Search Results for “interviewing”

Interviewing for Hard and Soft Skills: The Alchemy of Finding the Right Fit

Monday, May 15th, 2023|

When interviewing, it’s not enough to focus solely on hard skills and experience when evaluating candidates. Soft skills play a crucial role in identifying the right fit for a position. In this article, we’ll explore the importance of incorporating both hard and soft skills in the interview process and provide tips for asking insightful questions to assess candidates effectively.

Interviewing is an art that combines detective work, psychology, chemistry, and salesmanship.

Detective work requires that we ask insightful questions, learn about a candidate’s expertise, look at past work history, and put the pieces of their career trajectory together.
Psychology helps us unearth a candidate’s motivations, goals, likes, dislikes, and future aspirations.
Chemistry encompasses how we connect as humans. Do we feel a sense of connection, of belonging, inclusion, and how do we relate to one another with authenticity and empathy.
A dose of salesmanship ensures that we can highlight the opportunity we are hiring for well and sell the features and benefits of working for our firm. Afterall, as much as we are interviewing the candidate, they too are interviewing us as a potential boss, and our company as a potential next right career step.

Traditional interviews often prioritize a candidate’s hard skills, such as technical expertise, certifications, and years of experience. While these qualifications are important, they only paint part of the picture. In creative fields, for example, proficiency in tools like Adobe Creative Suite, Figma, or After Effects is essential, along with data-driven metrics and ROI. However, soft skills such as empathy, connection, and adaptability are equally vital.

Soft skills align with culture fit, values, communication skills, and overall compatibility with the team. Assessing these skills requires asking situational questions that delve into empathy, emotional intelligence, conflict resolution, and problem-solving abilities. Some sample questions for soft skill interviewing include:

Share a time when you successfully diffused a misunderstanding between two colleagues.
Describe a situation where you rallied your team members to accomplish a task.
How do you handle change and unexpected interruptions?
Can you explain your approach to prioritizing and planning your day?
Provide an example of fostering a sense of belonging and teamwork among your peers.
What leadership qualities do you admire most about yourself or your current boss?
How did you appease an upset client?

While hard skills can be acquired through various educational resources, assessing a candidate’s cognitive and emotional intelligence, as well as their field expertise, requires a holistic approach. By incorporating both hard and soft-skill interviewing techniques, recruiters and hiring managers can gain a comprehensive understanding of a candidate’s capabilities.

To conduct effective interviews, it’s crucial to listen actively to candidates’ responses, ask follow-up questions, and observe their body language and communication style. This approach ensures a thorough evaluation and helps identify candidates who possess the right blend of technical and interpersonal skills.

Interviewing for hard and soft skills is indeed alchemy and requires a balanced approach.

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Storytelling and Interviewing

Wednesday, June 5th, 2019|

If you’ve spent any slice of time searching for a job, you’ve probably experienced this. At some point in a typical job interview, often right at the top, your interviewer will say, “tell me about yourself.”

Technically, this isn’t a question, it’s a prompt. It puts you on the spot. It can be intimidating!

However, with the right preparation – along with dashes of confidence, enthusiasm, and self-awareness – “tell me about yourself” can be your opportunity to shine.

In preparation for this inevitable inquiry, here are a few ideas to keep in mind.

Tell Your Story

Intrigue your interviewer, engage their interest, and make them want to learn more about you – make use of your storytelling skills. Go on a journey, from the moment you realized your professional passion, through the experiences that honed your skills, to the conversation at hand and the opportunity currently in front of you. Explain how you’ve grown and evolved, and share anecdotes that support your big idea (e.g., “I’m curious,” “I’m an enthusiastic collaborator,” or “I’m a shameless data geek.”). Some classic storytelling structures used by great writers can serve as outlines for your own tale of inspiration, perseverance, and success.

Show Some Personality

Refer to your hobbies and the unique life experiences you’ve had. If it seems appropriate, you can even sprinkle in a bit of self-effacing humor. With the human element in play, the “tell me about yourself” portion of your interview can help you stand out and determine whether you’ll be a match for this team and its culture.

Specificity Kills Ambiguity

When you can, talk about your experience in terms of quantifiable accomplishments. “I had a job in digital marketing” makes less of an impression than “I led a Facebook ad campaign that grew my company’s email list by 300% in Q1 of 2019.” Similarly, when you talk about your personal qualities, use pictures, sounds, and feelings – this will give you an edge over competing candidates who lean on vague generalities, superlatives, and played-out jargon.

Cut to the Chase

You should avoid rambling and be able to comfortably wrap up your answer within 60-90 seconds. For practice, write out your answer, read it aloud, and cut anything that’s awkward or inessential. To get things moving quickly, hook your interviewer with your very first sentence.

Make It Relevant

“Always relate your answer directly to the job in question,” says Coach Tracy of The Career Launcher. “Tie your answer directly to the mission of the role and the challenges that typically are dealt with by job holders, and try to differentiate yourself with evidence of your skills for the job.”

Your interviewers want to be convinced that you’re right, as they need to know you’re the perfect match for this particular job. Whenever you tell your story, include variations each time to align with the details of the job description, the specific needs of the company, and how your skills and experience apply to the opportunity you’re applying for.

Spin the Table

Career coach Liz Ryan introduces “spinning the table,” a sophisticated method for transitioning out of your own story and into the substance of the interview, specifically your interviewer’s pain points, which you can then address. Answer your interviewer’s question, then ask them a question in turn. “You aren’t asking questions just for fun,” says Ryan. “You want to find out what the job is really about… You want to find out where the pain is because once you’ve got the hiring manager talking about their pain, the conversation can go to a completely different place.”

At Artisan Creative, we place creative, marketing, and digital talent with the companies and opportunities that will give them a chance to do their best work and live their best lives. Contact us today and let our a.team find your dream team.

We hope you’ve enjoyed the 534^th issue of the a.blog.

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6 Tips for Interviewing Creatives

Wednesday, June 7th, 2017|

Artisan Creative is celebrating 20+ years in staffing and recruitment of creative professionals. Over the years, we’ve learned a thing or two that we’d like to share with you. We hope you enjoy the 428th issue of our weekly a.blog.

Preparing for an interview is a two-way street that requires both parties to be present and engaged in the conversation.

In previous blogs, we highlighted general best practices for interviewers such as active listening techniques. As interviewers, we must set the stage and tone of the interview to reflect our company culture and team dynamic.

Interviewing and hiring creatives adds an additional layer of intricacy since the portfolio plays a key role in the dialog. Here are some important skills that interviewers can practice when looking to interview and hire creative candidates.

●Smile A welcoming smile is worth more than 1000 words.

●Prepare As interviewers, it’s our responsibility to be prepared for the meeting by reviewing the candidate’s resume and portfolio in advance and crafting targeted questions to learn more about them, the projects they’ve worked on, and build better rapport. Take notes beforehand to keep things on track and stay upbeat and positive.

●Listen Active listening is essential to getting the information you need. Make eye contact with the candidate and listen to their tone – as well as their words. The best creative work is often a result of successful communication – make sure you get the most out of your conversations with candidates.

●Ask open-ended questions Questions that start with “How”, “What” or “Can you explain” are generally more useful than “yes or no” questions when interviewing for creative roles. Open-ended questions allow candidates to tell stories about their experience, and ideas. Ask about the candidate’s design thinking and creative problem-solving process to get a better sense of their conceptual skills.

●Keep track of time Always leave time in an interview to address any questions the candidate might have about your company and the role. This will give you some insight about what’s important to them. You can often learn more from the questions candidates ask than from any other aspect of the interview.

●Arrange next steps If an interview goes well and you think you have the right person on the other side of the desk, say so. Enlighten them on the state of your interview process and set up a second interview with other hiring authorities or team members, as needed.

If the interview did not go well – or it’s too early in the process to determine a fit – let the candidate know when a decision will be made. Transparency around your hiring process helps keep candidates engaged. If a candidate isn’t a good fit, letting them down gently gives an opening to pursue other opportunities that they might be better suited for.

Hiring a new team member makes a huge difference to the future of your business. If you have questions around these high performing priorities, you can always ask an expert. At Artisan Creative, we are experts in interviewing creatives. Happy to help you with your next hire.

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Your Interviewing Style

Wednesday, March 2nd, 2016|

Just like no two snowflakes are alike, no two interviews are exactly the same. That being said, there are several archetypes of interviewers. Personality, company culture, and interview style play a big role in how a job interview goes, and there are many things that can contribute to a good or bad interview, such as whether the candidate is prepared, reading body language, and sussing out if they are indeed qualified for the position. But you — and the candidate — can help each other have a successful interview by knowing what type of interviewer you are.

The Talkative Interviewer

You’re friendly and warm! You love talking about the company you love working for and have a lot to say about the position. You may also have a lot to say…in general. Toe the line between gregarious and chatty by keeping your guard up. Let the candidate do more of the talking, and be an active listener. The more they talk, the more you’ll be able to determine if they’re really a good fit for the team.

The Inquisitive Interviewer

You feel that the best way to get to know people is to ask questions. You’re likely to ask a candidate about aspects of their life beyond their career accomplishments or future goals. Some personal questions are fine to ask. For instance, if they made a personal connection to your company’s work in their cover letter, it’s fine to explore this. However, you should never ask any questions that could be construed as inappropriate or make someone feel uncomfortable. If they’re a good fit for the company, you’ll get to know them better later.

The Questioning Interviewer

You like to get down to business. You don’t just ask a lot of questions — you ask them rapidly and expect the candidate to fire back just as quickly. While you may feel this is an efficient form of interviewing, your candidate may find it a little intimidating. Switch up the pace of the interview and allow them time to formulate thoughtful answers.

The “Follows the Script” Interviewer

You’re fair and objective. You also have a job to do, and that job is to find the best new hire for the team. You have a pre-set list of questions you ask, and you don’t deviate too much from the script. While it may help you keep the candidates straight, be prepared for someone you’re interviewing to talk at length on one subject, or demonstrate passion for a specific achievement. Let the flow of discourse shift when necessary — you may find that by doing so, you find your next hire faster!

The Busy Interviewer

You have a LOT on your plate. You’re leading the team, taking care of projects, answering emails — maybe you don’t even really care that much about being a part of the interview process. But the candidate might be nervous, and not feigning interest in the interview can come off as rude. Try to set aside any distractions and listen to them, especially because they could very well be working for you soon.

The Funny Interviewer

You’re a joker. You like to have fun and laugh, and you want a team that does the same. Yet sarcasm or jokes might cross the line. An anxious candidate might not know how to react to your humor, or even share it. Try to focus on their resume, and if you think they’re too serious, then you can make another choice later.

The New Interviewer

You’re fairly new to the company or your team. In fact, this might be the first time you’ve had the responsibility of hiring someone! But being new means you don’t have the same level of experience as other folks. Prepare in advance of the interview. Have a list of questions ready and their resume printed out for reference. Think of what questions they may ask you about the job or company, and have replies ready for them.

Are you looking for talent at your company? Tell us what you’re looking for so we can help!

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Episode 7: The Follow Up

Tuesday, November 28th, 2023|

Now that you’ve completed the necessary interviews and have the feedback you need, let’s move to The Follow-up phase.

The expectation generally is for a candidate to follow up by a sending thank you email following the interview. If you are truly interested in a candidate or want to differentiate your company, why not take the lead instead and send a thank you to the candidate for their time, and let them know when to expect a follow-up from you?

If you choose not to move forward with a candidate you must have an empathic way to give feedback or let them know that you are not moving forward with them–especially to your runner-up candidates. Remember that they have invested time and effort (and heart) in applying and interviewing with you. Your follow-up here is a way to continue to validate your employer brand and continue to build trust—even if that relationship is not progressing further.

However, you want to build emotional equity to quickly reconnect with your 2^nd place, or 3^rd place finishers at a future time. This way when similar roles open up in the future, and your runner-ups are still on the job market, you can quickly reconnect and hire and reduce your recruitment efforts considerably.

Once your ideal candidate moves to the final stage, your process should include conducting reference checks and background checks. If you are working with a recruitment agency, they will take care of this, however, if you are handling the full cycle of hiring internally, ensure that you are connecting with previous supervisors and colleagues about your candidate’s technical and interpersonal skills.

When all the processes are done, and your offer has been extended and accepted, it’s time to celebrate and set the plans in motion for welcoming your new hire to the team.

Let’s do a Pulse Check

What is your process for rejecting a candidate empathetically?

How do you stay in touch with your runner-up candidates?

Watch the previous episodes in this series:

Episode 0: Introduction

Episode 1: Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

Episode 2: Writing Impactful Job Descriptions

Episode 3: Recruitment & Sourcing Strategy

Episode 4: The Candidate Experience

Episode 5: The Interview Mindset

Episode 6: Interview Timing

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Episode 6 : Interview Timing

Friday, November 17th, 2023|

At this stage of the game, you have set clear expectations for the role, you’ve written an amazing job description, prepared before and during the interview, and had your first interview with a candidate.

Now it’s decision time and time to choose whether that candidate is a good fit and ready to move to the next stage, or not.

It’s only natural that you may want input from other stakeholders to help you with the decision. You may feel a second or third interview and perspective is needed before you can make an offer.

If that is the case, then be mindful that your candidate may have other interviews scheduled elsewhere too. And if your decision-making process takes too long, you may risk losing your candidate to timing.

I am a fan of including key stakeholders in interviews. Remember that your candidate is also interviewing your company, so a couple of interviews with other stakeholders will give them additional insight into the culture, team environment, and product.

However, be mindful of the intention of multiple interviews, the impression it can leave, and the impact it may have.

Time is a valuable asset for everyone—including your candidate. The days when candidates had to jump through multiple hoops to show their interest in a job are over. Today, companies have to do the same.

So without clear and open communication, a lengthy interview cycle can imply that you are not serious about a hire, or are indecisive, or that you have doubts about their candidacy, and that their time is not valuable. This is not the way to build trust.

So please set expectations with the candidate upfront, or if working with a recruitment firm let them know what the interview process in your company is like, so they can inform their candidate ahead of time.

A simple statement can set the tone: “Our process includes X interviews with Y stakeholders. We value your time and promise an expeditious yet thorough process to give us both a strong sense of connection, understanding and requirements.

If multiple rounds of interviews are necessary, or assessments are required, please find out where the candidate is in their interviewing journey with other companies. Are they awaiting an offer, or have they just begun their job search?

Be ready to pivot and adjust your approach if you really like this candidate and they are your front-runner.

In our experience, we have had situations when a client was really excited about a candidate, but other stakeholders in the decision-making process were unable to conduct the follow-up interview for a couple of weeks due to vacations, tradeshows, and other deadlines….and during that time, the candidate accepted another offer.

Don’t lose your top candidate to TIMING. Create a process for fluidity. If needed, conduct multiple interviews on the same day or if multiple days are needed, then

make the interview a priority, and clear your and any other stakeholders’ calendars so everyone is committed to continuing the process smoothly without unnecessary delay.

If hiring is truly a priority….make it be one.

Let’s do a Pulse Check

Can you make interviewing a priority at your company?

How many rounds of interviewing do you need before a decision is made?

Who are all the stakeholders that need to be part of the decision-making?

Watch the previous episodes in this series:

Episode 0: Introduction

Episode 1: Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

Episode 2: Writing Impactful Job Descriptions

Episode 3: Recruitment & Sourcing Strategy

Episode 4: The Candidate Experience

Episode 5: The Interview Mindset

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Episode 5 – Interview Mindset (IQ, EQ & AQ)

Saturday, November 11th, 2023|

By this point in the hiring process, you’ve spent lots of time and resources to set up your employer brand, write your job description, review incoming resumes, and now you are finally ready to invite a handful of candidates to an interview.

No matter what route you take to get here, make sure your energy tank is full when you meet your prospective interviewee.

Make sure you are present, you are focused, prepared, and in the right interviewing mindset. Also, it’s key to allow each interviewee to shine on their own merit, and not let any history of previous bad hires impact this new person and this new opportunity.

It’s imperative that you or your lead interviewer are not tired, hungry, or rushed and instead are at your best to represent your brand in the proper way and make a good impression.

If your hiring mindset is wrong, it can lead to a wrong hire!

Interviewing is both an art and a skill and it involves curiosity, empathy, and authenticity to become a skillful interviewer. In order to conduct your most perfect interview, consider the following pointers to transform your interviewing mindset.

The perfect interview starts with

Your preparation
Managing your energy
How do you build rapport
Staying present and focused
Creating engagement
Create a true human connection
And building trust

Skilled interviewers have an equal balance of questions to determine IQ, EQ & AQ.

IQ-focused interview questions as about technical skills and expertise, certifications, education, awards, and the specifics of how to do the required tasks.

And while skills-based questions are critical in assessing a candidate’s ability to do the job right, they only paint a partial picture of overall fit within the company.

Equally vital are the interpersonal skills and emotional intelligence (EQ) of a candidate, which reviews alignment, culture fit, values, communication skills, and overall compatibility within the team.

Add to the mix an opportunity to assess for AQ, or adaptability quotient that highlights a candidate’s ability to handle change, leadership, decision-making, stress-management skills, and navigating the unknown!

This can be extremely valuable if you are launching a new product, are a start-up, or going through some changes within your organization or if all your processes and SOPs are not quite solid.

Assessing EQ and AQ skills requires asking open-ended, values-based, and situational interview questions which enable you to delve into a prospective candidate’s empathy, conflict resolution, and problem-solving capabilities.

Open-ended questions also allow your candidate to dive deeper into a topic and expand their answers, highlight their reasoning, thought processing, and communication skills

For example, you can glean so much information by asking:

Share a time when you successfully diffused a misunderstanding between two colleagues.
Provide an example of fostering a sense of belonging and teamwork among your peers.
What leadership qualities do you admire most about yourself or your current boss?

Values-based questions tie the interview questions back to your company’s values.

For example, if your company’s core value is Agility, then a line of questions that focus on agility will give you a glimpse into how that core value shows up for your candidate:

Tell me more about when you had to juggle multiple projects.
How do you handle change and unexpected interruptions?
Can you explain your approach to prioritizing and planning your day?

If Accountability is your company’s core value, then ask:

What do deadlines mean to you, and how do they impact teamwork?
How do you motivate yourself to stay accountable and achieve your tasks?
Describe a situation where you rallied your team members to accomplish a task.

While hard skills can be acquired or taught through various educational resources, assessing a candidate’s cognitive and emotional intelligence requires that you actively listen, be present, and be focused.

Asking follow-up questions, and observing their body language and communication style. This approach ensures a thorough evaluation and helps identify candidates who possess the right blend of technical as well as interpersonal skills that may align with your company culture.

Let’s do a Pulse Check

How are you currently interviewing for IQ, EQ, and AQ?

Watch the previous episodes in this series:

Episode 0: Introduction

Episode 1: Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

Episode 2: Writing Impactful Job Descriptions

Episode 3: Recruitment & Sourcing Strategy

Episode 4: The Candidate Experience

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Episode 1: Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

Monday, September 25th, 2023|

In his book” The Speed of Trust” Stephen R. Covey says “Trust is the one thing that changes everything.”

In Hiring, building trusted relationships starts before the recruitment and interviewing phases begin.

It starts with the preparation you do before you set out to hire that builds trust sets the stage for WHY a candidate chooses your company instead of a competitor’s.

In any hiring climate, You want to be a candidate’s First choice and highlight WHY joining your company is a good career move for them.

Not only are YOU interviewing a potential candidate, THEY are also interviewing YOUR firm, and in that vain they are reviewing YOU, and checking out your company’s reputation.

It is no longer a one-way responsibility on the candidate’s shoulders to promote their skills, YOU have to do the same.

What prospective candidates learn about your firm via your digital presence helps establish your employer brand and builds trust between your company and their decision to apply. Clarifying your purpose, identifying your values, and highlighting your culture, and being a subject matter expert in your industry builds trust with applicants.

Building trust includes the communication you have with them from the time they apply, throughout the interview phase to the final step of an offer.

Trust is also built (or broken) in how you lead, how you give feedback, how you interview, and how you,= as a leader, show up.

I am going to ask you more questions to get you thinking about “why”…..

You don’t need to have the answers now….this is to transform the hiring mindset. There is a worksheet in the resources section to work on this when you are ready.

Trust is a critical component here and ties right into why you are hiring now:

Why is this role open?

Is it because of growth?
Or is it because of attrition?

If it’s because of growth:
Are you hiring because your workload is too much and your team is already tapped?

Or is your team missing key skillsets to address the new work?
Is it to offload some of the things that you are doing yourself that you just don’t want to be doing anymore?
Is there an influx of projects, however, you don’t have enough staff to be able to handle them, or are deadlines being missed or opportunities being lost?

However, if it’s for attrition:

Did an employee leave?
Or did you let somebody go?

These are very different questions to ponder and the answers may shed light on a deeper issue to address with the next hire:

If somebody left:

Why did they leave?
Was there a cultural nuance that you need to be aware of?
A team dynamic or leadership issue to be aware of?
Was it because of salary/benefits?
Did they leave for a better opportunity? What does that mean? And how can you message and build trust that they can grow and flourish right here and that your workplace is that better opportunity?

Or did you let somebody go?

Why was that?
What was missing in how they did their job?
What was missing in their technical or communication skills?

Contemplating these questions will help you determine what your team needs now, who will be the right candidate, and how your employer brand is perceived… then start building trust with your messaging as you embark on the hiring journey.

Let’s do a Pulse Check

What does your employer brand convey?
Can an applicant get a sense of your culture from your digital presence?
How is trust established via your online communication?

What the previous episodes in this series:

Introduction

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Introduction : Transforming Your Hiring Mindset

Saturday, September 9th, 2023|

Do you remember your first job interview and how you felt?

I did. I was excited. I was prepared. I even bought myself a new outfit. And I was confident that I was just going to ace that interview.

However, things changed when the interviewer showed up …late, unprepared, rushed… and then grilled me question after question without creating any space for me to ask my questions. And then they cut the interview short because they had to run to their next meeting.

The irony is, I did get an offer from them after all, and turned them down, and instead accepted another position and ended up staying at that job for close to 10 years.

That first interview was 30 some years ago, and I still remember the feeling I walked away with. Unheard.

And perhaps that’s why I am here with you. A seed was planted that grew into a passion that both the candidate and the hiring company have a win-win relationship.

For the past few decades, my team and I have worked with hundreds of companies and business owners on their recruitment objectives and have gathered great insight into when interviewing and hiring go well, and when they don’t.

Whether you have an in-house HR and recruitment team, work with an outside recruitment agency, or you yourself are reviewing all those incoming resumes, there are several critical steps to implement throughout the hiring process to create success and become a skillful interviewer.

Usually, we expect the candidate to come prepared, be open, be engaged, have high energy, and be communicative. We want them to not only have researched the role, know about our company, and be enthusiastic, we want them to want the job!

Today, we are going to flip the script and focus on us as the business owner, hiring manager, or department head who maybe deciding when it is the time to hire, or greenlighting the budget and salary, or perhaps conducting the first or final interview.

This series is divided into the 3 phases of hiring to transform the hiring mindset and set the stage for a successful hiring practice that will set you apart from your competitors. The three phases are:

The Preparation required before interviewing & hiring can begin
The Process for set-up, and follow-up on applicants and interviewees
The Presence of mind is needed during the interview and onboarding.

Together we will review the importance of establishing trust in your employer brand, writing impactful job descriptions, becoming a skillful interviewer, and creating follow-up procedures to transform your hiring practice.

So, let’s start at the beginning of the hiring journey before you decide to hire!

Enjoy the first of our 9-part series.

Katty Douraghy | President | Artisan Creative

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Bringing Our Whole Self to Work

Monday, April 10th, 2023|

I decided to repost this article that I had originally written in 2021 because this past year has reaffirmed that as hiring managers we must encourage interviewing and meeting candidates with empathy and authenticity. There are gaps in many resumes these days. Before rejecting a candidate because their resume has gaps, or it seems they have job hopped, can we pause and ask why to learn more? These have been hard times for many. Layoffs are a reality. Short freelance stints are a reality. Covid and its emotional and financial repercussions are a reality.

Can we connect on a human level with one another?

This is my story:

When people hear that I’ve written a book, they generally assume that I’ve written about recruiting, human resources, or the culture of creativity. After all, with over 20+ years of experience in the creative recruitment field, it’s an expected assumption.

When they learn that my book, The Butterfly Years, is actually about the journey from grief toward hope, a puzzled look crosses their brows, expressing an initial surprise that I share so vulnerably my experience of loss and grief.

You may wonder, what does that have to do with my business? What’s the connection? Well, writing the book had absolutely nothing to do with my business and has everything to do with my business… because it has everything to do with me.

I choose to bring my whole self to my business.

In the book, Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations, Frédéric Laloux explores the concept of new organizations (Teal Organizations) where management and teams focus on creating a culture where the whole self comes to work.

My whole self has dealt with grief this past decade, including the loss of both my parents and step-parents. I wrote about grief because it was hard for me to concentrate, stay focused, or even remain positive. I worked hard to hide what was happening inside. Of course, I did not let candidates or clients, or even my team, get a glimpse at what was truly happening to me on the inside at that time. I thought that I needed to fake it so I could make it. I was wrong.

Over the past ten years, I’ve learned the importance of being true to myself, being authentic, and encourage genuineness from those around me, professionally and personally.

So this is a request to all the hiring managers and recruiters who are interviewing right now. Everyone, every single candidate that you connect with, is more than their LinkedIn profile. They are so much more than what you see on their resume. It’s key to learning more about a candidate’s interests and passions, about their core values, aspirations, and motivations.

As you interview new candidates or manage existing ones, ask yourself who is the “whole self” that you’re interviewing and meet them where they are with empathy and authenticity.

Katty Douraghy

President, Artisan Creative

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