Filip_Murar
Comments3
Great post. I have had multiple conversations lately about people's disappointing experiences with some EA org's hiring processes, so this is a timely contribution to the Forum.
A lot of your recommendations (structured interviews, work samples, carefully selecting interview questions for relevance to the role) are in line with my prior understanding of good hiring practices. I am less convinced, however, that behavioural interviewing is clearly better than asking about hypothetical scenarios. I can see arguments both for and against them but am unsure about which one is the net winner.
For instance, behavioural interviews may be favourable because past behaviour tends to be a strong predictor of future behaviour and because they ask about actual behaviour, not idealised situations and behavioural intentions. On the other hand, they may introduce noise, as some capable applicants will not have very good examples of "past situation X" (and vice versa), and they may introduce bias because they judge applicants based on their past behaviour, not their current capabilities.
What are your top arguments in favour of behavioural interviews? Are you aware of any high-quality studies on this topic? Your section on behavioural interviews doesn't have any references...
Hi Nick, thank you very much for your thoughtful feedback! I researched the syphilis idea so will address those questions.
1. The dual tests have recently become very cheap too, costing some $0.95 each (largely thanks to CHAI's work in this area). In our understanding, this is only some $0.15 more expensive than a single HIV test – though I'm sure prices will vary geographically. If there are places where the dual tests are more expensive than two separate rapid tests, then I agree that the dual tests wouldn't make sense there.
2. You are right that changing the existing system (including updating diagnostic algorithms and training the relevant health workers) is one of the main challenges and one of the reasons why this idea has not already been implemented more widely. However, it seems that what is currently lacking is technical assistance for countries' health systems to make this switch – and this is exactly the sort of implementational work that we think strong charity entrepreneurs can do well!