Question

Case Study

Today, we all seem to be very concerned with who we are. “Who am I?” Oprah asked herself, as she has asked others for years when interviewing. We tend to ask this question often as we compete with others 24/7. In fact, the competition seems to have grown fiercer as students try to edge their foot inside the doors of top organizations. This is definitely the case in Beirut, Lebanon, a developing country in the Middle East and North African Area (MENA), where successful companies begin with interview screening, having done an initial background check (sometimes without the applicant’s consent) in order to monitor whether the candidates did well in university, were successful in the local or regional market, or had a criminal record. Today, job applicants are aware of “impression management” and the importance of perception. How important is a candidate’s appearance? For instance, the highly competitive local market in Lebanon adheres to the French tradition in terms of mannerism and dress code. Managers and employees alike adhere to a custom that favors bright, attractive, very fashionably dressed personnel. As such, before they went to be interviewed at Byblos Bank, a leading domestic multinational bank, Zeina Samaha spent a small fortune on cosmetic surgery, whereas Josiane El Khoury spent it on her briefcase, suit, shoes, and jewelry. Even though they had both graduated with distinction from university and had shown professional competence in their previous job, they understood that appearance played a crucial role in the business world. These issues also influenced Joseph Boustany, the human resource manager at a trendy clothing shop on the Jounieh shopping strip of Kaslik. Before being interviewed at Zara, the hip Spanish clothes shop at the ABC Mall in Aschrafieh, Joseph went over the company’s history and the job description; then he thought through the upcoming interview and mulled over his dress code before he bought a fashionable trendy suit, tie, and jewelry.

Questions

1. People in general spend a fortune to improve their physical image as well as their résumé. Do you think candidates eliminate competition when improving their personal image?

2. What is the extent of candidates’ control in terms of “dressing up” their résumé and letters of recommendation? In effect, how much latitude do companies give when they assess candidates’ portfolios?

3. Is it ethical that potential employers have the right to carry out an assessment of the candidate’s past?

Answer 1

1. One of the harsh realities of the new generation is the cut throat competition for limited opportunities. Be it in business, marketing, sales, office promotions, office space, or even college. The world has progressed so far that everyone has found multiple challengers in unexpected ventures. For instance, consider the scenario where a new role is being formed in an organization. Even before the post has been declared there will be lot of internal people having an eye for that post and already putting word in with job posters. Once the job has been posted on any job forum or classified, thousands of applicants flow in for such posts. Studies show that a job poster gets an average of 20-30 seconds to glance through a CV before moving on to next one. This is not just down to the vast number of applications but also to the fast that all the acquisition needs to be done faster since there might be a business impact due to delay. It is no secret that most of the CV`s that reach a recruiters desk are written by well paid professionals who ensure those CV stand the glance test and show out the key word to attract the poster. Once the CV has been selected, the next step is usually the face to face round. During this round there again will be lot of aspiring candidates all plying for the same role. They might have similar backgrounds too and their answers might be on par too. In such a case, the HR and recruiter would often have a look at the personality of the individual and how the individual can gel into the team. One common method through which everyone tries to impress the recruiters is by dressing up their best . but it goes beyond that, people spend countless hours taking effort into staying fit and improving the personality defects just to gain the slight advantage over others when the time is due. I personally think, candidates with better personality can reduce the chances of a candidate with sub-par personality even if the CV is not on par. In the new generation, where all the candidates are similar in nature, it becomes vital for the candidate to ensure each of the aspect including the personality traits are groomed in such a way that it sets with the requirement in the corporate and the community.

2. Every candidate usually gets their resume validate by few others before they apply using it to various organizations. This helps in ensuring there is new perspective on the resume and also gives a non biased view on the changes needed in the resume. Very often, candidates use help of external partners to design the resume in such a way that the resumes can stand out from the crowd. This helps them to prepare the resume which is apt for the job and also showcase different unique skill-set. Another way used by candidates to showcase the hard work and talent is by getting letters of recommendation from seniors in community or company to show their attitude and personality towards certain objective. All these matter to the employers who take pain to research the background of the employee to identify the correct candidate from a pool of candidates. From a candidates perspective, they can showcase themselves in the best possible manner through a well written resume and letter of recommendation. But in reality, unless the candidate is exceptionally good from other they would not help in getting a job offer. They might chances to have interviews but that is far from getting the job offer. While accessing candidates portfolio`s if the letters of recommendation have been given by certain prominent individuals in the company then it might have a certain impact else there is minimal impact of the letters of recommendation.

3. Every organization that hires a new employee is making a significant effort in terms of investment and time to identify the right resource and then reject others. There could be chances that there are multiple candidates who are on par with each other. In those cases. The organization needs to be certain that the selected candidate is the best among the available options. For this reason, companies perform background checks on individuals before hiring. The checks can be in form of medical checks, educational checks, recommendation check , employment history etc. No company would want to take a risky prospect and damage any reputation it has in the industry. I therefore believe that it is ethically right for potential employer to carry out a detailed assessment of the candidates past. If something which is not acceptable does come out the organization can always reach out the candidate and get a detailed explanation of the same.