 Welcome back. I'm just assuming all of you have been here before to the nonprofit show, but if you haven't, we welcome you for your very first time. We are thrilled to have with us because each and every month a representative from Staffing Boutique joins us and today we have Dana Skirlock joining us. She is Director of Recruitment at Staffing Boutique and is bringing to us a topic that is very critical. We haven't talked about it in a dedicated episode, so she's sharing with us what top interview questions you want to ask and why. So we're going deeper than that surface level. Like really, what are the questions and then why? What is the purpose of asking these questions and what are the answers essentially that we're seeking? So Dana, I'm excited to have you in the hot seat with us this month and share this conversation. Julia Patrick, of course, thank you for being here today. Julia is the CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. I'm Jarrett Ransom, your nonprofit nerd and CEO of the Raven Group, honored to serve alongside as co-host with you Julia. And we would be remiss if we do not give a huge shout out of gratitude to our amazing partners in this journey. Thank you to our friends over at Bloomerang, American Nonprofit Academy, fundraising academy at National University. Also, thank you to Nonprofit Thought Leader, your part-time controller, Staffing Boutique. Again, good morning or good afternoon to you Dana. Also, thank you to Nonprofit Nerd as well as Nonprofit Tech Talk. These are the companies that have walked with us day in and day out on this journey this month. We'll hit 900 episodes and we wouldn't be here if it weren't for these amazing partners. Hey, if you missed any of those episodes, that's okay. We've got you covered. You can binge watch, binge listen, however you choose to consume your entertainment. Download the app. Go ahead and scan that QR code right now. If you are visual and watching the show, you can just go ahead and download the app now on your smartphone. We're also on streaming broadcast platforms as well as podcast platforms. So pretty much anywhere, again, you consume your entertainment. Just call up the non-profit show and voila, we will show up. So Dana, thrilled to have you. I do know I took advantage of some questions in the green room chatter. Quite all right. The join us early. You are privy to those questions. But again, Dana Skirlock, director of recruitment at Staffing Boutique. Welcome back. Thank you so much for having me. It's always a pleasure to be here talking about another hot topic. I feel like I'm on the view. You are, in fact. That's what we want. The view for non-profits. When Jared and I talk, that's how we describe what we want. Coffee mug at all. As I said, I must have a coffee mug. Exactly. I love it. I wanted to be on the table, but we're on different coasts. Well, you know, you come to us from New York where I feel like a lot of things happen first. And then, you know, we kind of get your insight and then we can kind of see it moving across the nation. And it's really an amazing thing for us being in the western United States to get this perspective. And so we really value your insights and the things that you have to say and the nuances that we need to be thinking about when we're doing hiring. Everybody knows the nonprofit sector has, is not has, is going through a radical transformation. We have people retiring. We have people wanting to come in. We have people that are burned out. I mean, you go on and on and on. And so it just escalates the recruitment and the interview process. So we're going to ask you about five different questions that you've advised us that we should be asking. But more importantly, what are the answers that we're looking for? And what are we trying to glean when somebody answers? So let's get to the first one. How do you define work-life balance for yourself? Yes. So work-life balance, I think, has become a hot buzzword and at least to my experience and knowledge within the past, like, five to seven years. Like, when I first started recruiting in 2006, we didn't even talk about that in the interview. But now it's something that we're constantly, even on the initial screenings, you know, we're talking about this idea of work-life balance. I think that is a good thing and it's a testament to workers pushing back on employers to make sure that things are as equitable as possible. And making sure that they are balancing their ability to continue their career in a vigorous, robust way while also having a personal life that also supports that. And I think that there's often the idea that, like, you either get one or the other and not both. So I love that we ask this. I think that now the question is, for us as hiring managers and for organizations and recruiters to start digging into, what does that mean for the individual that you're speaking with? Because what that means to one person is very different to another. And that's going to be based on, are they single? Are they, you know, do they have a family? Do they have kids? Are they a single parent household or, you know, a partner family household? So all of that is going to look so different to them. Are they taking care of an elder, you know, family member or something like that, you know? It's, you know, it's all going to vary. And so I think instead of necessarily saying, you know, we have good work-life balance, we want to provide that for our workers. I think the question may be how, you know, the individual coming into the organization, how can we best provide you with the work-life balance that you need? I think a better way to frame the question and one that you can start in terms of conversations early on in the interview process. So rather than at the end, once a person's accepting the job and is sort of been wondering about the logistics of the position that they may be up for and might be taking, starting it out with the initial screenings. Like, here's what our culture is at our organization. Here's how we have some people within our organization, you know, balancing work and life. What do you feel about that? Is that something that you, that would work for you or would you meet a different setup for your work-life balance? And what would that look like? I think those are the types of, like, more specific questions that are, you know, tailored to the individual that are going to get to the answers that you need, which is, ultimately, how do I encourage this person to want to commit to my organization and stay for a long time? You know, and by long time, I mean, you know, that you don't have turnover within, you know, six months, a year, two years. You know, the development positions, we were just talking about that in the green room. You know, the average tenure of a development professional at this point is just under two years, was the last figure I saw, which means that there is so much turn and burn within these positions. So, especially with fundraising roles, I think it is imperative that we start figuring out how to make it so that, you know, and with development, I think it's tricky because the fundraising piece is so important to the engine of the organization that a lot of pressure goes onto the development professionals. And when you're starting a new job and it's your first six months, I think that's hard to be responsible for the health, the fiscal health of the entire organization from the day that you get there. And so I think that's also part of work-life balance, you know, for a development person. It's like, how much are you relying on this person to succeed in the role and to succeed super quickly to save the organization? And if that's the case, that's not going to provide them probably with work-life balance. Okay, let me ask you this. Yeah. Because I can't imagine anyone answering this honestly. Do you know what I'm saying? Like, you're going to be like, oh, I'm all committed. I'm all in. Who's going to come to an interview? And maybe I'm showing my age, but say, oh, well, I need, you know, flexibility or what? I've seen it. I've 100% seen it. Okay. Yeah, people telling me they're outside of work commitments, whether it's a faith-based, you know, sharing with me that they are from, you know, they're still healing their trauma and they need to take some breaks during the day to meditate. There's so many answers that I've received honestly, which I have seen that evolution, Julia, in the last 20 years of my career, changed. And I am amazed when I do hear honest answers and people advocating for, you know, what they need. But I think this takes us to our second question, which is all about self-care. And I feel, Dana, these two go hand-in-hand. What does that work? And then additionally, how do you manage your own self-care? Yeah, I think you're absolutely right that it goes hand-in-hand. And I think that I've experienced people who have that interview style where whatever the interviewer says goes and they're going to say, I don't need any time off. I'm totally gung-ho about the job. I've seen people over the years that become more forthcoming as well. But I think it also is up to the interviewer to make it a safe space for the person to feel like they can answer honestly. And so that, I think, is also a part of self-care is, you know, being comfortable enough to share what you need in terms of self-care, maybe something very vulnerable and personal. And so, you know, whether that means using an example of yourself as the hiring manager and saying, well, I, for example, do X, Y, Z. You know, this is what I do based on my history for self-care. Is that something you could see yourself doing? Or is that something that, if it were offered, you would take advantage of? Or even just implementing these things with your current staff? Like, that might be a better place to start if you're starting from ground zero. It's like polling. You can do a survey monkey of your staff and say, what would provide you with self-care? What could we do that would assist you with work-life balance and your self-care? And maybe you'll get some ideas that you can start implementing so that when you're interviewing new candidates, you're starting off with, well, this is what we already have for self-care for our employees. And then that gives them a feeling of, wow, this is an organization that takes care of its staff, you know, going into it. And they're going to be more likely, number one, to be more honest if you're telling them, we already have these things in place. So, you know, feel free to add to what we're discussing. It's not going to be viewed as a negative. And then also, I mean, and also it should be something that you genuinely want to do for your staff, of course. And I think hiring managers, you know, doing the research and really understanding why these self-care measures will help them with their bottom line, I think is another way to entice them to want to do it. And what I would, my argument would be is that it's going to help your retention, which is so costly. And by the time you've hired somebody, gone through all the interviews, so much time, you've paid somebody like me to do the search. You know, if you've had to go through an agency to have them come on and leave within a year, it's just so cost ineffective. And so, you know, my argument, and there's some things in life you can't change, people move, people, you know, have emergencies in their family and things like that. But other than those, you know, you really want to be retaining the majority of your staff that are able to continue working. And so that's, I think, thinking about your current staff and how you can support them with self-care is going to help lead you to how to present those during interviews for new candidates. I absolutely love that. And I feel like we could have an entire conversation, and maybe we will, about creating the space for the interview, right? Like really creating a space to ask the questions, to provide, you know, information, leaning in to say, here are some things that I personally do to take care of myself as well as developing my own work-life balance. You know, I always feel that when someone shares from a place of vulnerability, it does allow the other person to lean into that. That's their choice, right? Whether they do or they don't. But the ultimate goal is how can we support you as an employee? And I would think we certainly want to know that before we make that offer so that we can, you know, develop that space, absolutely. Yes. And a lot of people, I think, as candidates, tend to do the sort of bait and switch. They want to get the person enticed in there, or the organization enticed by their background, and then start making sort of these demands. You know, I hate to call it demands, but start making these requests, accommodations, and they may not work for the particular position that they're applying for. And so I think by starting the conversations with the hiring manager early on, I think that that also helps with that. Because if somebody wants, really, they want to work from home four days a week and they don't want to come to the office too much because they've got three kids and they really can't do it. It's better for you to know that early on. And I think what a lot of candidates will do is like hold their cards close to their vets, not mention it until you're ready to give them an offer. And then they'll say, great, I have an offer. And now here's a slew of things that I need to make sure that I would want to take this job. And it's the first we're hearing of it. So it's not just the candidates. It's also the hiring managers have not brought the subject up. And then especially nowadays post pandemic people are more familiar and fluent in the ideas of flexibility of scheduling things from home and we've got all this great technology that allows us to do a conference call today, you know, that can be streamed out to everybody. And so people are kind of, you know, utilizing those things but I think the conversations need to happen a little bit earlier than they are right now, because I've had a lot of offers kind of like go wonky because of that. And it's not anyone's fault. It's more of just we should have discussed it earlier and found you a placement that that accommodation made sense. So finding that we should ask this in interview one. I'm familiar with a series of interviews. Is it conversation number one to, I mean, where, how soon we ask these questions. Yeah, it's a good question. That's a very I think that may depend on the level of the position. So, for example, if it is something that is like an entry level administrative role. I think the first interview can really run the gamut of everything. And I think that the content of the interview is going to be, it's going to make sense to be able to ask them that because how long do you need to interview. In other words, like, if you're interviewing a receptionist, it's not going to take you as long as interviewing a CEO. So that you can probably lay all your cards on the table with a more entry level position. The higher level positions. I understand not wanting to launch into all those things round one. You're really just doing like an intro to even see if they're even remotely a good fit. And then I think once the second round hits, you can start talking about because there's probably going to be a third round and then around with the board where you can dig in even deeper. But I would say with a higher level position, certainly by the second interview should be talking about that. But entry level mid level positions, non management roles. I think you can start talking about this from from moment one. Perfect. Well, let's go to question number three, because it's really an interesting thing. I mean, I know that this is changing a lot. But question number three, why did you stay in your last position for the length of time? So it used to be if you were like, you know, flipping around and even the way I framed it shows my my prejudice here. You would be perceived as somebody who is not a worthy candidate versus somebody that had like stayed with somebody, you know, with the organization forever. It's kind of switching out. I mean, I think a lot of people are looking at this saying, hey, if they've only been with one organization, no matter, you know, for all this time, maybe they're not flexible. Maybe they're not, they haven't grown. I mean, so it seems to me, Dana, there's a lot going on here with asking this question about time and tenure. Yes, tenure. I think in general, you're absolutely right has become a hot button issue. Like we said, with development positions, you know, the tenure with that particular role and sector has become so low that there is no choice. When you look at resumes, I'm telling hiring managers every day, you can't expect to see 10 years, five years on a resume for development. You're going to see a year to two years or less. Now, most other industries and most other positions, that's not the case. So then the question becomes, how much does tenure matter to this particular hiring manager? I would say that if it were left to all the hiring managers, they would love to see tenure that, you know, shows that you stick with one organization for like three, four years at minimum. Or they would love to see more. I think they're not seeing it on resumes. And so they've just had to adjust to the reality that most people are not staying as long as they've in the past that they've seen on resumes. As far as culturally, why that is, I think there's a variety of reasons. Number one, if an organization is not fulfilling your needs, people are less afraid to go ahead and move on to candidates market unemployment is very low. They know they can find another job during the pan. I'm not the pandemic during the recession in 2008, people weren't moving because they didn't have options. So I think people are as flexible as their options are. So like, if, if the hiring managers have 10 options of people that have great tenure that have been in places for five to 10 years, they're going to gravitate towards them. I don't think there's much we can do about changing their mind about that because it is more of an insurance that the person will say and you can't afford to replace people every two years. But I think it's good to ask candidates, what about that job was unsatisfactory that you felt you had to leave so quickly, especially if you're seeing a pattern on their resume of 10 years are very short. I think that's the bigger issue for hiring managers these days than just one job that has short tenure. It's if it's multiple jobs that you know you're staying at one job for a year and you're bouncing to the next one in two years and then, you know, do three jobs where you just stayed for a little while. I think if it's just one job where that was short, people will very quickly be able to overlook that. So is that my prejudice? I don't know. I look for tenure when I'm looking at resumes. Okay. I was going to say devil's advocate. I do see very frequently in our sector, the wonderful nonprofit sector. Often, a younger candidate will jump to, you know, to another organization at a higher position, and then go to another like they use different organizations to climb the ladder, if you will, as opposed to a limiting ladder climbing. You know, we're there within one organization because they're simply not upward mobility. And so what if that's the case Dana? I think you can totally make the case for that. And I think that it will be clear in that person's cover letter or in the interview with them if that is the case. So if you're talking to them about, you know, and I think that you can also phrase these things in a way that are less accusatory such as like, yeah, yeah. Well, when you moved on from this organization, what did you find was different? What was the, you know, incentive for you to move on from that place versus like, why did you leave there after a year, you know, kind of positioning. And if their answer is, well, this was a bigger job with more responsibility and they're showing that ambition, that's going to be, you know, that's probably going to supersede the tenure issue. If their response is, well, my friend called and they said that this place was hiring. So I decided to move over here. That's going to be something. So I think it's going to kind of be, you have to create an environment where it's safe to share and ask them honest, open questions, be vulnerable yourself. And hopefully you'll be getting truthful answers from then from the candidates and then you'll be able to glean and read between the lines. I think that most people want to be ambitious and seen as a go-getter and it's going to be very clear who is sort of just moving jobs to move a job. And I see that all the time. There's people that are like that and they may, you know, be good workers that you can utilize in a certain position, but maybe you don't want to make them like a manager if you know that that's their tendency. But maybe if they're interested in a more entry level position with you, you may be comfortable with that level of commitment that they have. I think that when, especially when you're getting the higher up jobs, you need like that would be a red flag to me. Sure. You know, we don't have a lot of time left and we have two more questions to get through, but we have a viewer that's popped in and asked a really interesting question. So I want to make sure we address this. The viewer writes in what happens when an employee who seemed to be a perfect fit misrepresented their skills for a role and that has been identified within the first six months. Oh, gosh. Well, I am sorry to hear that and I totally know and I totally understand your frustration. You know, as an interviewer, as a professional interviewer, I understand that like, I'm doing this all day is my position. And for a lot of hiring managers, it's 10% of their job. And so your expertise in interviewing is going to be reflected in that. You know, just like I'm not a professional development person or an executive director, you know, I'm not expecting them to be expert interviewers. I think that utilizing a recruitment firm can help with that sometimes because, you know, they're able to do a lot of like screening on the back end. And we really, because we're not the actual hiring manager at the organization, we can be really candid with the candidates and candidates tend to be candid with us. Recruitment firms, I understand are, you know, a surplus in terms of like a fee. I understand you can't always use them for everything. So the best thing to do is to really like utilize resources to interview as well as possible and to ask the types of questions that we're talking about. But even the best interviewers, you know, even if I consider myself a professional interviewer, I've been hoodwinked to people who are good interviewers. There are people who are better interviewers than they are workers. And there are people who are great workers and bad interviewers are interviewees. So, you know, it's tough. And if it's within the first six months, I think that's the best time probably to go ahead and make a transition. Because if the person is just not working out and you don't feel like you can. Rehabilitation placement, it's time to just cut ties and at least save the money on paying them for, you know, the remainder of the year while you figure out what to do. I mean, it's going to depend on the situation though. I mean, once you've already hired them, there's no legal recourse to take from somebody misrepresenting their their skill set in your opinion. So there's not much you can do other than, you know, let that person go and move forward. But my advice would be to do it sooner rather than later. Okay, let's get to question number four. And again, I hate to put you even turn. I've turned up the temp on the hot seat. No worries. Question number four. What type of support do you need to excel at your job? Why ask this question? I think that this is an interesting question because number one, it gives the interviewee a chance to assess your organization and whether your management style or the culture of the organization is going to be a fit for them, potentially long term. And I also think it provides the interviewee with the feeling of, wow, this, this entity, this organization, this person that represents this organization, they really want me to succeed and they want to provide me with the tools to do so. So what I find a lot when people are talking to me about their kind employer or previous employer is they'll say, you know, the expectations were high, which I have no problem with. But I was never provided with the tools nor was I ever asked what tools I needed to get ahead. They didn't know what tools I would need coming in. They didn't seem to, you know, be able to provide me with them when I would ask for them. And so I think it would be a great green flag for people interviewing with your organization to hear that type of question that they want you to be able to be equipped well armed and well trained and comfortable in your role from the get go. So even at the interview, they're asking you how they can prepare you for the role. And again, I think it's the same thing as with like the first three questions about self care about it's going to depend work life balance depends on the person. What I need to excel is different than the next person. And so finding out specifically from this person, what they need to need from you to excel, I think is invaluable information. Okay, question number five, we talked a little bit about this in the green room. Jared ransom, if I asked you this question, when you're starting out in your career, what would have been your answer. How do you see yourself in the next five years. Yeah. Well, so it wasn't right when I started out but it's I certainly did answer it this way Dana. How do you see yourself in the next five years and I certainly said in an executive position. In the green room chatter right Julia said, and let this go over right and I said, fabulously I got the job. They saw my ambition they saw your ship track and my desire to, you know, to excel in my own way. What do you think we're seeing as the answers for this Dana, when we ask someone how do you see yourself in the next five years. What answers are we really looking for. So, I think that this is kind of a dummy question if you will sort of a generic version of how can we as an organization as an entity assist you with your overall career. Do you see being here as a way station to where you really want to get to which might be, you know, opening your own organization or nonprofit or do you see it as something where that this is like the type of mission you want to commit to for like the foreseeable foreseeable future in your career. So I think that you can ask this question in a lot of different ways I think people interviewing for jobs are expecting this type of question, and they will have come up with some sort of can answer. What I would suggest is encompassing this idea but acting it in your own style so and tailoring it to your organization and for the position. So again, if you're hiring for, you know, an entry level job as an assistant. I think the way that you frame this question might be different than somebody who's auditioning or interviewing for a high up executive role because the executive like it could be how do you see yourself in five years, I might be like retired in five years if you're talking about like an executive director, you know, so I think that you also have to kind of like the see how it makes and that might work for that organization to it might be a perfect fit for this person to lead them for the next five years and then move into retirement and they are grooming the next person, you know, so I think it's a great question. And it puts the onus on the interviewee to think about if they haven't thought about what are your goals with joining this organization are you just moving jobs to move jobs. Are you just trying to get a job to get a job right or have you really thought about the trajectory of your career and I think there's another option here is like asking these questions early on and saying to the person if you don't have an answer now. I'd love for you to think about it and send me a follow up email after we meet. Now that you've learned more about our organization and then seeing what they, instead of like under duress like what they answer when they're interviewing with you to have them give like some thought to it because they may not have. And so, and then just giving and like very quickly being like, you know what, if you don't have a specific answer. I actually understand that because who knows what tomorrow may bring in, you know, and like I was saying in the green room. I like to make decisions based on what's the information that's available right now so like for me to answer where I want to be in five years. The answer is, I don't know. Like, I don't know. It depends on what's going on in five years. So, I think that that's also a way to, you know, do it is have them plant the seed so that they can think about it in the context of your organization and then provide you with a written answer or maybe in a follow up conversation. So, I think you'll see more of the information that you're really trying to glean, which is for this job at this organization at this time, do their goals, fit in with ours or not. But we know that their skills do based on our, you know, first couple interviews but are your goals so if we have another person whose goals align more more closely, we may want to go with that person and that you wouldn't find out unless you kind of like allow them time to think about it. Dana, such great insight. Thank you. For those of you watching and listening, Dana Skirlock has joined us today. We turned up the heat in the hot seat. Dana serves as director of recruitment at Staffing Boutique. She's very generous with her email. You see it right here. Dana at StaffingBoutique.org. Her and Katie Warnick joined us. You know, one of them every single month joins us here on the nonprofit show. So grateful to have your insight into this space, Dana, because I really feel that it is an area where many of us really aren't that experienced. You said 10% of our time goes to hiring. And so let's lean into the expertise that Staffing Boutique provides. Thank you, Dana, for providing that expertise. Thank you. Now, always wonderful to be with you guys. You know, it's a great conversation. It's something that we need to spend more time on with you because it's getting into the nuts and bolts of how we bring people in to our organizations and how we keep them. Again, I'm Julia Patrick, CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. Been joined today by the nonprofit nerd herself, Jared, our ransom CEO of the Raven Group. Again, we have amazing partners and they include Bloomerang, American Nonprofit Academy, your part-time controller, nonprofit thought leader, Fundraising Academy at National University, Staffing Boutique where Dana joins us from, nonprofit nerd and nonprofit tech talk. These are the folks that join us day in and day out. So hopefully we can really move the needle in our work, get the right people with us, and really achieve our mission, vision and values. Dana, you always give me new things to think about. Thank you so much. Well, that is a great compliment. Thank you so much. It is always so much fun to talk with you and with both of you and connect with your audience, and it's just such great to bounce ideas off of you both. So thank you. Oh my gosh, it's been really, really great. Hey, everybody, as we like to end every episode of the nonprofit show, we want to leave you with this message, and that is to stay well so you can do well. We'll see you again back here tomorrow, everyone.