Last Thursday, Feedback Labs hosted a LabStorm here in Washington, D.C. Ashoka’s Bob Spoer and Sadhana Chunduri joined to get fresh collective thinking on their own feedback-related idea: What if you could give feedback to your job interviewer?
On his LinkedIn website, Spoer—a veteran in recruiting talent for organizations— explains, “My recruiting vision is simple — be compassionate. I put myself in the shoes of the candidate and hiring manager. Provide value in every conversation, whether as a recruiter or career advisor. Offer the right information in the right context at the right time to help the candidate and hiring manager make the right decision.”
In his effort to be more compassionate to candidates, but also to help employers learn more about their candidates to get the right fit, Spoer and his team at Ashoka are piloting a new mobile application that allows candidates to provide feedback about their interview process.
According to Spoer and Chunduri, an interview shouldn’t just be an interview. It’s a partnership. While candidates are being reviewed, they should also be reviewing their employer.
It’s an interesting proposition and one that might help shift the traditional power dynamic to give the candidate more voice. Potentially, it could also help Ashoka learn about its hiring process; collecting candidate feedback and returning it to the HR team could help interviewers improve. The move to creating a partnership, instead of just an interview, might even help keep strong applicants—those who don’t make the final cut—in a pool for future consideration or for referral to other partner organizations that are hiring.
The LabStorm raised some interesting questions, principal among them being: beyond the question of just “what if I could give feedback?” there is the very real question of “would I?” If I were a candidate, would I want to use this kind of application? What value does this really provide me? Should I be concerned about anonymity and how this affects my candidacy? If yes, would I be as forthcoming in my feedback? What are ways for Ashoka to hedge this concern?
Moreover, is this application meant to provide more value to the hiring organization or to the candidate? How can it be improved to make sure that it does both simultaneously? And simply from a design perspective, are there ways for the application to un-bias responses?
We’re excited to follow and learn more about Ashoka’s development of this app. It has potential to change the interview process in some HR industry-shaking ways.
LabStorms are an opportunity to bring your feedback-related idea to a supportive and diverse group of people that care to help you make your idea great. If you’re interested in presenting your idea, please contact us at [email protected]!
