Presentation from the MCN Conference, November 7, 2019. Session Title: Acing the Interview Session Description: As rapidly as technologies change, so does the employment landscape for digital professionals. Hiring managers are increasingly challenged to find not just the right talent to fit organizational needs, but also to hire people who can join their existing teams as rapidly and seamlessly as possible. At the same time, job seekers want to present their best work and highlight the skills and characteristics that will make them the perfect candidate for the job. Whether you are an emerging professional, switching up your career after many years in the field, or anywhere in between, we want to help you ace the interview and get the job of your dreams. Through short presentations, mock interviews (demonstrations), and ongoing interactive discussion, attendees will witness the good, the bad, and the ugly of the interviewing process and learn how to handle its twists and turns. Topics will include: managing your resume, interview questions and how best to answer them, communication strategies throughout the hiring process, negotiating salary, and a few potential “gotchas.” Attendees will leave better prepared to navigate the complexities of the interview process.

1. Acing the Interview
November 7, 2019

2. MCN 201902
Introductions
Vicki Portway @sluggernova
Director Digital Strategy & Experience, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum
Douglas Hegley @dhegley
Chief Digital Officer, Minneapolis Institute of Art
Karina Wratschko @karinanw
Asst Director of Library and Digital Strategies, Philadelphia Museum of Art
Rob Lancefield @roblancefield
Head of IT, Yale Center for British Art
(speaking from hiring experience at the Davison Art Center, Wesleyan University)
Dana Allen-Greil @danamuses
Director Digital Strategy, Monterey Bay Aquarium
We will share this
deck, so no need to
frantically photograph the
slides or take copious notes
- unless you like that sort of
thing, then please be our
guest!
We will also share a
resource handout online

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Quick question

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We are explorers, not experts
Osa Johnson (1884-1937)
Explorer, Adventurer, Photographer, Filmmaker
a.k.a. “Historical Badass”
Image source: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/88101736431501364/?nic=1a

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Let’s Talk About Hiring

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“Sought-after jobs often come with the most difficult,
rigorous, and extensive interview processes ... weighed
down by arduous interview procedures that put the
candidate through the intellectual wringer.”
Jacqui Barrett-Poindexter (2012)
(emphasis mine)
Quote source: https://money.usnews.com/money/blogs/outside-voices-careers/2012/09/10/why-todays-interview-process-is-so-difficult
Image source: http://orig03.deviantart.net/de16/f/2014/303/4/5/trade___lisa_marie_varon_through_the_wringer_by_juacoproductionsarts-d84pdfz.png

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“If your organization is going to excel, it needs the right
people. But virtually every one of the standard approaches
to selecting those right people is dead wrong”
Mark Murphy (2012)
(emphasis mine)
Image source: https://profectusrecruitment.co.uk/interview-tips/

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Skills
Source: three-year study by Leadership IQ, a global leadership training and research company, compiled these results after studying 5,247
hiring managers from 312 public, private, business and healthcare organizations. Collectively these managers hired more than 20,000
employees during the study period.
When new hires fail, it is NOT due to a lack of skill

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But, wait … skills matter. Right?
Image Source: https://www.shanghaieye.com.cn/shanghai-craftsman-celebrates-the-skills-of-the-city/

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Skills are important ...
"We can agree that certain focused skills are essential. That
hiring coders who can’t code, salespeople who can’t sell or
architects who can’t architect is a short road to failure …
But how to explain that similar organizations with similarly
vocationally-skilled people find themselves with very
different outcomes?
Seth Godin (2017)
(emphasis mine)
Quote source: https://itsyourturnblog.com/lets-stop-calling-them-soft-skills-9cc27ec09ecb

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What Actually Makes a Great Workplace?

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How Do We Find Those Stunning Colleagues?
Image source: https://www.hrinasia.com/employee-relations/challenges-for-creative-teams-to-collaborate-in-the-workplace/

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The Usual Approach
● Post the job
● Screen resumes
● Interview candidates
● Pick one

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Posting: The Typical Job Description

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Oh, just a few required skills …
Source: Jeonghyun Kim, Edward Warga, William Moen. Competencies Required for Digital Curation: An Analysis of Job
Advertisements, International Journal of Digital Curation, 2013, Vol. 8, No. 1, pp. 66-83
This is a partial list taken
from an actual job
description for a digital
content archiving job

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Better Job Descriptions
Accurate - focused on the actual job
Thoughtfully and carefully constructed
Do NOT overstate necessary qualifications or education level
Note: By spending time and effort on the job description, you will save countless
hours you would have wasted screening poorly-matched applicants

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Screening Resumes & Cover Letters
Primary focus: skills
Rapid review, then stepwise “funnel”
How quickly can you test for necessary skills?
For example: 3-4 question emailed quiz
What are hiring managers looking for?
Image source: https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/smart-and-gets/9781590598382/Chapter04.html

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All-Too-Common Problems with
Resumes & Cover Letters
Too long, too wordy, too comprehensive
Obvious generic template (worse yet: overly-designed)
Lack of clarity - actually confuses a reviewer
Typos and misspelled words

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Hire character,
train skill
Image Source: https://goinswriter.com/wp-content/uploads/miyagi.jpg

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Acing the Interview
Interviewing

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Bad Questions
1. Lead the candidate to the desired answer
2. Answers cannot tell you if someone will be a high or low performer
3. So common or banal (or weird) that the answers will not differentiate people
4. Have little or nothing to do with the actual job
5. Stress, harass, pressure the candidate
6. Present hypothetical situations
7. Too cute, too clever, brainteasers (with no research backing them up)
8. Cherry-picked from a book
9. Illegal (please learn what you cannot ask by law)

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Effective Questions
1. Open-ended (leave the question hanging)
2. Get at values and attitudes
3. Based on the actual workplace culture
4. Help to differentiate candidates
5. Use curiosity to guide follow-up questions

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Answering Interview Questions - How To
1. Do your research
a.Company website, professional connection, Glassdoor, Hoovers, LinkedIn, Manta, Google
2. Honesty and authenticity are key
3. Practice and role-play
4. Use narrative - a brief story with specific details
5. Be prepared to speak to your values, work ethic, and ability to collaborate across
personalities and situations
6. Make sure to have a few pertinent questions of your own!

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Answering Interview Questions: Common Mistakes
1. Humble brag (false show of humility)
2. Me Me Me … forgetting that most success requires collaboration
3. Inflating your experience
4. Claiming lead role when not true (ahem, we check references)

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Acing the Interview
Mock Interviews

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Mock Interview: Scenario One
Two experienced managers interviewing a candidate for a management-level position
A mid-career museum professional seeking a significant change/promotion

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Thoughts? Questions?

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Mock Interview: Scenario Two
Two middle managers interviewing a candidate for a position in a photo archive.
An emerging museum professional, very early career, seeking first museum job

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Thoughts? Questions?

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Breakout Groups

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Report Back

32. Additional Resources
Handout
https://tinyurl.com/yyhkah8c

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Thank you!
And good luck out there!
Vicki Portway @sluggernova
Douglas Hegley @dhegley
Karina Wratschko @karinanw
Rob Lancefield @roblancefield
Dana Allen-Greil @danamuses