Question
I have had three interviews for a job and it’s been a month since my last interview. At the interview they said I was a strong candidate for the position. I followed up with emails and phone calls after the interview and they responded with “everyone was impressed, we should have a decision next week.” After that conversation, I never heard from them again. What happened? After talking to colleagues I have found that they also have had similar experiences. Why don’t employers get back to the candidates either way? Is there another way candidates should handle the follow-up process to secure a response?
Answer
Although it is decidedly unprofessional, it is not uncommon for people to encounter a kind of “radio silence” following job interviews. Indeed, it is something that recruiters themselves often experience, much to their dismay.
On the one hand, there is no foolproof way to ensure that someone will follow-up with you, particularly if you are no longer being considered as a candidate. On the other hand, there are some things you can do to make post-interview contact more likely, or at least make post-interview silence more understandable.
First, you can learn from the recruiters and ask a lot of questions about the position, either prior to or during the interview. Since recruiters need to fill jobs in order to earn their salaries and commissions, they want to know if the job is viable and if the client has a real sense of urgency. Good questions to ask are: “Why is this position open?”; “What happens if it doesn’t get filled in a timely fashion?”; and “How many people are involved in the hiring process?”
If the job is open because someone left unexpectedly, then there will probably be a great deal of urgency around filling it. Similarly, if the role is essential to a critical business process, there will also be a sense of urgency. On the flipside, if the hiring process involves a lot of decision makers, the sense of urgency may be undercut by the logistics of getting everyone on board.
In the end, the answers to these questions will give you a sense of the hiring timeframe. If there is a great deal of urgency, and you haven’t heard, then you can assume you are not getting an offer. On the other hand, if the hiring process will require a lot of input and whatnot, things may take longer than even the folks doing the hiring expected.
Secondly, you can follow the practice of recruiters and schedule a time for follow-up when you are scheduling the interview. “OK, so I’ll be there on Tuesday for the interview. If I haven’t heard from you by the following Tuesday, can I call you to discuss the status of my candidacy?”
Thirdly, you can use the incommunicativeness of the hiring manager to reevaluate your own interest in the company. Frankly, if you have gone through three interviews, and even had a follow-up conversation, only to hear nothing, there is obviously something broken with their process. You should ask yourself, if this is how this company treats prospective employees, who they are supposedly wooing, what’s it going to be like to actually work there?
Matthew T. Grant, PhD, Aquent