What is a Stress Interview?
A stress interview takes place when a job applicant is placed in a stressful situation to see how they react. The nature of stress interviews can vary.
The candidate may be asked repeated difficult or inappropriate interview questions, become subject to testing, there may be multiple interviewers at once or sequential interviews, or the candidate may be kept waiting, treated rudely, or otherwise put in an intimidating position.
Why Employers Use Stress Interviews
The goal of a stress interview is to determine how a candidate reacts under pressure. Creating an emotionally chaotic setting puts the candidate under psychological stress to see if they will crack, remain calm, or even thrive under such pressure. Here's an example of a stress interview.
Stress interviews are a highly contested topic because they create a sensitive and emotionally charged relationship between the applicant and the hiring manager, and therefore the company.
Employee efficiency may suffer considering the fear the company instilled within the worker during the hiring process. Sometimes, even the most successful applicants will turn down an offer on account of the nature of the interview alone.
How to Handle a Stress Interview
The key to getting through this process is to remain calm and unemotional throughout the interview, but for many when provoked or disrespected, keeping a level head is not as easy as it may sound.
It's important to keep in mind that you are interviewing the company as much as they are interviewing you.
A question to ask yourself, if you have been subject to a stress interview, is whether you would want to work for a company that treated job applicants this way?
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