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Bring I.T. to the Interview

The skills we assume

When a business hires someone, there is usually a well-worn process. Review the resume, check references, ask about past experience, and get a feel for whether the person will fit in with the team. What almost never happens is anyone checking whether the candidate can actually use a computer.

It's easy to see why. Computers have been in the workplace for decades, and nearly everyone carries a smartphone. Surely everyone has basic computer skills by now, right? Surprisingly, not often. Being comfortable with a phone is very different from being comfortable on a business computer. We regularly work with new hires who don't know how to attach a file to an email, can't tell the difference between saving a file to their desktop and saving it to a shared drive, or have never had to manage more than one window at a time.

None of that makes them bad employees. But it does mean someone has to train them, and that someone is usually IT, on the clock, after the hiring decision has already been made. In the worst cases, a lack of basic skills becomes a security problem. The person who can't spot a suspicious link is the person who clicks it.

What IT can add

Including IT in the interview process doesn't have to be a big production. Fifteen minutes is often enough. Some ideas:

IT can also help you write a realistic job description. Hiring managers often don't know which systems a role touches, and IT does. If the job requires heavy spreadsheet work or a specific line-of-business application, it's much better to find out in the interview than in the second week.

Yes, the corner office too

Here's the part that tends to get skipped: the President and C-level positions. These hires are usually handled by ownership or a board, and IT is the last group anyone thinks to invite. We'd argue they are the most important hires for IT to weigh in on.

Higher level people tend to want to do their own thing. They arrive with habits and tools from their last company, and they expect to keep using them. They want exceptions made. Can I skip the multi-factor login? Can I forward my email to my personal account? Can I have admin rights on my laptop? Can we use the project tool I used at my old job instead? Every one of those requests goes against rules that IT put in place for good reason.

Over the course of a career, many executives have traded tech savvy for business savvy. That's a reasonable trade, and it's probably part of why you want to hire them. But it also means they may not see how their exceptions chip away at the foundation IT has built. One exception from the top quickly becomes the reason everyone else asks for one too. (And executives are the people attackers target most, so their accounts are the last ones that should have weaker protection.)

We're not suggesting IT should quiz your next CEO on spreadsheet formulas. The goal is to find out how that person views technology and whether they'll work within the system. Ask how they've worked with IT in the past. Ask how they'd handle a policy they disagree with. Those answers tell you a lot.

Everyone should see the whole picture

A company's IT environment is a system. Email, file storage, the accounting software, the CRM, the phones, and the security tools that protect all of it are connected. Each piece was chosen to fit with the others. When employees understand that big picture and where their own tools fit in it, they make better decisions on their own.

Sales is a common example. Salespeople are always looking for an edge, and there is no shortage of apps promising one. A browser extension that scrapes contacts, a free file sharing site to send proposals, an AI note taker that joins every call. Each one seems small. But each one is another login, another place customer data lives, another subscription to track, and another thing to shut off when that person leaves. Sales can't bring in every little tool they want. That doesn't mean the answer is always no. It means the request goes through IT so the tool can be vetted and fit into the system properly, or so IT can point out that something you already pay for does the same job.

Setting this expectation is much easier during hiring and onboarding than after someone has signed up for six services with their work email.

The company truck

Imagine one of your employees takes the company delivery truck over the weekend to pick up lumber for a new deck at home. Most business owners would frown on that, and most employees wouldn't even consider it. Everyone understands that the truck belongs to the company and is meant for company work.

For some reason, the same logic doesn't get applied to computers. We see company laptops used for personal banking, kids' games, streaming, personal photo backups, and side businesses. Company devices are not employees' own, and personal use needs to stay separate. Personal browsing and downloads are one of the most common ways malware gets in. Personal files on a work device become a headache when the employee leaves and the device needs to be wiped. And company data has a way of ending up in personal accounts when the lines get blurred.

The fix is simple, though it takes consistency. Make your acceptable use policy part of the hiring process, have new employees read and sign it, and have IT walk them through what it means in practice. People are far more likely to follow a rule they heard on day one than one that shows up in an email two years later.

Summary

Every new hire changes your IT environment, from the front desk all the way to the president's office. Bringing IT into the hiring process helps you find people with the right skills, sets clear expectations before bad habits form, and protects the foundation you've already invested in. If you'd like help putting together a technical assessment or an acceptable use policy, please reach out to us.

Questions about your own setup? Talk to us