In an effort to go beyond resumes as tools in its search for executive

Question

In an effort to go beyond resumes as tools in its search for executives, one leading company has resorted to interviewing the top candidates for a position all together in a single group. This technique is supposed to afford a direct comparison of the candidates with respect to some personal qualities that cannot be gleaned from a resume.

Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the value of the simultaneous interview technique?

A. Resumes do sometimes allow reliable inferences to be made about a candidate's personal qualities.

B. The simultaneous interview could become cumbersome if there were a great many candidates for a position.

C. The more perceptive the interviewer, the more revealing the simultaneous interview is apt to be.

D. In There are certain personal qualities that only an extended simultaneous interview can bring out.

E. The simultaneous interview distorts each candidate's response style by inducing stresses unlike any an executive position induces.

adstudy · Accepted Answer

Here from the stem we get that, the purpose of following the simultaneous interview technique is for interviewer to assess on personal qualities of a the candidate that he is not able to assess upon via the resume.

To weaken this we need something like that says, with this technique also we are not able to asses because, like in resume, for this methodology also personal qualities are not assess-able for that candidate.

Option E states exactly that. Candidates personal qualities do not come out naturally due to stress induced by these interviews in specific.

So IMO E should be the answer

AdityaHongunti · Answer

]In an effort to go beyond resumes as tools in its search for executives, one leading company has resorted to interviewing the top candidates for a position all together in a single group. This technique is supposed to afford a direct comparison of the candidates with respect to some personal qualities that cannot be gleaned from a resume. 
 understand- 
1. company wants more infor than it can get by interviewing
2.plan - interview all at once IN A SINGLE GROUP
3. expectation- direct comparison of the candies w.r.t some personal qs'

Question analysis - Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the value of the simultaneous interview technique?
- WEAKEN the VALUE (usefulness of technique) of SIT

though process - author wants a more thorough assesment of candies and hence he thinks that putting them all up for discussion at once would give him some more insight into the candies . the author has just put a plan and has not given any evidence to support this plan . As it stands this is a weak argument and has many flaws.

flaw- what if the candies have a difference in their response which would not be a real representative of them? what if the candy gets nervous or one of the candies is too dominant and hence intrigues another , resulting in unrepresentative COMPARISON? as comparison is the way the author thinks he will get more insight he assumes that no such thing will happen which will jeopardize the validity of the comparison .

weaken framework (what do we want to weaken?) : the conclusion is> SIT will result in MORE INSIGHTS IN THE QUALITIES of candies. we have to find an AC which will show us that when SIT is applied the comparison(the main way) is not valid enough to be considered for evaluation of candies.

A. Resumes do sometimes allow reliable inferences to be made about a candidate's personal qualities. 
Irrelevant - what resumes do tells us nothing about SIT

B. The simultaneous interview could become cumbersome if there were a great many candidates for a position.
out of context: first of all we dont know how many candies and so we cannot consider GREAT MANY candies. secondly, even though the SIT may be cumbersome(difficult) , it may still provide valid results.

C. The more perceptive the interviewer, the more revealing the simultaneous interview is apt to be. 
out of context: Do we know how the interviewer is? is he or is he not perceptive? we dont know anything about interviewer. Secondly, even if the interview is perceptive , do we know the extent of info we get? the more revealing is true but will it represntative enough? it may or may not be. 
 
D. In There are certain personal qualities that only an extended simultaneous interview can bring out. 
Opposite:STRENGTHENER - this supports the author's conclsuion.

E. The simultaneous interview distorts each candidate's response style by inducing stresses unlike any an executive position induces. 
same as though process: of SIT DISTORTS response then the true qualities may not be what the interviewer will get. we want comparison which will tell us more about the PERSONAL qualities.

alexkozhura · Answer

I think it should be  E .  C  strengthens the argument instead of weakening it.  C  states that if you have a really good interviewer, then simultaneous interviews are going to be very valuable. Not something that we need.

Sefy · Answer

Why B. is incorrect, because 4x Large Hall can be arranged before interview for the candidates applied for vacant. Only if we perceive logically

MasteringGMAT · Answer

Is response style assumed to be a personal quality of a candidate in option E. trying to understand the underlying reasoning as to why this option is correct.

Posted from my mobile device

exuberantvivek · Answer

Answer seems completely based on your assumption.
We are assuming that Executive doesn't work under stress and group interview induce stress so it is not fruitful.

I am really confused how we are reaching to this conclusion.

bronaugust · Answer

The first step as a solver is to understand what the question requires you to do. You can figure that out by reading the stem of the question. Clearly, you are to choose an answer option that will cast the most serious doubt on the value of the  simultaneous interview technique. In other words, you need to weaken the argument that favors this technique. You shall now work the argument by figuring out what the technique actually is and on what basis it is touted to be successful.

CONCLUSION:   The technique of interviewing the top candidates for a position all together in a single group is supposed to afford a direct comparison of the candidates with respect to some personal qualities that cannot be gleaned from a resume. (Why so?)

PREMISE:   The technique would help   the company go beyond resumes as tools in its search for executives.

Now that the argument is worked, you may want to figure out a potential weakener. Remember, before eliminating, you need to know what the right answer option must be doing.

POTENTIAL WEAKENER:   -> The technique may not bring out the personal qualities of the interviewee.

Now that you have a potential weakener, you know what your right answer should be doing. The right answer should be introducing a flaw with the technique. You can now eliminate answer options that strengthen the argument besides the ones that are either out of scope or too extreme.

A. Resumes do sometimes allow reliable inferences to be made about a candidate's personal qualities. -   OUT OF SCOPE   -  Not worried about what resumes SOMETIMES do  -    ELIMINATE

B. The simultaneous interview could become cumbersome if there were a great many candidates for a position. -   OUT OF SCOPE   -  Not worried about whether the interview could become cumbersome or not  -    ELIMINATE

C. The more perceptive the interviewer, the more revealing the simultaneous interview is apt to be. -   OUT OF SCOPE   -  Not worried about any qualities of the interviewer  -    ELIMINATE

D. In there are certain personal qualities that only an extended simultaneous interview can bring out. -   STRENGTHENS   -  If certain personal qualities can be brought out only in an extended simultaneous interview, it will actually end up strengthening the argument  -    ELIMINATE

E. The simultaneous interview distorts each candidate's response style by inducing stresses unlike any an executive position induces. -   INTRODUCES A FLAW WITH THE TECHNIQUE   -  If the technique distorts the response style of a candidate, it is not going to help understand his/her personal qualities  -    MARK AND MOVE

Therefore, E is the right answer.

bronaugust · Answer

The first step as a solver is to understand what the question requires you to do. You can figure that out by reading the stem of the question. Clearly, you are to choose an answer option that will cast the most serious doubt on the value of the  simultaneous interview technique. In other words, you need to weaken the argument that favors this technique. You shall now work the argument by figuring out what the technique actually is and on what basis it is touted to be successful.

CONCLUSION: The technique of interviewing the top candidates for a position all together in a single group is supposed to afford a direct comparison of the candidates with respect to some personal qualities that cannot be gleaned from a resume. (Why so?)

PREMISE: The technique would help the company go beyond resumes as tools in its search for executives.

Now that the argument is worked, you may want to figure out a potential weakener. Remember, before eliminating, you need to know what the right answer option must be doing.

POTENTIAL WEAKENER: -> The technique may not bring out the personal qualities of the interviewee.

Now that you have a potential weakener, you know what your right answer should be doing. The right answer should be introducing a flaw with the technique. You can now eliminate answer options that strengthen the argument besides the ones that are either out of scope or too extreme.

A. Resumes do sometimes allow reliable inferences to be made about a candidate's personal qualities. - OUT OF SCOPE - Not worried about what resumes SOMETIMES do - ELIMINATE

B. The simultaneous interview could become cumbersome if there were a great many candidates for a position. - OUT OF SCOPE - Not worried about whether the interview could become cumbersome or not - ELIMINATE

C. The more perceptive the interviewer, the more revealing the simultaneous interview is apt to be. - OUT OF SCOPE - Not worried about any qualities of the interviewer - ELIMINATE

D. In there are certain personal qualities that only an extended simultaneous interview can bring out. - STRENGTHENS - If certain personal qualities can be brought out only in an extended simultaneous interview, it will actually end up strengthening the argument - ELIMINATE

E. The simultaneous interview distorts each candidate's response style by inducing stresses unlike any an executive position induces. - INTRODUCES A FLAW WITH THE TECHNIQUE - If the technique distorts the response style of a candidate, it is not going to help understand his/her personal qualities - MARK AND MOVE

Therefore, E is the right answer.

bronaugust · Answer

B is incorrect because as a solver, you are to weaken the argument. Whether or not the process could become cumbersome is totally out of scope. That will not impact the argument in any way. The argument is about bringing out the personal qualities of the interviewee by making use of the technique, so even if the interview becomes cumbersome, it may still bring out the personal qualities.

yolo2025 · Answer

Where did this question come from?

mellowmev · Answer

E casts serious doubt on the value of the simultaneous interview technique because it suggests that the interview environment introduces artificial stress that doesn't resemble the actual pressures of an executive role. If the interview stresses are not representative of real job conditions, the qualities being assessed may not be relevant or accurate, thus undermining the effectiveness of the technique. This makes (E) the strongest challenge to the value of the simultaneous interview.

guptaprateek78 · Answer

Why is the answer choice A wrong?
The stem says that the simultaneous interview allows to see some personal qualities which can’t be seen in resumes. But option A says we can make reliable inferences about some personal qualities from resumes. Does this not weaken the argument?
Or is it wrong because of the word “some”?

OnkarSawantBhosle · Answer

A just makes a statement without backing it with a reason. E gives you a reason to why its saying what its saying.

rishabh1105 · Answer

In an effort to go beyond resumes as tools in its search for executives, one leading company has resorted to interviewing the top candidates for a position all together in a single group. This technique is supposed to afford a direct comparison of the candidates with respect to some personal qualities that cannot be gleaned from a resume.

Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the value of the simultaneous interview technique?
This is a weaken question.

A. Resumes do sometimes allow reliable inferences to be made about a candidate's personal qualities.
Even if resume does sometimes allow reliable inferences about a candidate personal qualities. The argument isnt about what resume can do or cannot do, but about the qualities which can only judged together(through direct comparison which cannot be done using resume). So irrelevant.

B. The simultaneous interview could become cumbersome if there were a great many candidates for a position.
So what? Even if it is cumbersome, we are getting valuable insight out of it, so the argument still holds strong.

C. The more perceptive the interviewer, the more revealing the simultaneous interview is apt to be.
Got it. So more perceptive the interviewer we will get more details, but nothing to weaken the argument.

D. In There are certain personal qualities that only an extended simultaneous interview can bring out.
Clearly strengthens

E. The simultaneous interview distorts each candidate's response style by inducing stresses unlike any an executive position induces.
If the simultaneous interview distorts each candidate's response style by inducing stresses, we might get a distorted view of candidates capability, which weakens the advantage we get from simultaneous interview. So weakens

Kandy11 · Answer

Doesn't seem to be a good GMAT level question...Sentence E lacks clarity.....

hakzarif · Answer

Logically you are right but you cannot bring any external assumption while attempting to CR. 
We do not know about the infrastructural capacity of the company and hence no guessing 😃

The easiest (and the best) way to cancel out option B is  nowhere in the text it is mentioned that the company is looking for only 1 (or any number of) candidate . If the process help us to get more potential candidates then it is actually favoring the company.

In an effort to go beyond resumes as tools in its search for executive

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