It's doing a type of nursing that I can't say I really wanted to do, which worries me.
I am going to be a rehab nurse at a small rehab hospital. The pay is excellent, but it is considered a "pool" position, so no benefits. Now, I am planning on using this job as a means to gain experience in order to get on at one of the larger hospitals here, so I don't see this as a position that lasts more than 5 months (I hope). I guess I just worry about burning out.
Now, can you manager types that interview folks tell me if this is a common interviewing method.
I went on an interview today (for a different job/different hospital) and the manager just asked me canned questions off of a form - "tell me about a successful moment at work / how did you deal with a difficult patient" type stuff.
I don't really have an issue with those types of questions, but I was really bothered by the fact that the manager never really made eye contact during the interview. Just took notes. Looked up every now and again and then went back to the scripted questions. Nothing else. Lasted about 12 to 15 minutes max.
Is this normal? Does this happen elsewhere? I felt that there was no interest in who I was, or what I could bring to the unit - just a script. Very disappointed with the whole thing, since my 15 minute interview had almost an hours worth of driving round trip.
As far as the interview went, some HR departments demand that all questions to each candidate be the same in order to prevent discrimination lawsuits (I always tended to stray a bit).
Frustrating for both the interviewer and the interviewee.
I went on an interview today (for a different job/different hospital) and the manager just asked me canned questions off of a form - "tell me about a successful moment at work / how did you deal with a difficult patient" type stuff.
I don't really have an issue with those types of questions, but I was really bothered by the fact that the manager never really made eye contact during the interview. Just took notes. Looked up every now and again and then went back to the scripted questions. Nothing else. Lasted about 12 to 15 minutes max.
Is this normal? Does this happen elsewhere? I felt that there was no interest in who I was, or what I could bring to the unit - just a script. Very disappointed with the whole thing, since my 15 minute interview had almost an hours worth of driving round trip.
Most of my interviews have contained the same canned questions. Sometimes the interviewers have a list, sometimes they have a pool of questions to select from. I believe it's becoming standard practice for the reasons Andy stated, and also to make things real easy for the HR folk who don't necessarily understand the technical aspects of the position but need some criteria by which to vet candidates.
As far as the interview went, some HR departments demand that all questions to each candidate be the same in order to prevent discrimination lawsuits (I always tended to stray a bit).
This.
1. the interviewer will score the the interviewees on the questions, so they want the questions to all be the same
2. there are so many things they cannot ask due to legal restrictions, canned questions are safest
It's doing a type of nursing that I can't say I really wanted to do, which worries me.
I am going to be a rehab nurse at a small rehab hospital. The pay is excellent, but it is considered a "pool" position, so no benefits. Now, I am planning on using this job as a means to gain experience in order to get on at one of the larger hospitals here, so I don't see this as a position that lasts more than 5 months (I hope). I guess I just worry about burning out.
Now, can you manager types that interview folks tell me if this is a common interviewing method.
I went on an interview today (for a different job/different hospital) and the manager just asked me canned questions off of a form - "tell me about a successful moment at work / how did you deal with a difficult patient" type stuff.
I don't really have an issue with those types of questions, but I was really bothered by the fact that the manager never really made eye contact during the interview. Just took notes. Looked up every now and again and then went back to the scripted questions. Nothing else. Lasted about 12 to 15 minutes max.
Is this normal? Does this happen elsewhere? I felt that there was no interest in who I was, or what I could bring to the unit - just a script. Very disappointed with the whole thing, since my 15 minute interview had almost an hours worth of driving round trip.
Congratulations on the job! As for the interview, having gone on interviews and performed interviews, I can say that personality types vary for interviewers as interviewees. It sounds like you got a manager who was disengaged from the process--either he's introverted, hung over, etc. I don't think that's normal for folks doing interviews. I think the person you interviewed with is a crap interviewer.
I went on an interview today (for a different job/different hospital) and the manager just asked me canned questions off of a form - "tell me about a successful moment at work / how did you deal with a difficult patient" type stuff.
I don't really have an issue with those types of questions, but I was really bothered by the fact that the manager never really made eye contact during the interview. Just took notes. Looked up every now and again and then went back to the scripted questions. Nothing else. Lasted about 12 to 15 minutes max.
Is this normal? Does this happen elsewhere? I felt that there was no interest in who I was, or what I could bring to the unit - just a script. Very disappointed with the whole thing, since my 15 minute interview had almost an hours worth of driving round trip.
I've had a couple interviews like that (and didn't get the jobs). They were both for government jobs.
Is this normal? Does this happen elsewhere? I felt that there was no interest in who I was, or what I could bring to the unit - just a script. Very disappointed with the whole thing, since my 15 minute interview had almost an hours worth of driving round trip.
I was on a hiring committee once (this was for an administrative position at a community college). And yeah, the HR department had lots of rules to make sure everything was the same for every candidate for anti-discrimination purposes. First, we had to come up with a list of evaluation criteria for resumes; only after we submitted this to HR would they actually let us see the resumes. Then, we had to give a numerical rating for each criteria for each resume, and the highest sums would be brought in for interviews (the number of interviewees was left for us to determine, but hey, it was our time, not theirs). For the interview, we had to come up with a list of questions; again, these questions would be evaluated on a numerical scale. The candidate with the highest score in the interview gets the job, unless we decide that none of the candidates meets the minimum qualifications. If, at any point, we had decided that the criteria that we submitted to HR were lacking, and we actually valued things differently, then we would have needed to go back to square one and re-advertise the job with an updated job description.
So yeah, there's some wiggle room with assigning numerical values, and the person doing the hiring will usually get who he/she wants. But the process can be somewhat mind-numbing, for both sides.
At an old job for some big corp I used to run the 2nd shift of the audit/quality control department at their distribution center. When I would get an opening and have to inverview for it the HR department would give us (the department head and me) a list of those pre-made questions.
We were supposed to ask them and record their answers on the sheet and submit the sheet to HR for their review.
But ummm yeah I wasn't going to leave it up to HR to decide who was going to work for me. The first time I did that I ended up with a guy who was nothing but a headach.
We would have the guy get comfortable in the conference room and then just talk to them about stuff. Anything really, games, sports, outdoors, family, the closest holiday, weather etc...
We would take a quick break decide if I/we wanted him or not. We would go back into the room and ask the questions on the page. If we decided we wanted him we would coach him through them and fill out the sheet in his favor for HR to choose him.
I am excited to start the new job, and I have made peace with the idea that I just need to do what needs to be done in order to get the job I do want later.
And thanks for the feedback on the interview stuff. I didn't consider the angle that canned questions are more "fair" in a way to broad group of folks.
Oh, and Dar, yes yes I do need to come pay you a visit. And I will bring the wife - so I can get all the stuff I want!
Not sure when my start date is. I just got back from doing the drug screen, and there are a few people that I am waiting on to submit some references, but it should be soon I hope.
And while there are certain things about the food service business that I will miss, I am sure that I can come up with some entertaining rants about healthcare.
Oh and speaking of fun food service stories - last night had a good story.
Had a table last night of known big spenders, had a good conversation with them, and they liked me so much that they asked that I be their permanent waiter. When I told them that I was about to leave for a nursing job, they congratulated me and asked that I share a drink with them.
So I did - Remy Martin Louis XIII at $300 a glass ( I only had one, the other 2 gentlemen had 2 each.) With the wine and food, the bill was just short of $2000. And they were pretty generous on the tip as well.
