Thread: Job Interviews

Scenario:

Paper screened Job candidate pool that is composed of candidates that have known members of the interview commitee for several years (because some of the candidates are lomg-time and current employees applying for a job opening within the company) as well as other candidates that have never met the interviewers.

Interviewers are instructed by HR to pretend and act as though they do not know any of the candidates (well, especially the current employees that they actually do know) and to disregard any commendations/ job performance that they may be aware of.

Likewise, current employees interviewing for the job are expected (but not told) to pretend that they do not know any of the interview panel and to "sell" themselves to the panel. Other candidates, the ones that actually do not know any of the interviewers, are obviously not expected to pretend anything since they actually do not know the interviewers.

Additional information:

One candidate, who is a current employee for over a decade and has multiple commendations, has known one of the 4 interviewers for 12 years and two others (one of which is that employees current immediate supervisor and the hiring manager) for approximately 3-5 years. Also, that same candidate is currently working interim in the position being interviewed for, for over 6 months without incident.

Results:

The candidate mentioned above (the current interim who knows and works with most of the panel) is rejected and not recommended to proceed to second interview due to "under-selling" and not impressing the interview panel despite answering all interview questions adequately. And, a new hire, still on probation and competing for the job, is advanced ahead of that veteran. Oh, and this new hire also happens to be female, under 40, and LGBT. Don't know if that's a significant factor or not. Just sayin'

Question:

Does something seem fishy about the above?