Hiring the right person for a job is the most important thing that a parish does because hiring the wrong person creates no end of grief. There are however, several issues that people involved in interviewing should know before beginning. Hiring can be a legal and ethical minefield. The following will help
avoid potential pitfalls.

Resumes that are received for upcoming jobs for religious education leadership include items like birth-date, marital status, number of children etc… A resume is distributed to the interviewing committee that is assembled to review candidates for open positions. If any information on the resume is not relevant to the job description them the committee is informed and will .

There are questions that are deemed illegal for example: What is the nature of your disability, Does a disability cause absences due to illness, has a certain disability caused a workers compensation accident or illness, Do you now or have you in the past had drug/alcohol problems, can you indicate the severity
of the disability, That is an interesting name, What is your ethnic origin. These questions are considered illegal and unacceptable and must be excluded by the committee assembled to review resumes.

If at any point in the course of an interview a candidate indicates that they cannot perform a specific function that is required for the job- say “Are you saying that you are unable to perform the position as described?” If the answer is Yes then end the interview immediately. What is written down in an interview form? The interviewing committee writes only what has been seen and heard ! Never write down a subjective evaluation. For example to write down that the candidate was “Embarrassed” is a subjective evaluation. Could it be proven that the person was feeling embarrassed ? What was witnessed is that the candidate lowered their eyes, became flushed in the face and seemed to pull into themselves. Anyone in the room could have seen these things. This is what is written down, It requires diligence but it is important.

Photo by Shutterstock.com