Hiring the Best: Manager's Guide to Effective Interviewing and Recruiting, Fifth Edition Paperback – August 30, 2005

A great resource for interviewing prospective employees where you can structure the interview questions to fit the job profile -- sales, administrative, creative -- and the questions are open-ended which allows for no yes or no answers. Great resource!

The first time I read this book was during an HR class on recruiting in the 90's. I've kept up with every update and find it to be one of the best and easiest books to utilize on hiring. I keep a supply on hand to give to hiring managers who don't have experience or need more experience with interviewing. It is easy to read and follow and the interview skeletons in the book give you a lot of ideas on how to structure your interviews. I would highly recommend this for anyone who does recruiting or interviewing.

I use this book both for interviewing techniques and for preparing to be interviewed. Its a great book for interviewing because he presents the pros and cons of different techniques and gives what I consider to be a good framework for identifying quality candidates. Its a great book for preparing to be interviewed because it helps you identify the objectives of interviewers and make a better case. As a hiring manager, you should be able to pass an interview with flying colors, shouldn't you?Perhaps the most enlightening wisdom I got from the book was the enumeration of the qualities of a good employee:1. Ability to do the job2. Willingness to do the job3. Manageability of the candidateMost interviews focus on the abilities of the candidates and stop there. Big mistake! Mr. Yate gives you guidance on evaluating the whole candidate, and in general I like and agree with his advice.Other good ideas are evaluating the cracks in resumes, phone screening, and lunch. Never hire anyone without checking background, verifying employment and education, and seeing if they can carry on a conversation at lunch.I draw ideas for interviews from several books, but this one is the overall framework that I have worked from. I feel the style is readable, the length is appropriate, and the content is excellent.

This is an excellent book written by an author with decades of experience who writes in an easy-to-understand voice. Unfortunately, the seller packed the book in a plastic bag with no protection, so the book arrived slightly damaged (hence my deduction of one star). Obviously, the damage didn't affect the book's content, which remains excellent, but I'd planned to give the book as a gift. I strongly recommend the book but wish that this seller had packed it better, perhaps with some cardboard reinforcement, say.

This is an extremely well written and very useful book on hiring techniques and methods. The author analyzes all aspects of the hiring process beginning with the different types of resumes and when each type is used; what flags to look for and how to evaluate an applicant's overall resume. Chapter five focuses on short-listing through a `phoner' while the subsequent chapters are devoted to interviewing techniques and the science of asking questions.The author introduces four different interviewing techniques - Situational; personality profile; stress; and & behavioral - and also gives a very useful and informative analysis of the different types of questions that can be asked in a hiring interview like half-right reflexives; hamburger-helper questions; and question layering. In the following chapters, the author focuses on evaluating the candidate's ability and willingness to do the job as well as manageability. The questions and the author's commentary on what to look for and red flags in an applicant's answer are informative, highly usable, and extremely useful. These are not your 'standard' interview questions (though there are some pretty standard questions included). They are well formulated and clever probes into the applicant's skills, knowledge, personality, and background.The rest of the book is devoted to functional areas with a chapter devoted to clerical, management, sales, contingency workers and law hires. Again, I found the advice and suggestions relevant and informative. In formulating the hundreds of question suggestions scattered throughout the book, the author has given a lot of thought to the qualities, experiences, and areas of concern that hiring managers and HR people focus on.

ok read

Like many small business people, I was a complete bozo at hiring for many years. Fortunately, at some point I woke up to that fact and decided to educate myself. I took classes, read books and did everything I could to become a skilled interviewer. Without question, one of the most helpful tools to escaping Bozoland was this book. Although I am now a freelance business consultant and have no employees of my own, I frequently assist my clients with their own hiring processes, and in so doing I still refer extensively to Martin Yate's excellent book.

So few people have solid interviewing skills, which are critical in ensuring that you consistently hire the best people. This book is incredibly useful in helping you move past the "gut" decision. Several chapters are spent on how to ask various questions so that you neither lead the candidate into giving you the answer you want, nor intimidate the candidate at the wrong time. Very helpful in redefining the typical standard questions (which any decent candidate is prepared for) so that you can really get to the substance.The book's focus on explaining why certain methods and techniques work better is excellent. In particular it has been very useful in teaching and/or re-assuring the interviewers (both veterans and newbies) at my company that they are asking the right questions and making the correct judgement calls. That confidence is a key success differentiator from the usual randomness in interviewing that often leads to a substandard hire.