The Early Bird…

The early bird really does catch the worm when it comes to interviews.

That’s the conclusion of a study published in the journal Psychological Science.

It found that applicants for a higher degree were more likely to be selected if they were interviewed during the morning, compared with later in the day. This was nothing to do with how they performed, but the result of a perceptual bias by the interviewers.

The study revealed that interviewers feel they have to ‘mark down’ afternoon candidates if they have already seen high quality applicants in the morning. It seems that interviewers like to have each day’s ratings balance out. When an interviewer sees several good candidates in a row, they worry that they are giving too many high ratings. So, if another good candidate comes along, they get a lower score so that the ratings for the day are not uniformly high. 

The work was carried out by researchers Uri Simonsohn and Francesca Gino. So when arranging a job interview, go for a morning slot – it might increase your chance of success.