Screening the Candidates
Criteria for Screening
To prepare for its initial screening of the
candidates, the committee must first agree on the criteria it will use for the
evaluation. These must, of course, be consistent with the qualifications stated in the
position announcement.
Rating Form
In order to insure that all committee members are adhering to
the same set of criteria as they review the applications, the committee should create a
form to be utilized in the review process. This form should provide space to write in
basic information about the candidate, such as name, current position and location,
academic discipline, and highest earned degree (including the year and the institution
that conferred it).
The criteria should be listed individually on the form, with a place next to each for the reviewer to indicate a rating for the candidate on that criterion followed by a space for comments. To simplify the subsequent reporting of the committee's evaluations of each candidate to the university's Affirmative Action Office, the committee should agree on a rating scale to be used in this review. It's also helpful for the reviewer to indicate at the bottom of the rating form his or her initial impression of the candidate in terms of degree of interest in considering that person further; categories such as "high interest," "mild interest," and "no interest" may be useful in this regard. (See Appendix A for an example of an initial screening form that, with appropriate modifications for specific positions, has been used in administrative searches at Iowa State.)
Retention of Notes
Each committee member should retain his or her notes on
the individual candidates until the search process is completed and the appointment is
made.
Candidate Files
Individual candidate files should be numbered, either
alphabetically or in order of receipt of the applications. The latter has the advantage
of making it easier for the members to know which files they have read at a given point,
although it will be easier to discuss the candidates individually at committee meetings
if they are organized alphabetically. The person managing the files should have a method
of keeping track of which members have read which files, perhaps by simply having each
member initial the file as he or she finishes reading it.
Initial Review of Files
Ideally, all committee members should review all
files, since the members presumably were chosen for the diverse perspectives they bring
to the search. If, however, the number of applications is quite large, the committee may
decide to divide them among subgroups for the initial review. Those candidates in which
all members of the subgroup have no interest can be eliminated, and all committee members
can then read the files of those that remain.
Mid-Term Evaluation of Progress
Midway through the application period, it
may be helpful to hold a committee meeting to evaluate whether the search process is
generating an adequate number of applications as well as a sufficiently diverse applicant
pool. Based on this analysis, the committee members may decide to take additional steps
to expand and otherwise improve the pool, such as by making phone calls to colleagues at
other institutions, enlisting the help of local colleagues, etc. The committee may also
decide to extend the deadline in order to re-evaluate the position announcement or to
consider additional outlets in which it could be placed. In evaluating the pool, however,
the committee should bear in mind that the rate of application submissions - if not
necessarily their diversity - is likely to increase as the deadline approaches.
The Initial Screening
The Screening Meeting
The purpose of the initial screening meeting is to
consider all candidates who meet the minimum advertised requirements and select those
that the committee is interested in pursuing further. Advertised requirements that have
been designated as "desirable" or "preferred" should only be applied to applicants who
first meet the minimum requirements. The screening of applicants against job-related
desirable or preferred characteristics should be documented thoroughly for each
candidate.
The candidates who survive the initial screening should be those that the committee believes have the potential to be selected for the position. Those eliminated at this point should not include anyone who might be brought back into the pool later.
Eliminating Candidates
The committee's first task is to eliminate those
candidates in whom there is little, if any, interest. Rather than discussing each
candidate initially, the committee may find it more efficient to simply conduct a "show
of hands" on the candidates sequentially, with each member indicating whether he or she
has any interest in considering that person as a candidate. (Committee members may be
more comfortable if they are initially allowed to indicate mild vs. strong interest,
although eventually those categories will have to be merged to determine which candidates
are to be advanced to the next round.)
The committee members should agree in advance of the poll as to the number of "yes" votes that will be needed to warrant discussion of a candidate. Presumably those candidates in whom no member has an interest can be eliminated without discussion, but perhaps those with a minimum of two positive votes, or perhaps even one vote, are worthy of some discussion. Typically the committee member who is alone in his or her support of a given candidate will decide to withdraw that support and the candidate can be quickly eliminated, but it should be understood that any candidate that a committee member wants to have discussed should be discussed.
Discussion of Candidates
It will also become evident, as a result of the
initial straw poll, that certain candidates have very strong - perhaps even unanimous -
support at that point, and will require little discussion with respect to continuation
into the next round. Therefore, the discussion at this meeting can center on those
candidates about whom there is mixed opinion or about whom the members are uncertain.
Sometimes this uncertainty is due to a lack of certain critical information, which can be
obtained from a call to the candidate or through the reference checks that will be made
next.
Semi-Finalists Selected
The goal of this meeting is to determine which of
the candidates generate enough interest on the part of the committee members to warrant
further exploration. Although there is no firm number to be targeted, it should be such
as to be manageable during the next phase of the review - the reference checks. This
suggests that the committee should aim for somewhere between ten and fifteen
"semi-finalists," which usually turns out to be an attainable goal. In some searches, the
hiring officer will ask for the opportunity to review the "semi-finalists" before the
committee proceeds further. Usually, however, the committee is expected to continue the
review process until it arrives at its recommendation of the persons to be invited to the
campus for visits.
Notification of Status
As a courtesy, those candidates who are eliminated in
the first screening should be notified immediately of their status. Ordinarily this is
done by a letter from the person to whom the application was originally submitted. It's
usually best to state simply that the person's candidacy will not be considered further
because other candidates fit the unit's current needs better, and to avoid any references
to specific reasons for rejection that might lead to some dispute by the rejected
candidate.
Obtaining Information from References
Telephone Interviews
The next step is to obtain information about the
remaining candidates from their references. A reference's comments will usually be more
complete and candid, as well as more directly related to the position in question, if
they are obtained by personal interview rather than through a letter. Written references
are likely to be generic letters, prepared by the reference for a range of possible
positions, with relatively little information about how the candidate fits the specific
position under consideration. Furthermore, verbal reference checks are more likely to
evoke comments and nuances that may suggest reservations on the part of the reference.
Interview Procedure
In order to insure that all reference interviews are
conducted as uniformly as possible, the committee should develop an interview "protocol"
for the callers to follow. This can be drafted initially by a subcommittee, based on
suggestions from individual committee members, and then brought to the full committee for
discussion and final approval. An effort should be made to limit the total interview to
about twenty minutes. Questions should be fairly specific, and examples of behaviors
should be sought. For example, instead of asking, "Is this candidate committed to
diversity in hiring and promoting staff," the protocol might ask, "Can you give me an
example of an instance in which the candidate has taken an action to promote diversity?"
(See Appendix B for an example of a protocol that, with appropriate modifications for
specific positions, has been used in administrative searches at Iowa State.)
Interview Questions
It's generally useful to begin the interview by asking
the reference how long he or she has known the candidate, and in what capacity. The
interviewer then reads a description of the position and the qualifications desired, and
asks how well the candidate fits that description. Specific questions can then follow. A
couple of questions that are worth asking near the end of the interview are: "Would you
hire this person for this position?" and "Is there anyone else whom you believe we should
talk with about this person?" A useful final question is, "Is there anything I haven't
asked that you would like to comment on?"
Candidates Confirmed
All of the candidates about whom interview checks are to be made should first be called
by the committee chair to inform them that they are still under consideration for the
position. The chair can thereby confirm that they continue to be interested, as well as
inform them that their references will now be called. They should also be told when they
can next expect to hear about the status of their candidacy.
References Assigned
As indicated earlier, the initial announcement of the
position should have requested the names and telephone numbers of five references. Four
of those references should be assigned at random to four different committee members -
not all four to a single person. The fifth is kept "on hold" as a back-up if one
of the first four turns out to be unreachable.
Arranging Reference Calls
As soon as the candidates have agreed to having
the reference checks conducted, the chair should inform the committee members that the
calls can be made. A caller should make arrangements with each reference for a time at
which to conduct a twenty-minute interview. Depending on who answers the phone when the
call is placed, this arrangement may be made directly with the reference or with a
secretary or a family member. If the reference takes the call, it may be convenient to
conduct the interview immediately, but the caller shouldn't assume that to be the case.
The interview should be conducted from a printed form, with enough space so that the interviewer can write in the responses quickly and easily.
Making Other Calls
At this stage, calls should be made only to persons whom
the candidates have identified as references. To go beyond that group risks making a
person's candidacy public prematurely. If the committee believes it's necessary to make
inquiries of persons beyond those named by the candidate as references, the candidates
should be warned of this in advance and given the opportunity to terminate their
candidacy or to request limitations on this inquiry. It may come as a surprise, for
example, for a search committee composed largely of faculty members to learn that
candidates from the private sector may feel that they are putting their careers at some
risk if their employers learn prematurely of their interest in another job.
Selecting the Finalists
The purpose of the committee's next meeting is to review the information obtained from the reference calls and, if possible, to agree on those candidates to be recommended to the hiring officer for campus visits. This will almost certainly be the longest of the committee's meetings, and sufficient time should be allowed for a full discussion of each candidate.
Reference Reports
Each candidate for whom reference calls were made is
brought forward for discussion, with each caller reporting in turn on the substance of
his or her call. The committee may decide to discuss each candidate immediately following
the reports of the reference calls for that person, or the members may prefer to wait
until all reports have been received for all candidates. If a discussion takes place for
each candidate individually, the committee may find it helpful to take a tentative vote
to determine the amount of support for that candidate before moving on to consider the
next candidate.
Selection Procedure
Once all of the reference calls have been reviewed, the
committee must decide whom to recommend as finalists. In most cases the committee members
will agree that they now have sufficient information on which to base a recommendation,
but sometimes additional information will be needed. In the case of a major
administrative appointment, the committee may decide to interview some of the candidates
personally, perhaps by conference call or at an off-campus location such as a near-by
airport. Since the latter procedure can be expensive and time-consuming, it's usually
employed only in exceptional circumstances.
An informal poll of the committee members may show the number of candidates who now have strong support as finalists to be within the range requested by the hiring officer. If not, the committee members will have to agree on a procedure to narrow the number, perhaps by asking each member to vote for only his or her top three or four choices.
Recommendation to Hiring Officer
Once the committee has agreed on its
recommendation to the hiring officer, that recommendation is forwarded by the committee
chair. The chair's communication should include an explanation of the reasons for the
recommendation, as well as an evaluation of other candidates who had some support within
the committee but who are not being recommended as finalists.
The committee should bear in mind that it is recommending with respect to finalists, not selecting them. The hiring officer makes the final decision as to whom to invite for campus visits. In doing so, he or she may not include all of the persons recommended by the committee, and may decide to add to the group someone whose support in the committee was less strong.
Notification of Status
Those persons who will not be invited for campus
interviews should be notified immediately of their status, so that they will know of it
before the names of the finalists are publicly announced. Depending on the situation,
these persons may be told that they are no longer under consideration, or that they are
still being considered but they are not in the initial group being invited to visit the
campus.
