Number of interviews for a job

Why do companies feel the need to do 1-4 round of interviews to fill a job opening? how many people does it take to confirm the perfect candidate?

I interviewed with 18 people at J&J last week (2 rounds). At some point you start thinking, someone is bound not to like me =-). I think the whole interviewing process, especially at big companies is ridiculous, 4 or 5 people should be able to make a decision on a candidate, more than that and you have too many opinions.

The funny thing is that even after three or four rounds of interviews, companies still hire rejects, so the system still fails.

 

It seems like I have been through a hundred interviews over the last year. When I get multiple departmental and management interview, I tend to withdraw and lose interest in the process.

When you interview with 5 people.....4 of the 5 could careless about the hire. Trying to win over one or two people is fine, but I refuse to play the game after while. A major waste of time, energy and limited resources.

I swear management is so spooked to make a decision they let good candidates fall through the cracks.

The first pharma company I interviewed with hired me after an hour interview. I was with them for 15 years in various sales and management assignments.

Hiring is still a crap shoot. All the interviews, testing and analytic methods will not remove this fact.

 

Added, they interview candidates today as though they will be working across the desk from the candidate for 30 years. They go through this vast corporate search and interview process for a job a solid, high school senior could accomplish with some direction.

The average length of employment is 18 - months for new hires within a pharmaceutical and device company. Hiring managers take themselves way to seriously these days.

Some have a very high opinion of themselves. You feel the narcissistic overtures throughout most interviews.

 

I hear you, same thing at my current job. I have been at this company for 16 year and I was interviewed by 3 people.

Mind you, it is not just J&J, everyone here in the SF area I talk to has had the same experience. Some of these roles are for manager or director level too, so is not like they are interviewing for an SVP role.

I think is waste of resources, because some candidates just interview well and know how to work the system, these same candidate are the ones that are bouncing from company to company every two years as well.

One round of interview with 2-4 people should suffice or better yet, gather all 25 employees that are going to interview and put them all in one room with the candidate.

I kept telling the same story over and over at J&J, I started sounding like a broken record.

18 people and still can't decide??

I think I am staying put for now...

 

They do these multiple interviews to make themselves feel like they are working. It's a total waste of time and resources. Many of these people that are interviewing have no idea how to sell anything or build relationships with anyone. Everything is resolved by a formula for them. Interview 20 candidates eliminate 3 every round then drill the last two standing. Means absolutely nothing because MANY times the candidate that will ultimately perform the best was cut during the first round. It's Nonsense.

 

bringing on a new rep is expensive- I've heard over $100k. Sometimes it takes multiple people to uncover the professional interviewer- the ones that crush the interview but suck in the field.
In my opinion, more work needs to be done upfront before the interview. That's when reference checks should be done and top line background checks should be done.
As the industry shrinks, new job candidates will be scrutinized very closely. Get used to it

 

Yes, love that info