When interviewing
potential hires for roles that rely on soft skills--such as customer
support--you always run the risk of repeating the same questions, receiving the
same answers, having the same small talk, and then promptly forgetting all the
important details.
The antidote? Think creatively, establish a system, and then
stick to it. You won't be left groping for questions, your interactions will be
more memorable, and you'll be able to standardize the circumstances under which
you assess candidates.
A strategic approach makes for less fuss, more focus, and
leads to the best person possible joining your team. Here are some useful ways
to conduct better interviews.
Use storytelling to draw out details
Great support reps possess an abstract set of skills that
can be difficult to address head on. You need to find conversational side doors
to draw these qualities out. How? By asking questions that require a story to
answer.
Sarah Judd Welch, founder of community-building company
Loyal, handily employs this tactic by inquiring about advocacy:
"I ask them to give an example of a time they advocated
on behalf of someone else. I also ask for an example of a recent conflict and
how it was resolved. I'm closely paying attention to how they describe the
actions of others; you don't want them to harshly blame anyone else, but
objectively assess the situation and how they tried to resolve it."
These questions encourage candidates to share a relevant
on-the-job anecdote, but they also require them to tell a story in a coherent,
narrative fashion. Why is that subtext so important? Because you need to
appraise their ability to break down complex ideas into relatable, easily
understood steps; one of the most fundamental support skills.
People can reveal a lot about their personal psychology by
how they frame a story.
Reading between the lines, what do a candidate's stories say
about their penchant for patience, their willingness to help, or their talents
as a team player? "I've rejected people who otherwise seemed really good
because once they started telling stories, all of their examples lead to,
'Someone else made a dumb decision and that's why didn't work'," says
Mathew Patterson.
Here are some good storytelling questions to get you
started:
Tell me about a time when you were trying to convince
somebody to do something. Give a specific instance and detail how you handled
it.
Did your previous team ever have a project go completely awry?
What went wrong? What was the final outcome? (Leave out "What could you
have done better?" to give them a chance to respond unasked or completely
miss the opportunity).
Describe a negative interaction you had in a customer
service situation with a different company. What do you think they could have
done differently to make it better?
Listen to how they listen
An active listener is a prepared problem solver. Instead of
auto-piloting to a solution based on what they expect to hear, they're patient
enough to listen to how a customer feels and respond accordingly. The same
answer can be packaged in wildly different ways according to a customer's
temperament, and it's important to know if your future teammate can adapt their
tone.
You can tease this out during an interview by asking
multi-part questions. If a candidate carefully addresses each point you've
asked them to discuss, that means they're an engaged and sincere listener. It's
also a good indication you've found somebody who will treat users well when
they show up to talk to your company.
Try some of these examples:
What interests you about customer service, in particular?
Where do you see this role taking you?
How did you hear about our company? Is there something
specific that stands out to you about the product or team?
What's a time you had to give somebody an answer they didn't
want to hear? Were you able to approach it in a way that resulted in an overall
positive outcome? If so, how?
Throw a 'zag' into your interviews
Boilerplate questions don't reflect the reality of support.
They surprise no one, they won't surface an ability to thrive under pressure,
and their limited framing begets limited answers.
That's no good, because you're searching for creativity;
work isn't a multiple choice test.
Instead, complement your must-ask questions, your
"zigs," with a few questions that zag.
Ask a question the candidate won't know the answer to. How
do they respond? When they're new, they'll face many questions in the queue
that will leave them stumped.
Ask a question that has nothing to do with the product:
"Who's the most underappreciated hero/heroine in any story? Why?" Is
their response charming, or does it fall flatter than an 'N/A' reply in a
written interview?
Get people to commit with one question ("What are you a
perfectionist about?") and then dig deeper with a second ("When has
this created conflict between you and someone else?")
You can also zag by how you conduct interviews. I encourage
managers to take potential support hires out for coffee. Observing how someone
interacts with the outside world will speak volumes about their self-awareness
and personal motivations. A person who can't be bothered to say
"please" and "thanks" is not a person who should be in the
business of professionally making other people happy.
If your support team is based remotely, the digital common
space provides just as many opportunities for unconventional interviewing. At
Basecamp, they swap coffee for Campfire, setting up a chat between the
potential hire and existing teammates. Chase Clemons, who's on their support
team, says:
"All ten of us will participate, asking questions and
seeing how they communicate. That helps us see how they'll be on a day-to-day
basis interacting with us. Maybe somebody nails their phone interview, but in a
chat situation they're giving more 'yes' and 'no' answers. That gives us some
important insight into them."
Get real answers from references
References can be a valuable component of the interview
process if handled correctly. Granted, it can be a challenge to have a
forthright conversation with a person who has been hand-picked to deliver a
glowing review, but the right attitude (and some good questions!) will go far.
Help Scout's own Ivana Flodr has honed her technique down to
a particularly revealing pair of questions. First, she asks a reference to rate
a candidate from 1-10 in terms of living up to their potential. Most people
will respond warmly ("A 9!"), but her follow-up coaches more candor
into the dialogue: "How could they get to a 10?"
The question often lowers people's guards and gets them
talking about both a candidate's shortcomings and their ability to improve.
You'll get honest feedback about a person's trajectory and their commitment to
self-improvement; information that's hard to glean from anywhere else.
It's also important to ask for specific anecdotes and to
frame questions so they can't be answered with a pat "yes" or
"no." For example, "What's a time that this person resolved an
intra-team conflict?" will get you a lot further than, "So, do they
work well with others?"
One chance to get it right
The tricky thing about interviews is you only have one shot
to set the right tone and learn what you need. Even good candidates will
struggle to shine in a bad interview.
With a considerate process and clever questions in hand,
you'll own up to your end of the bargain and set the stage for candidates to
reveal who they are, how they work, and if they're the person you've been
looking for.
Credit: inc.com
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