---
title: "10-Minute Interview to Hire Core Employees!"
description: "This article discusses how to efficiently interview and hire core employees during peak recruitment season, proposing a 10-minute interview method consisting of four steps: chat, presentation, questioning, and answering. It also reveals three interview secrets: early disclosure of compensation, avoiding braggarts, and not hiring the 'best' candidates."
author: "景素奇"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2015-03-12"
language: "en"
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---

# 10-Minute Interview to Hire Core Employees!

> This article discusses how to efficiently interview and hire core employees during peak recruitment season, proposing a 10-minute interview method consisting of four steps: chat, presentation, questioning, and answering. It also reveals three interview secrets: early disclosure of compensation, avoiding braggarts, and not hiring the 'best' candidates.

This article is reprinted from: FMCG Distributor Professional Consulting Management (kxpjxszyzxgl)
Accompanying the eternal issue of how to deal with core employee resignation is how to recruit new core employees. During the peak recruitment season, how can companies improve efficiency in interviews for key positions?

[Why Can't We Select Talent?]
Any employer hopes to find excellent talent. However, after a series of recruitment steps—job postings, resume screening, initial interviews, and final interviews—employers often find that the hired person is not ideal. What is the reason? A typical interview just asks a few common basic questions and then relies on gut feeling. Larger companies may have multiple rounds of interviews, where a succession of people puts candidates through several rounds without making a decision. An interview style resembling an interrogation might barely work for hiring ordinary employees, but it is hardly effective for core backbone employees.

In reality, interrogation-style interviews are everywhere. Inexperienced or mediocre interviewers treat the interview as a procedural set of questions, with candidates mechanically answering, and then the interviewer dismisses them. The atmosphere is indeed similar to interrogating a prisoner. This direct questioning not only creates an awkward atmosphere but generally fails to elicit substantive content. Candidates either have prepared scripts or answer defensively, rather than openly and proactively. As a result, the interviewer has almost no impression of the candidate beyond appearance, and the important inner thoughts and basic abilities remain vague. The problem is not with the candidates but with the interviewer, who is constrained by a mechanical interview process, forcing candidates to adapt, making them appear to have little 'personality difference.' Ultimately, the interviewer arbitrarily picks someone based on personal preference, rendering the interview meaningless.

[How to Interview Core Employees?]
The typical interview process is: initial screening by HR—assessing basic qualities; professional abilities are evaluated by department managers; for important positions and manager-level candidates, one or two additional interviews are conducted by senior leaders. How should these leaders interview candidates? My experience is: one chat, two presentations, three questions, four answers.

[One Chat: Who chats? What to chat about? How long?]
Answer: The interviewer chats about content related to the position being recruited, for 3 minutes.

As an interviewer, the leader should briefly describe the company's general situation and development prospects in a few words, because the company's growth requires new talent to join. This naturally leads to explaining the reasons and significance of the recruitment. Then, specifically describe what the new hire needs to do, to what extent, and even mention the compensation for achieving certain results. In short, as a leader-level interviewer, you should convey the company's current status, development prospects, and relevant factors of the position in a coherent manner within the shortest time, taking about two to three minutes. Through this chat, even without asking questions, the candidate will immediately resonate and, based on the topic, proceed to elaborate, maximizing time savings. Otherwise, if you ask questions immediately or ask broad questions, candidates often don't know what to say and ramble aimlessly, wasting both parties' time.

Why use the chat format? Chatting differs from lecturing; it's an informal conversation between two or a few people, conducted in a relaxed, democratic atmosphere, making it natural, relaxed, and pleasant. This helps candidates relax and perform at their true level. Otherwise, being too formal makes candidates feel you are fake, bureaucratic, or even offensive.

[Two Presentations: Who presents? What to present? How long?]
Answer: The candidate presents content related to the position, for 3 minutes.

Even though the interviewer makes no requests or asks no questions, after hearing the interviewer's brief remarks, the candidate will immediately search their memory for content related to the interviewer's chat, and selectively present the most relevant and suitable aspects in what they consider the most appropriate way.

Why does the candidate present rather than chat or use other forms? This is due to the unequal psychological state and information asymmetry between candidate and interviewer. Candidates are generally eager to showcase their abilities and qualities suitable for the position, in a self-promoting state, so they cannot chat calmly. If a candidate can chat easily with the interviewer, it indicates exceptional psychological quality or a clear psychological advantage, typical of senior managers with extensive experience.

This presentation is the most critical part of the interview process because the interviewer can gauge the candidate's basic connotation, professional experience, and resource background. More importantly, it reveals the candidate's total knowledge, breadth of thinking, speed, depth, precision, language organization, logic, summarization, simplification, and adaptability—qualities hard to assess from resumes, written tests, or tests. Even if the interviewer has reviewed the resume, hearing the candidate speak is a completely different assessment angle. Experienced interviewers can form a clear view and a near-accurate judgment from the 3-minute presentation.

If the interview follows the traditional, simple, mechanical question-and-answer format, it won't yield such results. In a one-on-one interrogation-style interview, both parties feel tense, in both offensive and defensive positions, leading to adversarial rather than cooperative psychological states. How can a good interview result occur if both parties are uncooperative? Thus, the art of interviewing lies in the interviewer's ability to align the candidate's psychological state with their own, fostering positive interaction rather than conflict.

Therefore, during the candidate's 3-minute presentation, the interviewer should listen attentively, offering smiles of encouragement and affirmation, and avoid interrupting. Interrupting would break the candidate's train of thought, causing them to deviate from their prepared points, and also extend the interview time, increasing costs and delaying other scheduled interviews.

[Three Questions: Who asks? What to ask? How to ask?]
Answer: The interviewer asks about key content and contradictions, with a balance of firmness and gentleness.

The interviewer must patiently listen to the candidate's 3-minute presentation. For those who ramble on, the interviewer can use body language like checking the watch or politely remind them to wrap up.

After the presentation, the interviewer should proactively ask questions. What to ask? Avoid clichés, topics already in the resume, or those covered in the written test or the 3-minute presentation. Otherwise, candidates may be annoyed: 'It's in my resume,' 'I just said that,' causing awkwardness.

What should be asked? Focus on: questions the interviewer needs to know but weren't covered in the resume, written test, or presentation; contradictions in the candidate's statements or resume; and aspects where the candidate's stated facts or resume content don't align with the position. In essence, ask about contradictions to see how the candidate responds.

How to ask? The tone and style should vary by individual: for outgoing candidates, ask more directly and quickly; for introverts, be more tactful. But never attack, hurt, or lecture the candidate. Regardless, questions should be soft with firmness, indirect yet direct. Only by hitting the key points and contradictions can the interview be effective. This is because you need to supplement key information and assess the candidate's adaptability and defense ability, as well as integrity and underlying issues.

[Four Answers: Who answers? What to answer? How to answer?]
When the interviewer hits a sore spot, the answer is crucial. As the saying goes: only high-level questions elicit high-level answers. At this point, the interview reaches its climax. The candidate's ability to handle contradictions and their artistic charm are revealed in these brief answers. The real confrontation begins. If the candidate answers clearly, proceed to the next question; if there are flaws, probe further; if the candidate becomes flustered or sweaty, it may indicate issues or hidden difficulties. As the interviewer, you can let it go, switch to a lighter topic, and give the candidate a way out. Remember, both parties are equal and mutually selecting; the interviewer is not a judge and shouldn't act like one. Just knowing the issue is enough.

In practice, candidates may also ask the interviewer questions, typically about salary, benefits, leave, work hours, business processes, inter-departmental relationships, company background, or competition. The interviewer should answer truthfully and directly, but with some artistry.

The total Q&A time between interviewer and candidate should be kept within 4 minutes.

In summary, the total time to interview one candidate is 10 minutes. Too little time yields poor results; too much time increases costs and reduces effectiveness. Of course, for clearly unsuitable candidates, the interview can end in as little as 5 minutes, but politely and courteously.

[Interview Secret 1: Disclose Compensation Early]
Candidates first care about the position's compensation, second whether they can handle the job, and third the job requirements and fit. However, many employers only mention job requirements, not the first two, reflecting severe self-centeredness. Regarding salary and other routine matters, the interviewer should ideally inform the candidate within the first 3 minutes, or in the first round, or even in the job advertisement, to avoid candidates circling around the topic out of embarrassment. This isn't vulgar; it's being responsible to the candidate and to yourself.

[Interview Secret 2: Don't Hire Braggarts]
Experienced interviewers generally don't ask: 'How would you do this job well?' or 'How much sales can you achieve?' If an interviewer asks such questions, there are only two possibilities: either the interviewer is inexperienced and ignorant of HR, or they have ulterior motives, hoping to gather ideas from your thoughts, or even asking you to produce a plan within 3 days—often they ask many candidates for plans to steal their wisdom rather than hire talent. Candidates should be wary of such employers and interviewers.

On the flip side, for interviewers genuinely seeking talent, if a candidate brags about their abilities, resources, or sales potential, there's only one response: 'Definitely reject them.' Such candidates are either liars or madmen, both highly destructive to a company. Think about it: an outsider unfamiliar with the company's internal information claims they can achieve great things just by reciting a mantra—aren't they mad or fraudulent?

How to judge practical ability? Simply look at what they've done, what they've accomplished, and how they did it. What they've done shows experience; what they've accomplished shows ability; how they did it shows their thinking. That's sufficient! These can be verified through resumes, interviews, and background checks, not by listening to what they claim they'll do in the future. This discussion focuses on hiring for key positions—management and leadership roles, core backbone employees—not ordinary staff or new graduates needing development.

[Interview Secret 3: Don't Hire the 'Best']
After interviews, if 10 qualified candidates need 4 hires, who should be chosen? Even a fool knows: pick the top four. But practical experience suggests: avoid the top two and hire those ranked third and below. Why?

First, because the best are in high demand; you're not the only employer. When you hire the top two, there's a probation period. Employers often think, 'I'm testing you,' but forget that candidates are also testing the company. During probation, both sides have low opportunity costs and can fire each other—not just the company firing the employee.

Second, excellent people always have many opportunities. Not only do you see their value, but other companies do too. During probation, they'll keep their options open, and many opportunities will beckon. They may leave at any time. Then what? You think of those ranked in the middle, but by then they've found jobs, leaving you empty-handed.

Third, those ranked at the top may soon develop intentions to leave after joining. Why? Because they quickly discover many negative aspects of the company. Before joining, they only saw and heard the good side. Once hired, they encounter the full truth. If they also face bullying or jealousy from colleagues, it's even harder to bear. If external opportunities arise, they'll leave quickly.

This article is reprinted from: FMCG Distributor Professional Consulting Management (kxpjxszyzxgl)
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