Setting the stage for a great interview
Why you might want to cheer for and high-five your next job candidate

​By Rich Trombetta
​Nov. 9, 2022

Welcome to our monthly deep dive inspired by pop culture. A little longer than our newsletter but with the same calories.

Job interviews can be a stressful experience. Picture how things might be different if candidates received a standing ovation just for showing up, the hiring manager explicitly stated that one of the primary goals was to ensure that everyone felt safe, comfortable and respected, and that, above all, the company recognized that if applicants were relaxed they would be better able to be their true and best selves.

While this is not how the job process rolls in most - if any - corporations, it is how auditions are done at a local improvisational theater in Boston, and companies would be well advised to learn from this approach.


Enter stage right

The process begins with improvisers being placed in small groups of eight in the lobby of the theater. For the next hour or so, this team of strangers will be forced to coalesce and work together knowing that few if any will be chosen for a call-back. The group nervously goes through some basic warm-up exercises and huddles together until a staff member opens the door to the stage area and announces, “OK, they’re ready for you.” 

Let the competition begin. Check that. Let the collaboration begin. 

Instead of the situation becoming a reenactment of the Coliseum scenes in “Gladiator,” performers are instead greeted by producers, cast members, and directors with a hero’s welcome, each standing, applauding and cheering as the people auditioning enter the space; “Thank you for coming.” “Congratulations for signing up.” “We are so happy you are here.” The nervous smiles of the people entering become…just smiles. 

“We wanted a room full of support and joy,” said Deana Criess, a former performer and instructor at the theater. “You have to be safe in order to do your best. Innovation doesn't happen in a state of fear. It happens in a state of support and encouragement.”

A competition where one is safe is the wrong way to think about job interviews.

​Stage fright

Ask someone to play word association with the phrase “job interview” and words like pressure, nervousness and judgment quickly come to mind.

So often the setting is an office where the hiring manager is on one side of a desk and the candidate sits anxiously on the other, the power dynamic clearly favoring the employer versus the prospective employee. It is reminiscent of the scene below from the 1975 film “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” where travelers come across a bridge and are asked three questions; one wrong answer sends them spiraling to the abyss.

While people will be welcoming and offer the obligatory cup of coffee or glass of water, these are not standing ovations or high-fives. It is time to get down to business, the business at hand is judgment. Criess offers a different perspective.

The power dynamic in job in job interviews. One "wrong" answer and you are out.

Suspending judgment

​“[The process] is designed to get people to not only to feel comfortable, but to notice them, not to judge them,” Criess said.

Criess explains that by shifting from “judge” to “notice,” an interviewer is working from a place of curiosity and exploration. For example, a typo on a resume is something that usually spells doom for a candidate, i.e. see the Monty Python scene referenced above. Yes, the person may have gone to MIT, received a master’s degree in physics and solved world hunger, but a typo? We can’t have that. 

“A typo on a resume could be because a person is using speech to text because they're visually impaired,” Criess noted. “And so could that be why that exists? Or someone showed up for their in-person interview wearing jeans and a sweater instead of a suit. Well, could that be because they are in an economic situation where they couldn't afford a suit to get here? Or could it be because they have sensory issues and therefore that this is more comfortable for them?”

While there can be debate about the specifics of Criess’s examples, her point is not something that can be contested - have empathy. And, while her suit comments might introduce doubt to the validity of her line of thinking, the scene below from the 2006 film “The Pursuit of Happyness” might alter your perspective. This is based on a true story.​

Let people be their true self and suspend your judgement.

​The reviews are in

Criess, who in her current role with the Perkins School for the Blind has interviewed countless people for various roles, notes that in her experience that when a person conducting an interview adjusts their thinking to be inquisitive versus presumptive - or, said another way, is focused on the positive versus the negative - there are better outcomes in terms of retention, productivity and attracting candidates from diverse backgrounds with unique points of views.

Although Criess does not bring the company together to cheer on a possible candidate like a waiter at Applebee's gathering everyone from the hostess to the fry chef to sing happy birthday to someone being surprised by their friends and family, she does apply the same overall philosophy she followed at the theater - go above and beyond to ensure people feel safe.

“It's again about creating a space where they know they're not being judged. It's not about you as a person, it's about whether your skills are the right match,” Criess said. “I already think you're great or I wouldn't be calling you. That's what I say from the beginning."


Bringing down the curtain on old ways of thinking

Although companies - Criess’s included - might not be ready to hire the Notre Dame marching band to play every time someone shows up for an interview, the results prove that examining how to ensure every candidate feels psychologically safe is in the best interest of the company. By doing so a hiring manager will get a better sense of who the person truly is versus who the person thinks the company wants them to be. 

“Adjusting your interview process to allow everyone who walks in that room to feel safe and allow them to unlock their best work is important,” Criess said. “That has to be intentional. It can't be we're gonna interview the way we always did with multiple people behind a desk with their notebooks waiting for you to fail. It doesn’t work.”