Still Learning How to Interview Posted on October 19, 2007 Robert C. Malenka (bio) enumerates some key personnel challenges in running a research program.

How do you hire people? How do you get them to do what you want them to do? How do you incentivize them? How do you get rid of people who you just don’t really like anymore?” And there are no easy answers to this.

And the joke I have heard told by a distinguished colleague of mine is, when asked, “How can you be a psychiatrist and run a basic science laboratory,” the response is, “How can you run a laboratory and not be a psychiatrist?” So these are very complex interpersonal dynamic issues.

It’s a real skill how to interview somebody, how to evaluate how they’re going to perform. And I’m somebody who’s been doing this now for 18 years and I am still learning that skill. But the things to look for are kind of common-sense items.

You’re looking for somebody who’s motivated, who really wants to do this work with you, who’s excited about the research that you’re doing. You’re looking for track records. I mean, obviously if somebody comes to you, if it’s an undergraduate who has straight As and has actually read some of the papers that are related to the type of work you want to do, that’s a really good sign.

But how you decide who that person is, it is very, very tricky and there’s no – if you can get letters of recommendation, that helps, but there is even a skill to learning how to read a letter of recommendation. A letter is sort of a static kind of document that you sort of have to sometimes intuit whether this is a complementary statement or a little hidden warning about the person. So there’s nothing wrong when somebody’s applying to work with you if they give you a list of names and you ask for letters from those people. Always ask for letters.

Calling up that individual and saying, “Do you have five minutes to talk to me about Joe Smith or Jane Smith and can you tell me a little bit more about him or her and were they hard-working.”

People are often willing to say something on a phone that they’re not willing to put down on a piece of paper or even in the email nowadays because emails are becoming legal documents.

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