The aims of this chapter are to give an overview of:
The application process prior to the interview
The aims of the medical interview
The different types of medical interview
The make-up and role of the different members of the interview panel
The types of questions asked at the medical interview
How candidates are selected
1.1 The application process
Although the main focus of this book is on the interview stage, it is important to cover the process that precedes the interview. This will vary according to the post for which you are applying.
The Modernising Medical Careers (MMC) process has led to the development of Foundation programme (F1 and F2) and Specialist Training programmes for each specialty (ST1, ST2, ST3, etc.).
For the majority of Foundation posts, candidates are matched and interviews are not carried out. However, for Foundation posts that remain vacant, a short-listing and interview process is still used to select appropriate candidates.
For those who are applying for Specialist Training (ST) or General Practice (GP) training, the short-listing is undertaken by Deanery-based selection panels. Selection consists of a structured interview process. You are advised to check the MMC website for updated information that relates to your chosen specialty (see later).
Structured application forms may be preferred as the basis for short-listing and interviewing candidates rather than the traditional curriculum vitae(CV).
However, there are many situations in which CVs are likely to be requested. The most likely posts that CVs will be required for are:
Vacant Foundation posts
Trust doctor posts
Senior medical posts.
For GP training there are three stages that candidates need to undergo in order to get selected:
Stage 1: an application form (this may be online), the purpose of which is to check the eligibility of the candidate
Stage 2: a written assessment under exam conditions. This could involve an MCQ (multiple choice questions) exam or essay questions that test generic skills
Stage 3: an interview.
How are candidates short-listed for ST and GP training posts?
Each post comes with a Person Specification and consists of entry criteria (minimum standards) and selection criteria. The entry criteria allow non-medical staff to screen candidates prior to short-listing. Those who are short-listing decide who should be interviewed according to the selection criteria. There will usually be an agreed subset of main selection criteria:
Entry criteria
Qualifications
Eligibility
Career progression
Fitness to practise
Health
Language skills
A 'complete application'
Selection criteria
Clinical skills
Personal skills
Commitment to specialty
Probity
Academic and research achievements
It is vital that you read through the Person Specification criteria for the post that you are applying for in detail.
Here is an example of requirements for an ST1 post in General Medicine:
1.2 The aims of the medical interview
Why does the medical interview exist?
Historically, across all spectra of business and industry, the interview has been used to select applicants for posts, with candidates usually having been short-listed on the basis of an application form or CV.
The interview gives employers the opportunity to meet potential employees face to face and decide if they wish to employ that person. It provides an opportunity to test applicants' competencies and motivation in a structured environment, thereby attempting to provide a level playing field on which the best applicants can shine.
Medical interviews are no different in this respect, and the aim is to select the best candidate for the vacant post.
Does everything hinge on the medical interview?
There may be factors other than performance at interview that impact on whether a candidate is successful. Some candidates will have an advantage based upon their past experience and performance, including their responses to questions on the application form. As part of some selection processes (such as GP) there is a written assessment under exam conditions. A good performance, or additional qualifications or experience, may add to the over all strength of a candidate's application.
It is also possible that candidates will have gained an advantage prior to interview through previous contact with members of the panel. Occasionally an interviewer has witnessed a candidate's performance first-hand in the workplace. In other instances, a trusted colleague may have recommended a candidate to a panel member. Sometimes candidates have made the effort to meet with panel members for the first time prior to interview, but this is frequently not possible.
However, do not fall into the trap of thinking that the outcome of an interview is predetermined. This is rarely the case, and is frequently used by unsuccessful applicants as an easy excuse to explain their failure.
There can be no doubt that it is the most crucial component of candidate selection. The interview process, in whatever shape or form it takes, is labour-intensive for those who are organising and running it. Applicants who have made it to that stage will be of similar calibre, and an interview performance may be the only way to distinguish between them.
What does the interviewer expect?
Much is made of the personal biases of people who sit on interview panels, and naturally there may be individual preferences according to personalities and styles. You may be surprised to know that there is usually broad agreement amongst interview panel members when it comes to selection. In other words, the best candidate is usually obvious. Your aim should be to convince the panel that you are the best candidate. The key to achieving this is good preparation!
Remember (this might sound obvious), each member of the interview panel usually wants to select the best candidate at interview.
1.3 Types of medical interview
For many years the format of the medical interview has been similar for all grades of doctor, except that with increasing seniority longer interviews and larger interview panels could be expected.
Recently, however, in many cases the traditional medical interview has been supplemented or replaced with other mechanisms for selecting candidates. These may include competency-based tasks.
A loose distinction can be made between the older style 'traditional medical interview' and newer interviews that incorporate competency-based tasks.
We encourage you not to think of these as mutually exclusive, as medical interviews frequently incorporate elements of both.
In general, interviews are carried out in an educational setting based within a Hospital, General Practice or Deanery.
1.4 The traditional medical interview
This is the type of interview that many senior doctors will be familiar with. The interview typically involves a panel of interviewers asking a series of questions, with all candidates being asked similar questions.
Interviews may last anything from 15 minutes to 1 hour. Shorter interviews generally occur with smaller interview panels.
For ST posts, the national recommendation is that a minimum of 30-minute interview slots are allocated to applicants who have been successfully short-listed. Interviews for Consultant posts typically last for 1 hour.
1.5 Competency-based assessments
The idea of using different selection tools, other than the traditional interview, to select doctors is relatively new. It is, however, a commonly used selection method for recruiting in the business world, and we discuss these tasks at length in Chapter 7.
Competency-based assessments have a well-established role in the selection of GP trainees and have now been implemented in most ST interviews.
Assessments are designed to test various competencies, with an emphasis on generic skills rather than the candidate's clinical knowledge or past experience. Examples of exercises include:
Patient simulation exercises
Prioritisation exercises
Group tasks
Making a presentation
Written exercises
Tests of medical knowledge.
How is a competency-based interview day structured?
Typically, a Postgraduate Educational Centre is the location for a competency-based interview. Approximately 30-40 candidates are assessed during the day. Candidates will normally have three or four assessments, each lasting 30 minutes. Candidates should expect to spend at least half a day at the centre. A typical timetable for a competency-based interview is as follows:
1.6 The interview panel
For ST posts there are national recommendations for England, Wales and Northern Ireland that determine who should be present on interview panels. You can expect the following people:
Lay chairperson
Regional College adviser or deputy
Postgraduate Dean or deputy
Programme Director or chair of Specialty Training Committee
2-4 Consultants from training locations
A Trust Senior Manager
University representative (for academic posts).
Frequently, however, Deanery-based interviews may consist of as few as two Consultants and a lay member.
If the interview consists of a number of stations, there are usually two interviewers allocated to each station.
The interview panel for stand-alone or trust-grade posts typically consists of a number of consultants (any number between 1 and 10) and a representative from Medical Personnel who takes no part in the decision-making process. When a post is relevant to just one department, it is not unusual to find just two interviewers.
Interviews at Consultant level will include a Senior Manager (typically the Chief Executive or Medical Director),and a representative from the appropriate Royal College and from the Deanery.
In academic institutions there may be a University representative present for interviews for ST level and above. This is usually an academic clinician at a Consultant-equivalent grade.
Although Medical Personnel departments and Deaneries will not usually give out the details of those involved in the short-listing process, it should be possible to discover in advance who will make up the panel.
Those individuals involved in the short-listing process will usually make up part or all of the interview panel.
1.7 Questions asked at the medical interview
How are interview questions decided?
Fortunately, with the traditional interview, the types of questions that you are likely to be asked are fairly predictable. Naturally, for senior medical posts, questions may be more difficult, but the preparation should be similar for whichever post you are applying for.
Typically, the format of the traditional medical interview will be as follows:
Questions about your CV and medical career to date
Questions about your portfolio
Questions that test your motivation. Why this job? Why this area? Why should we choose you?
Questions about audit and/or research
Questions about NHS (e.g. MMC) and management topics
Questions about medicine (e.g. recent articles read/recent advances/medical knowledge)
Questions that test your generic skills
Questions about your interests outside of medicine
An opportunity for you to ask questions.
At least one interviewer will choose to run through the candidate's experience to date, and this is often the opening enquiry. This question gives the candidate an opportunity to provide a quick summary of their medical career and experience to date whilst enabling them to relax ahead of potentially more difficult questions.
This will be followed by questions from other interviewers that will focus on all other aspects of their CV, their motivation, their understanding of health policy, knowledge of relevant literature, education and ethical issues.
At interview, each panel member will decide in advance which questions they are going to ask. Interviewers may have their personal favourite questions that they consider to be 'discriminatory'. It is considered good interview practice for the same questions to be asked of each candidate (although this is rarely adhered to rigidly).
For this reason, you may wish to enquire gently of departing candidates the nature of questions they received. However, be wary of information received from those you don't know or trust.
Our advice is that you should not tell other candidates the questions that you have been asked.
The following statements regarding interview questions are likely to be true:
Questions will be based on the relevant person specification
Questions will be consistent across interviewers and for all candidates
Questions will be scored according to a scoring framework that links to the Person Specification.
Although minimum standards for training posts have been agreed nationally, the interview format is decided by the local Deanery and the individual specialty, so that there will be significant variation between interview centres.
All of these topics and other commonly asked questions are covered in detail in the rest of this book.
1.8 Candidate selection at interview
During an interview, each member of the panel will adjudicate and score the candidate. Each panel member is asked to score an individual according to a number of characteristics that are considered important for the post.
Each member of the interview panel plays an equal part in adjudicating, with the exception of the Medical Personnel officer, those simply sitting in for interview experience and sometimes the chairman. A simple scoring form looks something like this:
Name Experience Qualifications Other Overall Comments Rating (score 1-5) (score 1-5) factors impression (score (score 1-5) (score 1-5) 1-5)
With this scoring system, there is plenty of scope for subjective assessment on behalf of the interviewer. Increasingly, more detailed forms are being developed, based upon essential and desirable criteria.
Below is an example interview question about coping with stress for an ST1 training post in General Medicine. After the question, you will note a number of positive and negative indicators that help to guide the interviewers. A scoring scale accompanies these indicators. This helps provide an assessment of candidates that is based upon objective measurements.
'Describe a time when pressure at work has led to you feeling angry'
Probes: What was the cause? What did you do? What was the outcome?
With interviews that involve a number of stations, trained assessors evaluate and score candidates' performance during each exercise. Information is then summated for each candidate in separate files. After the final exercise, an assessor studies each file. The assessor should have had no earlier involvement with that candidate and provides an independent evaluation of every doctor's performance.
Assessors then discuss performance across all exercises, and selection decisions are made. An independent facilitator over sees this process and asks assessors to provide evidence for their evaluations, in order to increase objectivity and fairness. Decisions are based on the evidence observed according to objective parameters similar to those out lined in the above example. The objective is to avoid decisions based upon 'gut feeling' or unsubstantiated judgements.
After all of the interviews have been completed, the final rating scores are added up and the posts are offered in order according to which candidate ranks most highly. If there is a choice of posts, then the candidate ranking most highly gets first choice.
Important! All interview selection processes should not discriminate against those candidates who are willing to accept some posts but not others.
Generally, this principle is adhered to and it is in your best interests to be honest about which posts you are interested in and which you are not.
How do candidates find out if they are successful?
With Consultant and stand-alone posts, candidates are likely to be told on the day of the interview if they have been successful. This may take the form of the successful candidates being invited back to the interview room, or being telephoned. Formal confirmation may then follow in the post.
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Excerpted from How to Succeed at the Medical Interview by Chris Smith Darryl Meeking Copyright © 2008 by Blackwell Publishing. Excerpted by permission.
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