Is Musk right, is it all about the interview?

“Don’t look at the résumé — just believe your interaction.”

So said Elon Musk recently, in describing the best way to hire successful candidates.

While the Tesla CEO admitted he has “fallen prey to the pixie dust thing” of being dazzled by big-name employers such as Google or Apple, he recently urged leaders to focus on whether an interview conversation makes them say “wow” within 20 minutes.

But this advice is being met with some skepticism from three HR experts who spoke with Canadian HR Reporter. They say relying on that interaction alone is likely to lead employers toward weaker hiring decisions, less diversity and more bias.

The problem with taking Musk’s approach is we know that an interview is very ineffective unless it's done properly — and most people don't do it properly, says Karen MacMillan, assistant professor in organizational behaviour at the Ivey Business School at Western University.

“What he probably does, which many people do, is they rely on their gut instinct. And so it's almost like they're interviewing for a friend… we can talk, I can get a vibe… but that’s not actually what recruiting and interviewing should be about.

“It should be about ‘Is this person going to be good at this job?’”

Unstructured interviews ‘notoriously unreliable’

MacMillan points to evidence that often hiring decisions are made within 10 seconds of people meeting.

“So, by the time I'm done shaking your hand, I've decided. And then everything you say in the interview, I filter through that initial impression,” she says.

“That’s part of the reason why I think unstructured interviews are notoriously unreliable — you might as well throw darts at the résumés on the wall.”

An untrained interviewer will do an unstructured interview, which is more like a conversation, says MacMillan.

“It’s like ‘Tell me about yourself… What are your hopes and dreams? Where do you hope to be five years from now?’”

While that might provide a few insights, these general questions aren't related to job performance and are “really ineffective” in assessing candidates, she says. Yet many organizations continue to use them because they feel successful when “they fill the seat,” she says.

Off-the-wall questions no help

The kind of interaction that Musk appears to favour — largely focused on whether he likes the person and sees “good character” — is not highly predictive of job performance, agrees Lisa Cohen, associate professor at the Desautels Faculty of Management at McGill University.

“You're going to end up with a bunch of people who are really good talkers, which doesn't mean they're good employees. It means they're very articulate. And if it's a sales job, maybe that's appropriate. But not every job requires that.”

The candidate may be selected because the interviewer agrees with them politically, likes the same sports team or has been to the restaurants, she says: “None of which is really relevant in the job.”

Both experts are wary of the quirky questions some interviewers favour. MacMillan cites a common example: “If you were to be a kitchen utensil, which one would you be?”

Those questions “drive me crazy,” she says, adding that claims such questions show how candidates “think on their feet” are unconvincing.

“There are tests that do that — so, do those tests.”

Laura Salvatore, executive vice-president of human capital at Centurion Asset Management, also cautions against being overly impressed by a polished interview performance.

“Strong interview performance can sometimes reflect confidence, communication style, or preparation — rather than true capability," she says, so interviews can reveal dimensions a CV cannot "but they are not inherently more objective.”

How gut hiring hurts diversity

The risks of Musk’s casual approach are particularly acute for equity, diversity and inclusion.

Cohen points to the idea of “homophily” — when birds of a feather flock together — as a central challenge.

“People will have a tendency to select people who are somehow like them, similar to them. That might be along demography, that might be along other dimensions like ‘Oh, they went to a school I went to,’ ‘Oh, they do research on things I find really interesting’ or ‘They've written articles that I find really interesting’ — rather than when they should really be selecting on: ‘Do they write excellent articles?’”

When leaders lean on gut feel and informal conversations, they tend to hire people who are like them, says MacMillan.

“It's going to be somebody with my skin colour or my background or who went to the same school as me… So, if I happen to be not similar to my interviewer, then my chances go way down.”

The impact extends to neurodivergent candidates and others who may not shine in a high-pressure conversation. A role might require someone to largely deal with data, for example, says MacMillan: “Why do I assess on how social you are in the interview [or] how well you can think on your feet?”

Tests, work samples provide insights

Cohen says consistency is important, so employers have the same information to make good comparisons.

“If you have really diverse information, it's not a fair comparison, and that's a problem. You'll end up possibly with people you already know, because you have extra information on them — rather than the people who are necessarily best.”

Start with the job, then look at your requirements, CVs, interviews and references, says MacMillan.

“There's some research that says that probably the best way to do it is neither of the things that Elon Musk says in Business Insider. It's probably more doing a work sample — having somebody work with you for a short period of time that’s tied very closely to the job,” she says.

On top of that, properly designed tests can help assess traits that Musk says he values, such as “talent and drive and trustworthiness,” she says, as long as their “predictive validity” and reliability have been assessed independently.

Cohen says that interviews can be “an excellent selection tool” or a really bad one, depending on how they’re conducted.

“When they work is when you do things like you ask questions that are… behavioural or hypothetical: ‘Tell me about a time you did this,’ ‘If you are in this situation, what would you do in response?’” she says.

If candidates lack a track record in key aspects of the job, Cohen’s institution uses what's called a work sample, she says.

“We have people present and we look at how well they present. And work samples are much more predictive of how someone will do than… an unstructured interview.”

Evidence-based model for hiring

For Salvatore, the answer is to use a more balanced and evidence-based model, by treating the CV as an initial data point, and the interview as a way to assess alignment, both from a cultural and behavioural perspective: "However, we place significant emphasis on structured, role-relevant assessments.”

Ultimately, the future of hiring is less about choosing between CVs and interviews, and more about integrating both into a broader, more rigorous assessment strategy that prioritizes demonstrated capability over presentation alone, she says.

"The risk today isn’t just embellished resumes: it’s optimized candidates. In an AI-enabled world where both CVs and interviews can be engineered for impact, hiring must move beyond presentation and focus on demonstrated capability.”

As for checking references, MacMillan says that’s important — as long as they’re taken with a grain of salt.

“There's some research to back it up that past performance predicts future performance… that being said, the reference [checks] have to be structured too… [and] tied to the job,” she says.

“Keep in mind that maybe [they] didn’t work out well in that company for reasons that won’t apply at my company.”

Who should have the final say?

Musk has also joked about his reputation as a micromanager — preferring the label “nano management” — in having the final say on a new hire. But experts warn that having a CEO or top leader believe their interaction more than the process can undermine effective hiring.

MacMillan says if organizations have trained recruiters who do structured interviews, using tests that are valid and reliable, they don't need “the big shot coming in and putting the stamp of approval. That's an ego thing,” she says.

“If you have to go and dance for the puppet master for the final step, that's telling you something about the organization — that there's a puppet master and you might have to be asked to dance sometime.”

Cohen says top leaders should trust recruiters and managers to make a good decision in hiring the person who is going to work best for them.

“That person isn't going to see Musk very much, right?” she says. “Musk liking them doesn't matter to their daily performance.”