The Selection Process

When you are looking for a job, it helps to know what is likely to happen so that you can be prepared. For this reason, a peek at the selection process from the employer's point of view is detailed below. More than anything else, you need to meet or exceed the prospective employer's expectations in order to proceed through the selection process.

The initial stage in the selection process is the resume review. Most often, this is done by an individual who is simply looking for errors or unqualified candidates. The goal is to weed out the good from the bad in order to decrease the number of potential candidates. Why? Because interviewing people has costs. The fewer candidates that are interviewed, the lower the costs. Everyone has a budget and even HR has to stay within their limits.

Once the pile of resumes is decreased substantially, the remaining resumes are given a more thorough read. Those which make a favorable impression are kept while the others are not.

Some companies use a telephone interview at this point and others do not. For those organizations which do, another screening is done with basic questions about professional history and qualifications.

Next comes the personal interview. A company may select up to ten candidates to come in for an interview. The job candidate may meet with one person or a half dozen. It depends upon the position being filled. A consensus of the interviewers is then taken and and the best candidate is offered the job. In the case where the interviewers are not in agreement, another round of interviews may be done for the final candidates.

This is the basic selection process for most jobs. For more information, please refer to this article:

The Employee Selection Process