A coffee, a stranger, and a masterclass in how not to interview
“Do you use Powerpoint?”
“Yes. I do.”
“Great. Because this job really needs an advanced knowledge of Powerpoint to design and make presentations to staff and the board. Um… Er… How are you on Employment Law?”
It was at this point that I nearly redecorated the lounge of a well-known Business Centre just off the M1 with my coffee.
I’d arrived early for a booked interview room and was sitting in the business lounge, next to a conversation I couldn’t help overhearing. One person was a recruitment “consultant.” The other, becoming visibly more uncomfortable by the minute, was a HR manager being interviewed for a senior role with a well-known client. I was so surprised, I wrote the words down at the time.
Two things there nearly caused me to get coffee over the walls of the Regus centre…
Firstly, the lack of confidentiality. In the short time I sat there, I learned who the candidate worked for, roughly what she earned, what role she was being interviewed for, and other, fairly personal, details about both her and the client company. There were four other people in that lounge, working on laptops, reading the paper, waiting for their own meetings. This was no place for that conversation, however quietly it was being conducted. It’s not the only time either: I’ve lost count of how much sensitive information I’ve overheard in hotel lobbies, airport lounges, and on trains.
Secondly, the interview itself. The PowerPoint question – clearly relevant to the role, but with no real follow-up – was typical of the whole exchange: a string of closed, cursory questions with no depth and no flow. I had to leave before it ended, but I’ve no reason to think it improved.
What this actually costs you
It’s easy to read this as an amusing story about a bad recruiter and move on. But if you outsource hiring to a firm, retained or otherwise, that conversation is happening in your name, about your business, to a candidate forming their first real impression of what it’s like to work for you.
A superficial interview doesn’t just risk embarrassment – it risks the wrong hire. A good leadership recruitment interview takes knowledge, experience, and a bit of skill to properly assess someone’s suitability, motivation, and fit. It isn’t a checklist exercise, however much some processes treat it as one.
And the confidentiality point matters more now than it did when this happened. Candidate details, salary information, and client hiring plans are all personal or commercially sensitive data. Data your recruitment partner has a genuine duty, not just a courtesy, to handle properly. A recruiter having that conversation in a public lounge isn’t just indiscreet, it’s a real data-handling failure.
What to check before you hand someone a search
If you’re choosing who represents your business to candidates, a few direct questions are worth asking before you sign anything:
- How do they handle confidential information — in writing, in person, and in transit between meetings?
- What does their interview process actually look like? Ask to see the structure, not just a description of “we assess for fit.”
- Who’s doing the interviewing, and what’s their actual experience in recruiting, not just sales?
- Can they explain your business and the role back to you, in their own words, before they’ve spoken to a single candidate?
Recruitment fees are rarely cheap. If you’re spending that budget, spend it on someone who’d pass their own interview.
Written by John Hamilton
John is Managing Director of bfpeople. He is an experienced recruiter, qualified to use a wide range of occupational psychometrics, and a trained executive coach and mentor.
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