Interviewing For New Staff

[Guest]

Hi

I have arranged to do some interviews for new staff. I have never done this before and wondered if you had any advice. I thought i had seen this somewhere before on the forum but i don't seem to be able to find it.

[Guest]

You can find the article here, fourth heading down.

 

interview article

 

Here are questions I recently used for Interviews ( some questions are relevant to a previsit where the applicant is observed)

 

Then I give applicants a post interview questionairre to monitor equal opps etc.

 

Good luck, let us know how you get on.

 

Peggy

INTERVIEW_QUESTIONS.doc

POST_INTERVIEW_QUESTIONAIRRE.doc

[Alison]

We also just going through staff selection and the interview process.

 

thanks Peggy, the interview questions where helpful.

 

we were debating whether to include a mornings session as part of our inteview process (i.e. ask the prospective member of staff to spend the morning in the session) but wondered what other settings do?

[Guest]

We asked our applicants to come in for an hour before interview to play / interact with staff and children.

 

Hourly visits enabled us to do more than one applicant in a morning ( not more than one person "playing" at the same time).

 

It was useful to get staff's opinions on applicants ( helped staff feel that they were involved in the recruitment process - and taught them how difficult it is to judge someone in such a short amount of time )

 

The only set back was that myself and manager were interviewing whilst another applicant was "playing", therefore we were unable to observe them. The applicant is shown around the setting, then given a specific area to play in ( they are informed of this area when sent their interview appointment). They are not asked to prepare an activity ( how could they without knowing our children ) However one applicant did plan a very structured "creative" activity, bringing resources with her.

 

A few interview questions are based on the tour, ie: where would you find important notices? ( observation skills) and What did you enjoy about you area of play ( evaluation skills) How would you improve the area ( reflective- constructive critisism skills).

 

The feedback from applicants was;

 

1/ They enjoyed playing, some wanted a longer time.

2/ Some commented on current staffs attitudes.

3/ Some gave good constructive critisism on particular resources / layout of play areas.

 

Good luck.

 

I have found that recruitment is a long process which incurs at least 3 full days of work time, (and that's before induction) then you still can't guarantee you employ the best person for the job.

 

Peggy

[Guest]

Sorry, I know this is slightly away from your questio simcity, but I was wondering...

 

I am a manager of a pre-school. I have an immediate boss (the owner) but generally the day to day running of the pre-school, is down to me.

 

We are currently recruiting for new staff (as always!) but I am finding that I am not invited to join the interviews of these prospective candidates. Whenever I have been interviewed, it has always been done with the manager there, or it is the manager who does them. I appreciate that I'm new to managing, but would've thought it part of my development to sit in on interviews (ratios allowing of course!) possibly as it will be me who ends up doing them.

 

So was just wondering how other settings worked in relation to interviewing staff? I would like to be involved in the interviewing process, if not for input, then just to see how to go about it according to our policies etc.

[Guest]

Hi Clare

We are committee run. I will sit on the interview panel along with 2 committee members. I'm not sure what other groups do

 

Thanks Peggy, great advice as always, i will let you know how it goes.

Thankyou

[Guest]

Sorry, I know this is slightly away from your questio simcity, but I was wondering...

 

I am a manager of a pre-school. I have an immediate boss (the owner) but generally the day to day running of the pre-school, is down to me.

 

We are currently recruiting for new staff (as always!) but I am finding that I am not invited to join the interviews of these prospective candidates. Whenever I have been interviewed, it has always been done with the manager there, or it is the manager who does them. I appreciate that I'm new to managing, but would've thought it part of my development to sit in on interviews (ratios allowing of course!) possibly as it will be me who ends up doing them.

 

So was just wondering how other settings worked in relation to interviewing staff? I would like to be involved in the interviewing process, if not for input, then just to see how to go about it according to our policies etc.

55506[/snapback]

 

 

I am the owner and involve my manager in the interview, and staff observing applicants with children, as I stated above.

 

I know this may sound silly but, does your boss know that you want to be involved with the interviews? Let her know you want to learn from her/him, by first maybe observing ( taking the notes) then actually participating in drawing up and asking questions at interview. Be careful that you don't make him/her feel that you are undermining their abilities and feel "the need" to take part because of previous employment decisions, but because you want to develop these skills as a professional.

Good luck.

 

Peggy

[hali]

we are a committe run group and it is alaways the chair manager (me) and my deputy that do the interviewing. We also get the candidates to come in for the morning as you can tell a lot from watching them.

[Guest]

I am the owner and involve my manager in the interview, and staff observing applicants with children, as I stated above.

 

I know this may sound silly but, does your boss know that you want to be involved with the interviews?  Let her know you want to learn from her/him, by first maybe observing ( taking the notes) then actually participating in drawing up and asking questions at interview. Be careful that you don't make him/her feel that you are undermining their abilities and feel "the need" to take part because of previous employment decisions, but because you want to develop these skills as a professional.

Good luck.

 

Peggy

55595[/snapback]

 

Thanks Peggy.

 

I'm pretty sure she knows that I would like to get involved as I told her at my interview how keen I was to learn every aspect of the managers role. I didn't specify what areas and maybe that is what I need to do!

 

Out of curiosity, I was wondering, why do you feel it is important for your manager to be involved in the interviewing process?

 

Obviously I don't want my boss to feel that I want to take over completely and it is more about professional development for me than anything. I don't have the skills or experience to take over her group according to her wishes, but by her own admission, there will come a time when I am left to run the show whilst she goes and does other things. She has already told me that she intends to leave it all to me as she has fingers in other pies so to speak.

 

I suppose I'm just a bit baffled by her reluctance to show me all these things, but as you say Peggy, it might be that I haven't made myself particularly clear about what aspects of the job I wish to be involved in.

 

Once again, brilliant advice! Thanks!

[Guest]

It is important for my manager ( and other staff where appropriatte) to be involved in interviews because ultimately she is the person who will be working with the successful applicant on a day to day basis.

Basically, I've learnt from experience. When I first bought my preschool I acquired existing staff - this didn't work, I had a totally different ethos to what they were used to. My manager has been with me from day one ( as supervisor-I did day to day management then) she has the same ethos and more importantly the same vision for the future as I have.

Since September last year I have had less daily involvement at the setting ( although daily paperwork load at home) and my manager is responsible now for ensuring good team work. She knows the staffs areas of weakness and strengths, therefore she knows what type of person, skills etc would best fit the current team.

 

As you say your boss intends to "hand over" more managerial tasks to you to enable her to work away from the setting. She is handling it well by introducing the variety of management tasks gradually to you. Again, through experience, I have learnt that as well as running the day to day supervision of the setting, the managers other tasks, on top of this, can be quite overwhelming if introduced all at once. I also found it quite difficult to "let go", which didn't give my manager consistent messages of what was her role in relation to mine on a daily basis.

 

Now I have begun to feel secure enough to let go more, and as I now introduce additional management tasks to my manager on a gradual basis, things are more stable. I think to support a new manager well requires a long, planned induction process ( learnt through experience of not doing it this way initially ) I think it takes at least 6 months, if not more to cover all the roles required of a manager, it is so much more indepth than a supervisor role. Team motivation, reflective practice addressed through action planning for improvement and development, training in the workplace on a practical daily level, crisis management, building multi-agency working relationships, and that + lots more is on top of managing the services and needs of the children and parents

 

You sound like you have good foundations to your relationship with your boss, if you both listen to and acknowledge each others "pace" as to how and when things will progress then frustrations won't come into play, and it should grow into a positive partnership. Both being able to get what you want from each other in terms of personal development / space to address own individual goals, and the sense of both working together towards the same wider goals for the setting.

 

Peggy

[Guest]

Thanks Peggy! We do have an ok relationship and I say ok because there have been a few little incidents between us over recent weeks. There seems to be some confusion as to what my role actually entails, as we have an administrator who has been doing newsletters, policies etc and she know feels that I'm treading on her toes by doing these tasks, even though my boss gives them to me!

 

Unfortunately, she is not the most supportive of bosses and at them moment, my training seems to consist of doing the horrible jobs that no-one else will do. I don't mind, it's all part of the learning process for me so I'm happy to do it. Sometimes, it would be nice to do an 'important' job, but as you say, gradually is probably better! I think my problem is I want to learn as much as possible in the quickest time!

 

We have agreed that my training should be completed within 9 months so maybe I'm jumping the gun somewhat. But I am of the opinion that if I am to manage the day to day running of things, monitor staff etc, then surely I should be encouraged to take part in the interviewing process. To start with I'm happy to sit in and take note of what is happening, how my boss conducts interviews etc.

 

Is your manager responsible for paperwork or is that your department? The reason I'm wondering is that I am included in the ratios and have to be hands on with the children all the time, whilst simultaneously juggling the paperwork, which is my responsibility. I leave work at 2 in the afternoon and I'm still doing paperwork at home until 8/9 at night. I prefer the hands on work to the paper variety but was wondering how other managers manage to juggle it all!

 

Thanks for you reply Peggy. You always manage to give me loads to think about!

[Guest]

You can find the article here, fourth heading down.

 

interview article

 

Here are questions I recently used for Interviews ( some questions are relevant to a previsit where the applicant is observed)

 

Then I give applicants a post interview questionairre to monitor equal opps etc.

 

Good luck, let us know how you get on.

 

Peggy

55435[/snapback]

 

 

Hi

I have now conducted a very lengthy interview process, peggy your questions were a great help. I have decided to take on two applicants for september, with a few induction days between now and then,

I am just in the process of putting together a letter to send to successfull applicants, i am going to include a contract in with the letter, does anybody have an example of a letter they send out to applicants, i want to get the process correct.

Also does anybody include anything about how long people have to stay/ or clauses to do with training courses the staff attend in their contracts, we are losing 2 members of staff this july, and we have paid £400 each for them to do an NVQ 3 but we wont get the benefit. It just seems such a waste as we are a committee run pre-school.

Any advice greatfully received

Thankyou!!!!

[Guest]

Hi

I have now conducted a very lengthy interview process, peggy your questions were a great help. I have decided to take on two applicants for september, with a few induction days between now and then,

I am just in the process of putting together a letter to send to successfull applicants, i am going to include a contract in with the letter, does anybody have an example of a letter they send out to applicants, i want to get the process correct.

Also does anybody include anything about how long people have to stay/ or clauses to do with training courses the staff attend in their contracts, we are losing 2 members of staff this july, and we have paid £400 each for them to do an NVQ 3 but we wont get the benefit. It just seems such a waste as we are a committee run pre-school.

Any advice greatfully received

Thankyou!!!!

58252[/snapback]

 

HI simcity

 

I know at our nursery staff who have done their NVQ's with us sign in their contract to say they will work 6 months after completion of NVQ, and then any other training they do i.e in house training they agree to stay at least a month after the course they attended. If they breech this, they then have to pay the cost of the course/training they were on.

 

Dawn