Biased job interview

[wolniwnhoj]

My wife went for a job interview at a school for children with special needs. The job was Head of Care and Education. My wife is currently that in a residential charity for disturbed children. There were three candidates. two outside and one internal. There were 9 people at the interview. 6 of them school governors! They gave it to the internal candidate on the grounds that she knew the children! Isn't there something wrong there?"

[bednobs]

not necessarily. Who told you those were the grounds fr giving her the job? could it have been that she knows the children AND was also the best candidate?

[kira000]

Unfortunately, when there are positions in schools which could be a promotion for staff, you will usually find at least one internal candidate. However they are legally obliged to open up the position to external candidates. Which tend to mean, to some extent, it is a done deal before any interviews even take place, but they have to do the interviews.
Hard to prove any discrimination, as they set the criteria for selection, which, if they include something like able to demonstrate good fit with school ethos, ability to form good relationships with the children etc, will obviously give the internal candidate an advantage.

When i was applying for teaching/education jobs, if the job involved whole days of selection, and/or long journeys to interview, i would always ask if there were internal candidates as 9/10 the internal will get it.

[wolniwnhoj]

Thanks to both people for their responses. My wife corrected me: there were nine people on the interview panel-eight of whom were school governors! I accept that it might be hard to prove a bias in favour of the internal candidate, and that advertising the post has to be done,but surely the composition of the interview panel could be described as unfairly weighted?

[buildersmate]

Running an interview panel with nine people on one side of the table and the candidate on the other is just plain stupid and these people clearly know nothing about getting the best from an interview candidate. They appear to want to be bound by 'we made a joint decision because we were all involved' mentality.
I'd just let it rest and put it down to experience. She can't seriously hope to get the decision reversed and would your wife really want to work for this shower anyway?

[wolniwnhoj]

Thank you everbody for your input. Case closed!