Talking the Talk Versus Walking the Walk
We're currently interviewing interviewers about job interviews (I really wanted to say that!), and are coming up with lots of interesting material for our next website article. (Favourite interview questions in Qatar, for our Qatar jobs section!)
However, to me it seems there is a fundamental problem with interviews. Essentially, that you are always testing what people can say as opposed to what people can actually do.
Like me, you probably know people who can really talk the talk - people who sound like experts, but who are completely useless at their job.
You may also know people who aren't the best talkers, but who do quietly get on with their job - and produce really good work.
Personally, I am far more interested in what people can do than what people can say.
We only employ freelancers to work on the websites, but I recently chatted to one of these freelancers before giving her an assignment.
She really had absolutely nothing to say. She said so little, I barely knew she could speak English. She had, however, sent in a really good piece of work as an example, so I took her a risk and gave her a piece of writing to do.
She's done about eight articles for us since then, and they have all been excellent.
Which makes me wonder - just how useful are interviews?
