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When Personnel Officials Get Personal
By Sarah Schafer In a social setting these questions may make you feel uneasy. In a job interview, they probably seem downright intrusive. But how you respond to these and similar queries could affect whether you get the job. "Companies have been good at matching skill sets of the job to the skills you have, but what we haven't been good at is matching lifestyles," said Barry Lawrence of the Society for Human Resource Management in Alexandria. For this reason, Lawrence said, questions about your marital situation are bound to be of interest to employers. District law prohibits companies from asking a person about marital status or any question pertaining to "family responsibilities." Each state has different rules and different questions it considers unlawful to ask. Legal questions aside, when the topic of spouses comes up, you need to be ready. Whether you have a wife, husband or life partner, here is advice on dealing with the buttinsky interviewer.
Band of Gold Have you ever considered taking off your wedding ring before a big interview? Many women have. Unfortunately, employers are more likely to let a woman's marital status -- single or married -- influence hiring decisions than they are a man's, said Sheila Wellington, president of Catalyst, a nonprofit organization in New York that works for the career advancement of women. Often, employers worry that a married woman may not want to travel on business or relocate if asked. And if the interviewer knows you are married, he may ask you outright if your husband would object to these business-related tasks. If you choose to answer, refocus the conversation on yourself, Lawrence said. The best way to do this is to bring up past experiences. For example, if you traveled 75 percent of the time in your previous position, tell the interviewer. Offering proof of your mobility is better than vague statements such as how much you enjoy seeing new places. And leaving your spouse's feelings out of the answer brings the conversation back to the topic at hand: your eagerness to do the job. If you don't want to reveal information about your marriage during the interviewing stage, remember to tell your references. Renee Welker Cash, special events assistant at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, concealed her husband's military career from her first interview with the center. But a gushing reference managed to leak the classified information when she said how sorry she was that the Navy transferred Cash's husband to Washington from San Diego. As the wife of a Navy lieutenant, Cash said, she often faced interview questions that bordered on the absurd. One interviewer asked her whether she would have an emotional outburst at the office if something happened to her husband while he was on military duty. "I finally told him I wasn't there to discuss my emotions, but to talk about the position." Cash did not receive a call back. Final advice from Wellington: "Answer questions briefly with a simple yes or no and move on." She added, "That's personal advice from a woman who was asked in her first interview, 'When do you plan on getting pregnant?' "
A Guide for the Married Man As a man, you have the same prerogative as a woman in choosing whether to answer questions about your marital status. But as a married man, you may have an advantage in some cases over your bachelor buddies. Generally, men, too, should keep their married life out of an interview, "unless the spouse brings something unique to the candidate," said Paul Unger, vice president and global technology practice co-leader for A.T. Kearney Executive Search in Alexandria. For example, said Unger, maybe your wife happens to be a great networker or entertainer. You might tell the interviewer that she is a partner in your career in helping you make the right connections and impress the right people. Or maybe your wife works in an industry that is important to yours. For example, if you're trying for a job with a software development firm and your wife is a patent lawyer, you might be able to prove to the interviewer that she'll give you valuable tips. Another thing married men have going for them is the dependability factor, said Tom Morris, president of Morris Associates Inc. in Washington. "I might suggest to men if they're in a position where stability is important to mention they're married," Morris said. Or, he said, you could put it under "personal" on your resume. If you're a single man or woman, remember that you might get the reverse of every stigma attached to married workers. So, if you're a single man applying for a job that screams for someone who is grounded, be sure to list personal accomplishments that show you're the right person. That tutoring you did all year? This would be the perfect time to mention it.
Gay Workers' Dilemma Marriage questions are particularly tricky for gays and lesbians. The simple "Are you married?" can be handled with a yes or no. But if you are in a same-sex relationship that you consider a marriage and the discussion continues, you face another question: Do I play the neutral-pronoun game, or do I come out to my interviewer? Sometimes the interviewer's probing is not innocent. Whether you as the interviewee are gay, straight, married or single, Morris said, "there is a definite line over which some interviews go ... where it becomes apparent that the interviewer is going to use this information" to possibly discriminate. It's difficult to determine an interviewer's motives in a first meeting -- or even after several -- and you might want to look into a company's overall policies before you go to the interview. For example, said Bill Malone, a human resources generalist at the Whitman-Walker Clinic, a health-care facility that serves a largely gay population, does the company provide health insurance to same-sex partners? Also, find out where the employer places want ads. Employers who advertise in publications such as the Washington Blade, the area's largest gay newspaper, might be more open-minded, Malone said. You could use marriage and family conversations to test the interviewer. Bring up your same-sex relationship "in a matter-of-fact and non-dramatic way and see if the response you get is matter-of-fact and non-dramatic," said Rebecca Isaacs, a spokeswoman for the Gay and Lesbian Task Force in Washington. Isaacs, who is a lesbian and lives with her life partner and her 3-year-old daughter, said that in Washington "life is work and work is life." Because people will find out your business sooner or later, she said, she prefers knowing how a company will react before she takes a job. Few jurisdictions have employment anti-discrimination laws in place to protect gays and lesbians, Isaacs said. Washington does, for example, but Virginia and Maryland do not. Only federal workers are protected in every state.
Questions about getting ahead? E-mail Sarah Schafer at schafers@washpost.com.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company |
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