The Golden Rule of Interviewing

We've all heard the Golden Rule, which goes something like:

Treat others the way you want to be treated.

Well, my Golden Rule of Interviewing goes something like this:

Treat candidates the way you would want to be treated if you were the candidate.

Here are some corollaries to the Golden Rule of Interviewing:

• Don't ask a question you couldn't answer yourself if you didn't already know it was coming.
• Don't ask a question you wouldn't want to answer yourself.
• If you like to ask trivia questions about your favorite subject, think how you'd fare if the candidate asked you trivia questions about their favorite subject.
• Don't give a candidate homework you wouldn't do yourself.
• Don't ghost a candidate unless you like being ghosted.
• Don't require more preparation from the candidate than you're doing yourself.

You're a busy, high-status, well-paid professional. And so is the candidate you seek to hire. Do unto candidates as you would have them do unto you.