Recruiting Internally - Fair or Unfair?

JKSandy

The internal person may have applied at the same time as you and had their interview the same day.

TELLIT01

I have also been the only 'outsider' interviewed for a role. I obviously didn't know that initially but the person responsible for booking in the inverviewees had their screen in a position where I could see the list of names and timings for the interview. Every one, except mine, had 'internal' beside the name.
Astonishingly, I didn't get the job. That was with our local police force who I guess would have been 'forced' to advertise externally. A total waste of time and money.
When I called the agency to let them know they were not at all happy.

gettingtheresometime

I now refuse to even apply for positions within organisations such as NHS or Councils as the whole process, ime, is merely a formality and the successful candidate has already been chosen

DKLS

So very common in HE and local councils where they have to be seen to be "fair", and I have refused to interview external candidates when its clear that an internal is a shoe in.

I was rail roaded into doing one and it was just a waste of resources, me and 4 senior mgt staff taking up a day to interview people who had zero chance of getting the job.

WolfSong2000

gettingtheresometime wrote: »

I now refuse to even apply for positions within organisations such as NHS or Councils as the whole process, ime, is merely a formality and the successful candidate has already been chosen

I work in the NHS (as a contractor) and have seen both sides...pathetic "interviews" where they blatantly already had a candidate in mind, but also being brought to a interview for a job I wasn't remotely qualified for - all I had going for me was I was a quick learner and had glowing references from previous managers...in this instance I got the job, and I know for a fact at least one other internal member of staff had also been interested in the role...so swings and roundabouts.

The main thing with the NHS is once you have NHS experience you're "in". They *always* seem to prefer cadidates with experience working in the NHS...it's like a members club or something. Crazy.

Nebulous2

I don't see it often being as clear cut as many people here think it is.

I valued internal people who had worked hard and performed well and I often advised them to apply, whilst trying very hard not to appear to be hinting that they would get the job. I would often advise more than one person to apply.

I've gone into an interview thinking there was a strong internal candidate and found another internal candidate coming through instead.

I've interviewed a strong external candidate where they performed very poorly and an internal candidate came through instead.

In short although I may have had an opinion on people based on previous performance and their application form it often turned out differently.

A pattern of behaviour often helped as well. A decent candidate (both internal and external) who missed out narrowly often came back better prepared and were successful next time.

Some of the most satisfying experiences I had recruiting were where keen enthusiastic people with a few rough edges were successful when longer standing members of staff didn't apply because they thought it was stitched up.

sweetilemon

I don't think its fair it's wasting people's time, I have been an internal candidate, been interviewed then when the jobs were announced, it was clear I was never in the running. It took me a week to fill out the application, a new outfit and as I didn't even have a phone 3G to tether from or internet at the time had to leave the house for wifi every night. I don't necessarily think it's just an "internal applicant" problem. I understand why a company would stick to their current employees though - motivation for other staff (promotion or movement within the company) and money saving ( candidate already undertaken company checks and training).

BunnieJ

That's just it sweetilemon, you've put in a lot of time and effort for no reason . It can be very demoralising. I know it works the other way too, when external candidates prove to be much more suitable, then the internal "shoe-ins" for the job are upset when they don't get the job. However, they have probably lost a lot less than an external candidate. Perhaps some of them (I know not everyone will do this) may have not put in as much work as they thought they would be getting the job. There are lots of reasons why you might fail an interview, but IMO it should be because you performed badly/not what they company are looking for rather than because they already know who they're giving the job to.