I have received a few applications (yes, this is the way here: get ~5 app for one PhD studentship). The grant attached to it has very strict criteria of age and grades and there is just one candidate I want to interview. There's two actually, but one does not fit the grant's criteria, unfortunately. We'll speak on the phone on thursday.
I'm looking for any advice you'd have as to what or how to ask things.
The background: the candidate has a very strong CV but I'd like to hear more on:
-the candidate's motivation to pursue the topic of PhD. Candidate has worked on similar stuff previously but kind of drifted away during his master studies;
-part of the drift was away from empirical work, which will be a substantial chunck of what candidate will have to do. Is candidate into empirical work still?;
-his capacity to work in a team and to interact with other PhD students working on a close topic (which I hope will appear soon). I don't need people to become best pals, but I would consider it necessary that they can discuss and exchange.
Anything else I should ask about?
Thanks for any help! This is the most newest thing on the job so far and it terrorises me. I try to remember that you can't check everything and that even the best people sometimes misjudge candidates... but I also want to do things but the rules and in as correct a way as possible for everyone.
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5 comments:
Hopefully you'll just get to talking and it will flow easily.
But, chances are the candidate will be more nervous than you and likely to be all awkward because of it.
I've never interviewed anyone, so take my thoughts with a grain of salt. But it seems to me you could ask these questions almost as you have them written here. There must be a discreet way, however, to assess the working with a team thing, but I'm not sure what.
Looking forward to other responses!
Ah sure, I'm in the easier position!
Yes, I'm hoping we'll get into a conversation. The questions I want to prepare would be more the safety net or the thread or something like that.
Thanks.
You can't go wrong loosely basing your questions around an applicant's CV. Sometimes a question like "How has your Master's experience sparked an interest in going for a PhD" can bring out a lot of shifts in thinking. As for working as a team, I would talk with the secretaries after the interviewee leaves, particularly if he has some time where he's not being ferried around everywhere by a professor or graduate student. Talk to the other graduate students who met the candidate. What is their unedited feedback?
Thanks. Unfortunately, candidate is far far away, and I'm about to leave for even further away, so the interview will only take place on Skype (don't know yet if it'll involve video or not).
How exciting!
I've heard of people being asked about people skills via previous experiances. If they have ever had a disagreement/conflict with a coworker, how did they handle it? Or if that is too prying, just how they would handle a potential conflict (although this could be a red flag question for them!).
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