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When someone asks you to be a reference you should always prepare what you’re going to say prior to the call. You should be prepared with the following things:
- The name of the person and the company that is calling.
- The title and duties of the job.
- The length of time that you knew the applicant.
- The strengths and weaknesses of the applicant.
It does not require an extensive amount of work. Just a few minutes of your time to prepare for when you get that phone call. The rest you come up with based on what you’re asked.
Speaking of which…
I had the pleasure of being a reference for a former colleague of mine recently. Except, it wasn’t a pleasure. While I knew he/she had applied with this company and the position, I also knew that he hadn’t even interviewed for the job so I was not expecting this company to call. For the next 30 minutes I was asked questions about my former colleague that I would expect to be asked of him during an interview. With every skill they asked about I had to come up with specific examples. I felt like I was being grilled and not even about myself. Call me a bad reference because I was not prepared for that!
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Comments
07.29.09
I think that at some point I would have said, "These sound like interview questions. Am I being considered for a position in your company?"
Thirty minutes is much too much of your time for them to have taken. I got all of the information I needed about my last hire in two reference checks that probably didn't last 10 minutes added together! (I wish I'd given more weight to the second reference, but that's another story.) I think it would have been entirely reasonable for you to say something like, "I'm happy to recommend X for this job, but my available time has run out. Is there anything more I can tell you in 30 seconds?"
07.29.09
It could be worse. You could be party to an NSA background check conducted by the FBI.
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