Don't underestimate the value of well-prepared interviews.

• Author: Boutelle, Clif

Untrained interviewers and too much small talk can result in poor hires and promotions.

Whether used in hiring new employees or for determining promotions within an organization, interviews are a key component of the process of making decisions concerning current or prospective personnel. Managers conduct numerous interviews, and most will say they are apt judges of character and abilities and have a successful record in hiring competent and productive employees.

However, if employees turn out to be good hires or promotions, it is not necessarily because of the interviewing and selection skills of the hiring manager, said Wendell Williams, founder and managing director of Scientific Selection, an Atlanta-based consulting firm specializing in hiring and interviewing practices.

In fact, many managers, and even their human resources departments, are the weak links in the hiring chain because they do not know how to conduct the kind of interviews that reveal a candidate's suitability for a specific job, said Williams.

Too often, interviewers look at qualities not necessarily related to the actual performance of the job, such as personality, appearance, and likeability, and at how applicants handle themselves in the interview. Then, their opinions of the applicant are not related to competency but rather to issues peripheral to the job.

"Unless the hiring manager is a specially trained behavioral interviewer and has a thorough job analysis available, it is unlikely the interviewer will gain any good information about the candidate's ability to perform the job," Williams said.

The consequences of poor interviewing can lead to increased turnover, lower individual employee performance, and higher training costs and can damage morale if coworkers soon learn that the new hire is not capable of performing the job.

Because a candidate has succeeded in one job in the company doesn't mean that he or she will succeed in another assignment. A thorough assessment is needed to determine if he or she is right for the new position.

Take sales, for example. A true professional salesperson has exceptional rapport-building skills, asks the right questions at the right time, focuses on the client's needs, and can help buyers overcome the fear of making a bad decision, Williams said.

"Now move that person into a management role where the job requirements are quite different. In addition to the sales skills that made the person successful in the former position, he...