Donald Trump on the Florida High School Shooting President Trump’s bold hypothetical statements in the aftermath of the fatal school shooting which left 17 people dead, is, as an extreme example, at the heart of what recruiters and hiring managers are often conflicted with when gauging the suitability of an employee for a role. The jumble of truth, ego, and experience can be a difficult one to dissect.

We search for clues through body language and evidence based examples to assess whether the candidate is portraying themselves accurately, or rather how they want us to perceive them. The above comments from the leader of the free world jolt us back to recruitment 101- behavioural interviewing and its importance. If the president ever found himself in such a situation he may run in, he may not. He may freeze up in fear as lot of people in shock do. He may do as the first responder did and followed the procedure and issued a code red from a safe shelter. He may have run in unarmed and tackled the shooter and saved the day. We don’t know because he has not been in that situation. And that is the danger of hypothetical comments and hypothetical interviews, the hyperbole with which we indulge ourselves without having to demonstrate it. 

In the interview context we see this over and over again. That is why we introduced behavioural based interviews which require candidates to provide specific examples of where they can evidence a required capability. I am yet to interview someone for a frontline role that when you ask what is their strength does not say ‘Customer service. ‘ Yet we know this to be unequivocally untrue, as if it really were every candidate who interviewed’s strength, none of us would experience bad customer service. 

I am yet to interview someone for a frontline role that when you ask what is their strength does not say ‘Customer service. ‘ Yet we know this to be unequivocally untrue, as if it really were every candidate who interviewed’s strength, none of us would experience bad customer service. From retail, to hospitality, to a phone technician for your Foxtel we are frequently exposed to poor standards of customer care, yet at their interviews I am sure they all said told the interview panel that this is their thing. So instead of asking hypothetical questions like ‘ what would you do to ensure a customer receives great service from us?’ in which the applicant could make up anything from how they would drive the customers kids to school, to giving them extra change back from the till, we instead say ‘ Tell us about a time when you went above and beyond for a customer, what did you do specifically do to ensure a positive experience?’

Past behaviour as an indicator of future performance can be a flawed measure, but it is still best predictor of what someone would do if put into that situation again. If they spoke over and were rude to the customer in their last role, they are more likely than someone who wasn’t to do it again. So if we were interviewing President Trump and he tells us he would run in to save the children against an armed madman we would say ‘Please give us an example of when you have demonstrated such bravery?’ We would look through his resume and see that he had deferred military service 5 times and ask him to explain the disparity between his comments and his previous avoidance of armed conflict. We would assess him against other candidates who did give past examples of managing crisis situations and make the decision as to who would be the most likely to be successful in such a role. Whilst we cant always get it right and some people will tell mistruths even in behavioural interviews, we can use behavioural interviewing as a reliable tool to probe into the past and cut through the rhetoric. 

I press for progress for my grandmother, whose father, on learning she had taken a job, walked into her employer on her first day and dragged her out, he was so humiliated a daughter of his would work. The same woman who now, after a lifetime of normalised misogyny, still refuses to go to a female doctor.

I press for progress for my mother who, as with many women of her generation that pushed for equality, was often ridiculed and sexualised in her attempts to stand up for herself at work.

I press for progress for my foster daughters, so that the examples above may seem ludicrous to them when they reach the workforce. I press for progress for myself, so that I don’t have to hide my pregnancy bump as though I have leprosy.

I like the theme #pressedforprogress because it doesn’t imply we are at the finish line, it doesn’t ask for success stories. It asks what stage of the movement we are at today and what are we doing today that is different from yesterday. Being an open advocate for a cause like gender equality is daunting, it creates a genuine vulnerability from a reputation and physical safety perspective. I have seen it myself when I say I am a feminist at social events and people look at me like I’m about to rip off my bra and grill it on the BBQ, whilst singing Lesley Gores ‘You don’t own me.’ Or when emailing a former colleague about assisting them to hire more women and getting a vitriolic tirade that I am discriminating against men.

This fear of being disliked, hated even, for a long time has continued to hold me back. I am eternally grateful to women who speak without fear, or despite fear, like Clementine Ford, Constance Hall, Yassmin Abdel-Magied and Celeste Liddle so that I don’t have to. I don’t want rape threats, death threats, or any type of trolling that is the consequence endured by outspoken women. I had a very short lived reality tv career and I can still remember the hurtful remarks people made online on everything from my appearance to intelligence, as though it was my best friend that had sat me down and said them as known facts.

So for me the challenge to press for progress means I need to get comfortable with people disagreeing with me. I have to accept that some people wont like me for standing up for gender equality. Pressing for progress means I need the resilience to continue to speak out when it is easier not to. It means I and my colleagues must choose hope over diversity fatigue again and again and again. Pressing for progress is not a celebration that we have won, it is a call to action on all that must be begun.