Favoured Candidate Problem

Jarndyce

Passing this on for a friend, hoping to get some alternative insights from you lovely people with more experience of office politics than I have:

Hi, my immediate boss has just been promoted and I would love to have the opportunity to go for her old job. Trouble is, she has a personal friend at my level also who is clearly her favoured candidate and who she is obviously grooming for the role.

I have overheard her offering to coach her friend for the (inevitable) interview, and to email her the presentation that she gave for the role she has been promoted into, which sets out her vision for the future, which will clearly give her friend an advantage at interview

Now I have learned my old boss is going to be on the interview & selection panel for the job, so I feel I have even less chance. What can I do?

Googlewhacker

Not alot really.....

If she moans to her bosses boss then she will become disliked by her boss even more.

As long as its not discriminatory in the eyes of the law whilst its unfair I can't see anything your friend can do about it. Other than make it known that she does want the job and concentrate on the others that are in the panel in trying to win over.

Emmzi

ask the woman for a discussion about the role and then ask questions about vision and plan for the future. If that isn't forthcoming she can drop that into the interview (eg I know you don't have a clear plan yet but from our discussion I feel that...)

Little else can be done though. It's not illegal discrimination. I'd probably query whether it was worth the effort of applying although if close friend turns it down at least she's in with a shot.

scheming_gypsy

also has to hope that there's at least 3 people on the selection panel; and try and impress the others, to override the current bosses vote.

Acc72

Ok, this kind of thing happens all the time.

If your friend decides to apply for this role, they need to accept and understand the situation, get over it, be positive and work within the parameters that have already been set - otherwise they may as well just not bother applying in the first place.

eg. the other candidate may be "the same level", but do they have the detailed knowledge / experience that your friend has as a direct report of the person promoted ?

They need to focus on their own specific skills and knowledge, and not worry about what other candidates may or may not offer.

Your friend can also ask their former boss for help in preparing for the interview - few people can resist an ego boost, and as long as your freind asks the right questions, they might end up getting as much inside info. as the other candidate.

It just needs to be approached properly - rather than being negative (eg, you have told "x" so now tell me") they just need to be positive (eg, "you have really good knowledge of this area and also how to be succesful at an interview and I would like to pick your brains on a couple of points ...").

ladylouise62

I've been in a similar situation before (well, people already 'acting' in the post), but went for it anyway with all the enthusiasm I could muster - it gave me a chance to show myself off in case anything else came up.

Don't forget that even if she gets the job, anything could happen and the job (or another) could become vacant again in the near future. Again that happened to me, it took just 6 mnths before it was vacant again, and because I had already interviewed well they already had me under consideration for any future roles...so I got my job

SHIPSHAPE

Jarndyce wrote: »

Passing this on for a friend, hoping to get some alternative insights from you


she has a personal friend at my level also who is clearly her favoured candidate and who she is obviously grooming

I have overheard her offering to coach her friend


What can I do?

Bloody well join in the lez fest then tell us more!:j

TrickyWicky

Jarndyce wrote: »

What can I do?

Be Evil. Sounds horrible but it's dog eat dog these days and I've had enough of taking **** from people and sitting at the bottom of the ladder for being a hard grafter who's smarter than most.

Dig up dirt on the other colleague, grass up their bad practices, trash their reputation to hell and back. They won't get up the ladder then.

Someone will only do it your friend otherwise.

sho_me_da_money

TrickyWicky wrote: »

Be Evil. Sounds horrible but it's dog eat dog these days and I've had enough of taking **** from people and sitting at the bottom of the ladder for being a hard grafter who's smarter than most.

Dig up dirt on the other colleague, grass up their bad practices, trash their reputation to hell and back. They won't get up the ladder then.

Someone will only do it your friend otherwise.

Am feeling this.

Acc72

ladylouise62 wrote: »

I've been in a similar situation before (well, people already 'acting' in the post), but went for it anyway with all the enthusiasm I could muster - it gave me a chance to show myself off in case anything else came up.

Don't forget that even if she gets the job, anything could happen and the job (or another) could become vacant again in the near future. Again that happened to me, it took just 6 mnths before it was vacant again, and because I had already interviewed well they already had me under consideration for any future roles...so I got my job

This is a good post with some good advice.

mountainofdebt

even if this colleague does get the job, if she has to be coached for the interview then more than likely she's going to be over her head in the role.

Once this is obvious then I doubt the boss will be happy to carry her friend and I predict that the friendship will either come to a swift end or the friend will be moved out of the role - but more likely both will happen