Articles & Resources

Since 1982, we have written articles addressing the myriad of issues that interviewers encounter in the process of hiring top talent. Our library of articles are available below for your review.

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31 of 273 Articles Found

  • False Credentials for Sale

    February 2010

    These days, job seekers intent on gaining any advantage in a tough market don't have to falsify their resumes. They can hire the "experts" at websites such as careerexcuse.com to do it for them.

  • Quick Tips For Interviewers

    January 2010

    Here are some quick steps from our seminar to help you conduct a successful interview.

  • Revisiting Millennials in the New Economy

    November 2009

    The Millennials – a new generation of workers with different attitudes and motivations – entered the labor force during the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. Will the new economic reality force a change in this generation’s work attitudes?

  • YouTube Impacts Behavioral Interviewing

    September 2009

    There's been exponential growth in interview coaching services—from outplacement firms to the Internet and most recently to YouTube

  • AIG Talent Management Mockery

    March 2009

    What has infuriated most Americans is the $165 million in bonuses paid to the AIG executives who caused the company’s near-collapse. As I see it, AIG isn’t just a financial fiasco; it’s a talent management disaster.

  • Interviewing Sarah Palin

    September 2008

    Job candidates and political candidates have something in common: they do not like to answer tough questions. One technique they use is to hand a tough question back to the interviewer with a new question of their own.

  • NALP Articles and Resources [AUDIO]

    August 2008

    NALP invited us back for a tenth time to speak at the annual NALP conference on the topic of Millennials.

  • Assessing Candidate Values [AUDIO]

    August 2008

    This interactive two-minute audio segment focuses on getting at candidate values, one of the topics covered by Jim Kennedy, president of Management Team Consultants, Inc. at the 2008 NALP Conference.

  • 25 Years of Effective Interviewing!®

    December 2007

    We offer a quick look at some of the greatest changes—and challenges—of the past quarter-century and how we've responded to them. We also note a few practices and beliefs that we think could use improvement.

  • Doing 20% of the Job

    September 2007

    Imagine what would happen if corporate methods of assessing candidates were adopted by Olympic judges.

  • Interviewing Global Talent [AUDIO]

    April 2007

    This two-minute audio segment focuses on the importance of moving beyond first impressions in today's global workplace. This was one of many topics covered by Leif Everest, vice president of Management Team Consultants, Inc. at the 2007 SHRM Staffing Management Conference.

  • Helicopter Parents Take Flight

    March 2007

    We've been studying selection interviewing practices for over 20 years, and we've seen some very strange trends, but it’s hard to top the following: parents are beginning to join their child in their job interviews.

  • Addressing the Job Search Marathon

    January 2007

    Selecting the right candidate takes time, but if it’s too drawn out, an organization risks losing qualified applicants.

  • The Fallacy of "Give Me an Example" Questions

    June 2006

    If you want to get at the truth about a candidate – any candidate – we caution you against relying on “give me an example” questions.

  • Uncovering Incompetence

    November 2005

    Here are five qualities that interviewers frequently encounter in incompetent candidates: resume fraud, failure to take responsibility/blaming others, evading questions, counter-attack, and a complete lack of the core competencies needed to do a job successfully.

  • A $6 Billion First Impression

    February 2005

    Your initial reactions to a candidate can be powerful and persuasive, but they can also be spectacularly wrong. Find out how to avoid the pitfalls of snap judgments in an interview and hire effectively.

  • Donald Trump and the Ultimate Job Interview

    March 2004

    Donald Trump has seven rules of business success that he applies to his show The Apprentice. Our interviewing method is just as successful at revealing problems with prospective job candidates as Trump’s methods.

  • Credentials, Competencies, and Common Sense

    April 2003

    The March, 2003 scandal at the New York Stock Exchange underscored the importance of defining competencies before you interview a candidate.

  • Moving Beyond Your Cultural Comfort Zone

    October 2002

    After interviewing the interview expert Jim Kennedy, Michelle Martinez explores how to avoid cultural misunderstandings and make better hiring decisions.

  • Defeat Deceit

    August 2002

    Worldcom's accounting scandals shook investor confidence and brought down once-mighty companies and individuals. Discover how to potentially avoid a similar scandal by detecting if an individual is unethical during the interview process.

  • Behavioral Interviewing Reinvented

    February 2002

    Can a successful, but static business practice gradually lose its effectiveness? In the case of behavioral interviewing, a technique that predicts-on-the-job performance far more accurately than other interview methods, the answer is yes.

  • Arrogance, Ethics and Enron

    February 2002

    There are many lessons to be learned from the Enron scandal of 2001. Among them are the following three important pointers in assessing candidates: (1) Avoid being clinded by a candidate's credentials; (2) Recognize attitude as one of the key motivators that drives performance and behavior; and (3) Discover the total person and not just selected competencies or strengths.

  • "Magic Bullet" Questions

    December 2001

    Think you have a "magic bullet" question? You might want to think again after reading how this "magic bullet" question backfired. Not only did the bullet miss its target, it also led the candidate to silently mock the interviewer's skills.

  • Coaching Connie Chung

    October 2001

    When it comes to interviewing, we can learn from the pros - even if that only means avoiding their mistakes. Connie Chung's highly publicized TV interview with U.S. Representative Gary Condit is a case in point.

  • The Flawed Interview Process

    June 2001

    Graduate students are spending too much time learning how to take an interview but rarely learn how to conduct one. Look at the problems this presents once those students enter the workforce.

  • Does Behavioral Interviewing Still Work?

    March 2001

    Behavior-based interviewing that relies on give me an example questions is in jeopardy. A number of factors including ongoing talent shortage, increasing diversity, savvy candidates, and declining authenticity threaten the continued effectiveness of this form of interviewing.

  • Defining Competency-based Behavioral Interviewing

    February 2001

    Behavioral interviewing is a technique based on the idea that candidates' past and present behavior is the best predictor of how they will behave in the future.

  • References: Conspiracy of Silence

    April 2000

    Corporate America has its own "conspiracy of silence" when it comes to high-level executives who leave their firms under less than favorable circumstances. Learn techniques for getting a more thorough review of a candidate's past behavior.

  • SF EXAMINER: The Rising Decline of Authenticity

    March 2000

    Evidence shows that a growing number of job candidates deliberately mislead potential employers.

  • Training Magazine: Invented Lives

    October 1999

    Do you ask job candidates to describe real situations they've faced and problems they've solved? Good idea. But what if the stories they'are telling are bogus?

  • Cost of Hiring Mistakes

    July 1998

    As salaries for top business people continue to climb into the stratosphere, companies will find themselves paying increasingly high prices for poor hiring decisions.