Snowflakes

[Dave_Mole]

8 pints

you won't be saying that when we join the EU.

[CL]

I had the opportunity to interview him when Perpetual High Income was at the bottom of the league tables and TMT stocks were all the rage. I was an investor in PHI and also (as an ex-Personnel Manager) knew how to interview people. The interview lasted 55 minutes and the video recording was on the HL website for a long time.

Woodford was amenable but convinced he was right. He was contemptuous of those investing in what I had termed "glitzy" stocks. He compared it to a "religious cult". "It will end in tears - there will be blood on the streets".

I think it was the first time I had heard phrases such as the "greater fool theory".

He said "This (TMT) momentum will crack and the idiot in the queue will be handed a bomb, not a present" - so not a man crippled by self-doubt - as we have recently seen. I have followed his career since that day and his recent travails seem to be in character with the man I met, although then he was investing in "old world" stocks (Oils, pharma. Rolls Royce) that were somewhat more liquid than his current holdings.

Anyway I had a nice day out and was sent a case of very decent wine by HL as thanks; and Neil Woodford went on to make £millions!

Graham how's the Bianchi? Aside from that I'd be interested to know how you used to interview people. What was your method?

[Graham Breeze]

Graham how's the Bianchi? Aside from that I'd be interested to know how you used to interview people. What was your method?

Well thank you for asking. My Bianchi lifts my spirits as only a beautiful female can. But lest Wheezing Donkey excommunicates me I did ride up Park Rash from Kettlewell on my Boardman Comp recently.

Interviewing is a broad field and I was trained in selection interviewing a thousand years ago in an approach first formulated by the NIIP called the 7 Point Plan, but that is just a framework approach. The skills are then generally transferable.

In theory interviewing is common sense but the falsity of the situation and the enormous potential consequences make it stressful - possibly for both sides of the table.

So I think, I ask, I listen and I watch. An interviewer learns nothing when he/she is speaking so introverts are better interviewers (classic ISTJ are best of all!).

One should focus on areas rather than too specific questions, never telegraph what you are thinking (“Do you agree that?”!!!) – no smiles of encouragement because interviewees then respond accordingly, be flexible, always ask open questions, don’t follow a list but be able to move from topic to topic and be able to go back to something said earlier ie look for links and maybe contradictions, cover the whole person - not just the factual data, be empathetic and not aggressive, etc...it’s a conversation.

Every candidate has thought what might be asked and so will have pat answers prepared so the skill of the interviewer is getting behind that rehearsed response - otherwise the interview is just following a script.
It isn’t about trickery. It is about understanding the person in front of you. “Do I know enough to decide if I really want this person to work with me?”

Of course every professional interviewer has also been interviewed so they know what it is like. I remember one question I was asked 52 years ago in an engineering setting! I can see the interviewing room now. The interview was going reasonably well and then I was asked about a process I had never experienced - so I tried to answer from principles. I failed. It was a good question. The interview turned at that point. The panel rejected me. I had no complaints.

The very next day I carried out the process on my works location after which I would have be able to answer the key question - but the opportunity of promotion and relocation to Birmingham had passed. Ah well, “every cloud….

Every professional interviewer has a hundred anecdotes. A man once approached me in a bar and told me I had interviewed him 10 years ago and he had not been appointed. My heart sank. He then told me the questions I had asked him that he had found it difficult to respond to in the interview - ten years before! Simple questions - not tricky - but they exposed how profoundly (or not) he had thought about the job he wanted. Anyway we had a good laugh about it, he was a bright guy and I am certain that he would have been better prepared for subsequent interviews.

Interviewing people could be a bit of a grind - the “milk round” at universities could have its longeurs. Some people blame the interviewer for their own incompetent performance. It goes with the territory. But I have been party to transforming people’s lives and careers for the better. And when people approach me many, many years later and want to tell me so – it feels good.

[Llani Boy]

GB, did your interview technique warm up include a lie on a sunbed or covering yourself in fake tan in preparation to constantly interrupt your victim as seems to be the Newsnight method?

[CL]

Well thank you for asking. My Bianchi lifts my spirits as only a beautiful female can. But lest Wheezing Donkey excommunicates me I did ride up Park Rash from Kettlewell on my Boardman Comp recently.

Interviewing is a broad field and I was trained in selection interviewing a thousand years ago in an approach first formulated by the NIIP called the 7 Point Plan, but that is just a framework approach. The skills are then generally transferable.

In theory interviewing is common sense but the falsity of the situation and the enormous potential consequences make it stressful - possibly for both sides of the table.

So I think, I ask, I listen and I watch. An interviewer learns nothing when he/she is speaking so introverts are better interviewers (classic ISTJ are best of all!).

One should focus on areas rather than too specific questions, never telegraph what you are thinking (“Do you agree that?”!!!) – no smiles of encouragement because interviewees then respond accordingly, be flexible, always ask open questions, don’t follow a list but be able to move from topic to topic and be able to go back to something said earlier ie look for links and maybe contradictions, cover the whole person - not just the factual data, be empathetic and not aggressive, etc...it’s a conversation.

Every candidate has thought what might be asked and so will have pat answers prepared so the skill of the interviewer is getting behind that rehearsed response - otherwise the interview is just following a script.
It isn’t about trickery. It is about understanding the person in front of you. “Do I know enough to decide if I really want this person to work with me?”

Of course every professional interviewer has also been interviewed so they know what it is like. I remember one question I was asked 52 years ago in an engineering setting! I can see the interviewing room now. The interview was going reasonably well and then I was asked about a process I had never experienced - so I tried to answer from principles. I failed. It was a good question. The interview turned at that point. The panel rejected me. I had no complaints.

The very next day I carried out the process on my works location after which I would have be able to answer the key question - but the opportunity of promotion and relocation to Birmingham had passed. Ah well, “every cloud….

Every professional interviewer has a hundred anecdotes. A man once approached me in a bar and told me I had interviewed him 10 years ago and he had not been appointed. My heart sank. He then told me the questions I had asked him that he had found it difficult to respond to in the interview - ten years before! Simple questions - not tricky - but they exposed how profoundly (or not) he had thought about the job he wanted. Anyway we had a good laugh about it, he was a bright guy and I am certain that he would have been better prepared for subsequent interviews.

Interviewing people could be a bit of a grind - the “milk round” at universities could have its longeurs. Some people blame the interviewer for their own incompetent performance. It goes with the territory. But I have been party to transforming people’s lives and careers for the better. And when people approach me many, many years later and want to tell me so – it feels good.

Thank you Graham.

[CL]

GB, did your interview technique warm up include a lie on a sunbed or covering yourself in fake tan in preparation to constantly interrupt your victim as seems to be the Newsnight method?

Emily? Her Whippet looked cosy.

[Graham Breeze]

GB, did your interview technique warm up include a lie on a sunbed or covering yourself in fake tan in preparation to constantly interrupt your victim as seems to be the Newsnight method?

It's many years since I watched Newsnight and from what I have seen of the lightweight Emily that will continue to be the case. In fact I watch virtually no current affairs programmes and listen to the BBC news on Radio 4. You don't need a sun tan or a massive ego on the radio (excluding the prima-donnas on Today, of course).

Musing on interviewing: in the world of Human Resources - Recruitment and Selection, Training, Job Evaluation, Management Development, Manpower Planning,...are all seen as soft options - the real money and prestige and power belongs to those who can hack it in Industrial Relations and so walk tallest (and quite right too!).

If I were eg an MP and was interrupted I would just stay silent, and watch the interviewer panic...they would not interrupt me again.

[Muddy Retriever]

Emily? Her Whippet looked cosy.

I saw that - allowing her dog to occupy the seat next to her on a busy train. Nicely illustrates the superior sense of entitlement of these liberal luvvies. I imagine she didn’t want to risk somebody less worthy like a leave voter sitting there.

[CL]

It's many years since I watched Newsnight and from what I have seen of the lightweight Emily that will continue to be the case. In fact I watch virtually no current affairs programmes and listen to the BBC news on Radio 4. You don't need a sun tan or a massive ego on the radio (excluding the prima-donnas on Today, of course).

Musing on interviewing: in the world of Human Resources - Recruitment and Selection, Training, Job Evaluation, Management Development, Manpower Planning,...are all seen as soft options - the real money and prestige and power belongs to those who can hack it in Industrial Relations and so walk tallest (and quite right too!).

If I were eg an MP and was interrupted I would just stay silent, and watch the interviewer panic...they would not interrupt me again.

You made me chuckle there Graham. You don't let the forum get you down. As the song goes 'carry on regardless.'

[CL]

I saw that - allowing her dog to occupy the seat next to her on a busy train. Nicely illustrates the superior sense of entitlement of these liberal luvvies. I imagine she didn’t want to risk somebody less worthy like a leave voter sitting there.

Yes I agree. But I can't hold it against her dog. It's a beaut.