out whether they’ll fit in with the culture. So I say, what do you do on the weekends, Mike? So I was training a manager and I said, okay, you watch one of my interviews, I’ll watch one of yours. I said, you can’t ask any of the EEO categories, right? Don’t ask race, creed, color, age, right? Yeah. I said, okay, okay, okay, okay.

So they throw that question in there and I’m like, and the person says, well, on, on weekends, you know, I, I spend a lot of time you know, fixing my hearing aids cuz I can’t hear well at all without my hearing aids. I’m sure you didn’t notice it, but I have hearing aids and I know this is a receptionist job where I have to answer the phone, but I can’t really hear well and I hope that doesn’t preclude me from getting the job that I have this disability, you can’t unhear information, right? So, you know, the other thing that I’ve had, you know, innocently people say, oh Mike, that’s a really cool accent. Where’s that from? That can be misconstrued as discrimination, right? Your example

VANNOY:

To the best of your ability. I see. Can we bifurcate this thing between Yeah. Illegal. You can’t, it’s black and white. You can’t ask, and I know we can’t list all of the things you shouldn’t do. I tell my children this, right? It’s like, I can’t tell you all the things you can’t do because there’s no end to that list. I need you to have good judgment, right? But right there, give us some some of the just no-brainer, most common mistakes flat out illegally. You can’t. And then I think we’re where you’re going there. I, I wanna go deeper then on the more the best practice. What should you do? There’s a better way to get that information

SIMMONS:

Right? Right. A hundred percent. So I would say that where I find the, the biggest, you know, area of going into those I illegal questions is when you start asking anything that is personal, right? So, you know, you brought up, do you own a car? So, you know, the, the courts have found that that has disparate impact. Now, there are times where there’s a position that is a bonafide qualification that you can ask that question, but don’t ask it without talking to me, right? So cuz it’s very narrow, right? So, you know, there’s, there’s examples where you can ask religion, right? If they’re teaching religious education at certain organizations you may be able to ask, you know, what the religion is. But when you get into anything that is personal, it is not business related, right? And that can get you into trouble.

And you talked about, you know, interviewing and we will, you know, at a later date talk more about the interviews, but behavioral interviews, I give you a scenario and you tell me how you would react in that scenario, will tell you culture, how people react to things a a scenario or how they have re reacted in their past job is the best way for you to make a decision on how they will take those skills and act within your organization, right? Yes. No questions aren’t gonna tell you anything or very little, right? Those behavioral questions, right? If you had a difficult client, how do you react? How have you reacted to a difficult employee in the past? Tell me about it specifically that will speak more to culture than what you do on the weekends. It’s none of my business.

VANNOY:

And, and, and, and I do want to do a a, a whole topic with you someday on behavioral interviewing, but just I’m thinking different levels of the question earlier. How old are you? Okay. Flatly illegal. It’s an EO thing, right? I mean, it’s one of the areas of discrimination. Can’t ask it. Okay, well, can you crawl through vents because this is an HVAC job?

SIMMONS:

A hundred percent.

VANNOY:

It’s a, it’s a binary. It’s why legal, why it’s legal, but why the answer is binary. Cause you’re asking the, the, they’re interviewing for an HVAC job, they’re gonna say yes probably, right? A better question may tell me about the most strenuous work, physical work that you’ve had to do. What were those circumstances? And did you have to crawl in and under tight spaces, right? Uhhuh,

SIMMONS:

Right? And it’s business related. Yes. So that’s easy, right? It’s business related. There’s always gonna be a fine line for certain positions, right? So that’s why you need an HR professional to vet that question. I can’t tell you how many lawsuits we’ve had when people are inconsistent. So the, the area that I have seen a lot in in my past career is they’re asking women one set of questions because they’re assuming they’re the caregiver. And so I go for the same interview that you do. They ask me, can you work nights? Can you work weekends? Do you have daycare Who takes care of your children? How many children do you have? And people, interviewers may ask that innocently, right? Just to start the conversation,

VANNOY:

Right?

SIMMONS:

I that is not something that you can ask that’s not business related. It’s personal. That’s how you make the decision of whether the question is appropriate or not. And if you’re asking if people can work weekends and nights, you need to ask every candidate, regardless of gender, regardless of whether they’re married or not, also a question you can’t ask. And whether they have kids, you need to be asking every individual for that position. The same exact question,

VANNOY:

Mary. So again, not possible to literally list every question that you can’t ask. Cuz that list is endless. But what are the categories? Because I think it ties back to your e o c comment, right? It’s, it’s the areas of discrimination. These are the, these are the black and white categories that we can’t ask those specific questions. Can you kind of unpack that for folks?

SIMMONS:

So I think we you know, those, those basic EEO categories are sex, right? Exactly. So the other thing that, you know, we need to be aware of this overarching theme is that we really wanna use the candidate’s name as much as possible, right? Because you can’t assume the gender preference of the individual when they come in or we have a video interview. Yeah. So, you know, you want to try and use their name whenever possible instead of she, her, his, you know, et cetera. So that, that is important when we talk about sex. But what else comes under sex is somebody comes in and they look eight months pregnant. Do not ask if they’re pregnant. That is not your, I I know, I I have my employers argue with me all the time. It is not job related. What’s job related is if that individual came in for an interview and they appeared to be eight months pregnant, you ask the same exact physical questions you ask anybody else, right? So you would ask, can you crawl through vents that are five feet by five feet or, or whatever. They are the same. Can you

VANNOY:

Climb ladders? Can you lift up to X number of pounds? Right? That’s

SIMMONS:

Right. That’s right. So make sure that they’re job related. So sex does, right now, that category encompasses a lot. It’s very important. And I know the employers listening are saying, Mary, I’m not hiring somebody seven months pregnant. But because an individual, a woman is pregnant is not the reason you can’t use that solely as the reason. If they’re not qualified, they’re not qualified. But if they’re qualified, that is not the reason you should be using not to hire that, that person, that woman, right? So

VANNOY:

Just let I, I wanna make sure everybody understands the, the, the E E O C categories. So, race, sex, religion, what else?

SIMMONS:

Creed, color.

VANNOY:

Creed, color. Okay.

SIMMONS:

Age, did you say age?

VANNOY:

I did not that. So, so those are the categories that you can’t ask questions that would disclose which, which, how, how they, how they, if they fall male, female, how they identify from a sexual orientation, from a gender identity, from what race they’re, what religion, they’re et cetera. No questions that that, that, that make, that force them to specifically answer that could preclude you from hiring them because that could perceivably be the reason, right?

SIMMONS:

And there’s going to be employers that are listening in that have exceptions, right? So there’s certain positions where you have to be over 18. So that would be another position that they could ask that on an application, right? So serving alcohol, in some states, you have to be the legal age to serve alcohol. So if you’re hiring a bartender, that would be okay to ask, right? And I invite employers to say, tell the reason as per California law to serve alcohol, you must be 21 years of age. Are you 21? Yes or no? So age is, age is, you know, more than it seems also, right? Because, so the E E O C or title seven will tell you that over the age of 40 is a protected category, right? Sounds really young, right? But to discriminate based on any age will be heard by a federal court.

And there are many states that say over 18 is discriminatory, right? So the interview questions are, it, it would be a very rare exception that we would be asking age, but there are exceptions. So there’s exceptions to everything that we’re saying. And that’s why employers who are working with us, you know, value, value, being able to call my team and saying, one of my managers just asked this, or we wanna, we wanna know age for this reason is this, you know, a bonafide qualifying, you know, question. Can we ask it, right? Yeah. So age definitely has something to do with it. Religion, as we said, there would be very rare exceptions for when you can ask religion, but we shouldn’t be getting into that, right? So if we know that we need people to work Sundays, right? So I do happen to a lot of churches, guess what?

The busiest day for most churches Sundays, right? Yeah. So they ask everybody, right? On the facilities crew, can you help us on Sundays we have, you know, three services or four services, and this is what you have to do on Sundays, right? So they do ask, are you available on Sundays? They don’t say, are you going to church on Sundays? Right? Or are you going to synagogue on Saturdays? Or, you know, those credit you ask, can they do what you’re asking them to do physically or time? You don’t ask them why they can’t do it. <Laugh>, that’s personal.

VANNOY:

Okay. So on the to, to put a, put a bow on this whole things that are illegal questions, you can’t ask if it’s any of the categories of that that would be the basis for discrimination of the E E O C categories. How old are you? What sex are you, what religion are you, et cetera. You can’t ask those. But because there, it, it becomes so nuanced, so fast, there are reasonable exceptions in specific categories, but on those exceptions are only allowable if they rely, actually depend on the actual work to perform. This gets real complex. So our general guidance is we can’t publish a list because no such list could exist. It’s don’t ask questions, but the answer could lead to discrimination. It’s, it’s really that simple, right? Correct.

SIMMONS:

Right. It’s simple, but it’s not. Yeah.

VANNOY:

Right. Welcome, welcome to hr, right? That’s

SIMMONS:

Right, that’s

VANNOY:

Right. Okay. la last couple topics that I want to hit, hit on. I do wanna spend a little bit of time, we’ve been hinting at behavioral interviewing here. This is, this is a hell of a tea teaser we’re building. But I do wanna talk a little bit on questions you should ask and then maybe just as important, especially with the multi-person interview process, whether it’s panels or multiple interview sessions, how to interpret answers, right? So, right, let’s start with the best practices. What, what are some of the questions we should be asking?

SIMMONS:

So really the questions are gonna depend on the position. So the first thing that you’re gonna start with as an organization is a job description. So you’re gonna look at your job description and say, what are the responsibilities that this position will have to fulfill, right? And again, going back to behavioral questions, you’re not saying, Hey Mike, can you service clients? And Mike’s gonna say yes, right? We’re gonna say, give me an example of where you went over and above to give extraordinary positive customer service and tell me about it in detail, right? Perfect. And when we, when we ask questions like that, it also gives us so much information, right? Is the person articulate? Can they think faster on their feet? Are they telling the truth or are they going through one of these, yeah, they’re looking enough for the sky. Like there’s gonna be some answers up there.

I know there are. Right? So that gives us a lot of information. So looking at that job description, what are their responsibilities? What are the KPIs that we’re looking for from this individual? Have they done it in their past positions that they’ve had? And can they give us examples of where they did it? And if they never did a particular skill that, that we are looking for, right? So let’s say that they never sold to businesses with more than a hundred employees, right? Bigger businesses, they sold to smaller businesses. You ask them hypothetical questions. So how would you sell and where do you see the difference between selling to those? So the, the questions are going to be very different depending on the position. I would like to see a strength or a weakness question asked, but I would like for that middle manager, right? So let’s really gonna be a lot different if we’re, if we’re interviewing entry level. So let’s, let’s put entry level aside and really talk more about that middle manager. And I like the strength or weakness question, but not ask Mike, what’s your greatest, you know, strength? What’s your weakness, right? I I just we’re

VANNOY:

Too hard and care too much about people.

SIMMONS:

That’s right. That’s right. And when we do our training, we caution about those answers, right? So I think that the question on strength should be related to the position. So if we use your example of a salesperson, I’m going to say, how do you think that you’re successful in your sales approach? What helps you to be successful? That is a strength question, but it’s specific to the position. And then when I talk about a weakness, right? I’m gonna do the same thing. I’m gonna say something like, tell me a time that you lost a sale and what you would do differently the next time, right? Because if you say, did you ever lose a sale? They’re gonna say no. Every time I get on the phone I <laugh>

VANNOY:

Yeah, I’m, I’m amazing. Yeah, <laugh>.

SIMMONS:

So I always like a strength or weakness question. Again, if it was an entry level position, you could just say, what are your strengths? What are your weaknesses? And you can’t believe how people will be honest sometimes. And for customer service positions, say, I really don’t like people. Get along with people. Yeah. I’ve been doing this a long time. Nothing, nothing shocks me. But those questions have to be planned out, right? Because this is going to protect you from discrimination, right? You’re not asking different questions because somebody looks different or because somebody looks like the caregiver or says they’re the caregiver versus somebody who’s not a caregiver. We are sticking to the same questions. Understanding that their application and or resume will also direct us to have specific questions for each of those candidates, right? Because if you are looking at the resume, personally, I would go to every single position on that resume and ask them why they left. Why, what am I looking for?

VANNOY:

Yeah.

SIMMONS:

Do you know what I’m looking for when I ask that? Can you guess? Well,

VANNOY:

Yeah, I mean, did they get fired? Did they choose to leave? Were they recruited away? I mean, so when I, when I do this, I ask them, okay, we’re gonna start out, we’re gonna get, we’re gonna, we’re gonna get to know each other. But I just wanna start, take me through your resume. Go, go backwards in time to the oldest job. I want you to tell me why you left that job, why you joined the new and explain away any gaps. Right? And it’s exactly what I said. Exactly.

SIMMONS:

Exactly. So help, I was helping a client hire a new HR person, right? And she said, I really love this, but she’s perfect. She’s great. She’s it, you know, so, right. Let me, let me do your second interview cuz I can ask the hard HR questions. She never asked her why she left her last firm and she was terminated and really went into some detail. And that was important information for us to have.

VANNOY:

There’s an old saying in relationships, if you wanna know how your current relationship is gonna end, look at the last three and see how they ended, right? I mean, history’s a good, good, good indicator. Mary, I’m gonna ask you a question. So this might sound off the wall and I’m just looking at my, my phone here. But a book I recently read famous Silicon Valley, CEO venture capitalist author, Ben Horowitz got a bunch of great books. I recommend all of ’em. But his latest is what you do is Who You Are. It’s about branding. And, and it doesn’t matter the the Successories poster you put in your lobby, it’s all about how you behave. That is your brand. But he literally asked this person in an interview, he’s hiring for a sales leader and got super confrontational and said, what would you do if I punched you in the face right now?

And the guy’s answer is, well, you better knock me out. And he hired him on the spot. He was, I mean, not a conventional interview, right? And I’m, we’re not, I’m not advocating for it, but he was testing, he wanted someone in the role who was a fighter, who was gonna push back, who was gonna be super aggressive. I I, I’ve known some pretty successful sales leaders who are kind of torturous in their interviews cuz they’re, they’re stress testing the candidate to see how they perform under pressure. Can you give some guidance there? Cuz I, I mean there, there, I think there’s a fine line between asking, say behavioral questions. What was the most stressful environment you’ve ever been in? Tell me about it. Who was the name? What was this and what situation? How did you respond? What was the outcome? Right? Versus listen you <laugh> and just see how they react.

SIMMONS:

Well, so there’s a lot of different ways you could do that. And that’s why I say for certain positions you do ask them, you know, to do a presentation in front of 10 people, and then the 10 people start peppering them with questions. You know, my son’s a computer engineer, so his interviews, he is working through a very complex problem live while they’re peppering him with questions, that is to make sure that he can handle the stress, think on the job. So I think what, what employers need to do is think about again, what are the, the skills that we need in the position. If they need somebody to handle stress, I would try to replicate the situation that you have at work. Right? I’m pretty sure that that job, I mean, that sounds really funny and fun and exciting that he said, you know, what if I punched you in the mouth, but you could lose a really good Kennedy that way.

Right? So I think, and I don’t think they’re gonna get punched on the job, so I would rather you, you know, what we’ve done is built in more realistic, right? What are they gonna have to do, right? So if they’re gonna have to sell to, you know, a C-level suite, we replicate that. We make them come in, we make them do a PowerPoint for 10 minutes to a room full of people who are acting like the C E o. I like that situation better. It will give you the same outcome, I believe, and I think it’s a better predictor.

VANNOY:

Yeah. I just recently hired a director of digital marketing. She’s amazing. And she could tell you the grueling process. It was an interview of me and a one-on-one with, with a, a a future peer. Actually had her interview with someone who would be reporting to her. And then we did a big old panel. It was kind of a bake off, had a presentation with a, the whole marketing team got to, got to pepper with questions. And it was, it was two amazing candidates at the finish line. And we just, we, we, we all felt good about the, the process. It was, you, you couldn’t have ended it probably better. I love it. I love that. And

SIMMONS:

I didn’t even help you with that, so I’m very proud of you,

VANNOY:

<Laugh>. Thanks Mary. Hey, last, last topic. Let’s just talk a little bit about how to interpret questions. Excuse me, answers to questions. You know, been doing this a long time. A lot of times salespeople are fantastic because they’re just, they’re used to talking in, in spinning. And these behavioral questions are really great at, at, at getting to the real meat, right? And, and forcing them to, to, to give real examples of performance. The, the flip side, you could have just an absolute brilliant engineer who is an introvert and just sucks <laugh> on, on, on in video or on the phone and, and, and, and has a hard time getting the words out. Knowing that such a huge spectrum of jobs and personality types, what, what could you give our audience in, you know, in a few minutes here how to, how to think about interpreting answers from candidates?

SIMMONS:

So the, the, the bottom line is probably not good news for everybody, but after 30 years, I still can interview somebody higher than think they’re gonna be great and, and they don’t work out, right? So we’re dealing with people here. So you know, there’s really no surefire way to be positive that we’re hiring the best candidate. That being said I think that one time I was giving interviewing training and one of the managers was caught up on how do you know if they’re lying? Just kept coming back to how do you know if you’re lying? And that kind of speaks to this. And what I will say is you want to ask, if you’re not sure that the answer you got was the best answer or something about it didn’t sound right, you ask that you rephrase that question and ask it again.

And if you’re still not satisfied, you ask it a third time, right? And that, and you just keep doing a deep dive into that question and that answer, right? Yeah. We’ve gone so far as to say not sure I understand exactly your sales process. So if you could, what I’d really like you to do after the interview is send me back just a short paragraph of what your sales process is. Because in the interview we weren’t convinced that they had a process. Ask the question two times, maybe three times, and the process wasn’t clear. So we’ve done things, things like that. So interpreting the questions, if you feel uncomfortable with the answer, I think transparency is the best way. Mike, I’m not really sure what you meant by that answer. Let me rephrase the question and see if we, if I can understand you better.

Yeah. You don’t wanna insult the person and say, it sounds like you’re lying. And truly, you may not understand what they said, you know, their, their explanation. But I would be transparent. And then the other thing that I would do is try to ask that question more than once. And when it comes to interviewing, our recommendation is we give the interviewers an interview sheet. And you say, right up front in the process we teach our employers is you say, Mike, as we sit down, the first thing I’m gonna do is go over the job that you’re gonna come into, give you a job preview, and then I’m gonna ask you some questions. And at the end, I’m gonna give you time to ask, answer, ask me questions, and I’m gonna tell you next steps. Okay? Tell them what the process is, and then you say, I hope it’s okay with you.

I’m gonna type some notes, or I’m gonna write some notes about what you’re saying. Is that okay? Right. Get their buy-in right away. Let them know what your process is. Once you have those, those answers written down, you’re on unpacking that with everybody else who is interviewed, the person. That’s why you’re writing them down. Right? be careful. Again, we coach everybody to be careful about what they write. Right? We’re not writing anything discriminatory in those notes. Right. So that helps you now get together. You and I interviewed the same person, or, and we bring everybody together and say, well, how’d they answer this question for you? They answered it this way for me. Right. We’re looking for inconsistencies again. Yeah. Yeah. Or consistencies, right? Yeah. They, they nailed this.

VANNOY:

One of the things that I just highly recommend and, and another teaser for behavioral interviewing is Yes. Tell me about a time when, and so may, may maybe you’re trying to understand how they handle stress. Tell me about a time that was really stressful. What, what was the situation? How did you handle it? What was the outcome? Well, you know, my, usually when I’m in certain super stressful situations, I, and you can’t let it go. Like it don’t, don’t waste the five minutes of them rambling. Just stop. I’m gonna interrupt you start, Mary, I apologize for interrupting you. I know I’m putting you on the spot here. I really do want to hear a specific time when this happened to you. I’ll, I’ll, I’ll wait. I don’t want to let you to feel pressured, but tell me about a specific time I’ve had to interrupt candidates. One and two and sometimes three times. If they do more than three times, the interview’s probably about over <laugh>. Cuz I don’t actually have those stories, therefore, competencies to share with you. But, but I, I think I would coach people, don’t be afraid to politely interrupt and reframe the candidate, or I love you were, you were much nicer in your approach. Said, you know what? I don’t know if I quite understood that. Could you, could you add some more details to that please?

SIMMONS:

Right. But I like your approach too. And I’ve had the same exact situation. And again, what am I, what, when we do the training, I say to the, to the managers, I say, what are you gleaning from that? Right? Everybody’s had a stressful situation but this person not being able to recall that quickly. Maybe they haven’t had as many stressful situations, or maybe they don’t deal with them well, or maybe they’re ju their recall isn’t great. Like, so what are we gleaning from their responses? Right? So being able to interpret those responses, you know, whether they’re truthful or not. After you become a little bit more experienced in interviewing, you’ll probably get better at it, but nobody’s perfect, right? I still make mistakes and I, I do this for a living, right? Because we’re dealing with human beings. And so they can make a mistake and accept the position and not, and think it’s right for them and it’s not. But that, that job preview and making them feel comfortable marketing the position, telling them the why is gonna go a really long way to putting you in sync with that candidate. And when I say in sync, it doesn’t mean that they’re going to accept the position. It means they’re going to understand what they’re getting into and say, yes, I can do this, or No, I can’t do it. And that helps you.

VANNOY:

Yeah. Yeah. Very good. Mary. I think that’s an awesome place to, to wrap. We could go on forever here. I think there’s certainly, we’re gonna do a follow up here on behavioral interviewing. There’s probably four or five others that spinoffs we can do this discussion, but I, but I think this added a lot of value. This this is super helpful, so thank you. Can, can you just share, I, i I, I want today’s show to add value to anybody watching or listening in and of itself, but 15 to 20 seconds. What, what is it that Asure does, what does your team do specifically to help small and mid-size companies deal with these issues?

SIMMONS:

So this is such an important issue, right? And we talked about compliance, but like you said, I can’t get into great detail because there’s so many exceptions, and that’s where we help. Everything we do in the HR services is customized to the organization. We also give all of our clients an HR compliance library. So not only am I doing customized training with the managers so that they interview for your organization specifically, right? We know what the employment brand is. I share that and help the managers articulate it. I help them write their job preview, right? They shouldn’t be, you know, just saying it off the top of their head. That should be prepared. So we are in this strategic interviewing from the very beginning, helping them with everything, even that job description, right? That, that we need to have. And then we also have that compliance library where you can build your interview questions, where you can build your job description, where you can come up with a salary survey to find out what we should be paying that candidate, right?

So we didn’t talk about some of the specific in, in the states in New York and California. You can’t ask what their last salary was. You can’t ask about criminal history, right? Except in extreme situations, right? So there are so many specifics, Mike, that in this setting, you and I can’t do much. But when I’m one-on-one with the client, I am helping them with their industry, their states that they’re in, their managers, their particular organization to train the managers, figure out the interview structure, process questions, right? And how to make the best decisions for their organization.

VANNOY:

Mary, you’re awesome. Your team’s awesome, and anybody who wants help, there’s a survey at the end of this show. Let us know if you want us to get, get in contact and Mary can help your team with interviewing behavioral questions, but also just basic compliance sexual harassment training how to attract and build reliable teams and have a handbook that helps you run a better organization there. The, the, the topics. Keep going. Mary, I always enjoy talking to you and I always learn from you. So thanks for your time.

SIMMONS:

Thank you Mike.

VANNOY:

And thanks to everybody else. We will see you next week.