At ProspectHR MMI we’ve developed the only proven Multiple Mini Interview (MMI). Over the past 25 years, it has been extensively tested, evolved and improved so it is now the definitive MMI for identifying soft skills in the recruitment process of medical, municipal and educational institutes. 

This past summer, the City of Rochester, MN Fire Services used the MMI for the first time during their entrance process. Looking to improve the process they use to promote candidates to Fire Captain and Battalion Chief they once again integrated the MMI into their recruitment system. 

We caught up to Caleb Feine and Chris Ferguson, both Assistant Fire Chiefs for the City of Rochester, MN and their HR Business Partner, Kari Berns and asked them a series of questions to give readers a glimpse into their most recent experience with the MMI, the challenges they were hoping to overcome and the outcome. 

Question: Internal recruitment for fire services has followed a similar path in the past. What challenges were you facing with internal recruitment that spurred the idea of changing your process?

Caleb: Before we made any change to our process for promotions to Captain and Battalion Chief we went to the stations and listened. We attended morning meetings at all three shifts and invited insights and feedback. We heard that, in the current process, there was a perceived bias and also limited opportunity for the recruiting panel to really get insight into the person applying for the position. 

We knew we were looking for a way to gain better insights into the candidate based on the questions asked and by changing the person who was asking and analyzing the responses. The best way forward from our point of view was using the ProspectHR MMI. We’d used it in the recent past with great success and knew that it could be tailored for this use as well. 

Chris: The biggest improvement we were looking for was having a structured way to get multiple inputs on candidates from different perspectives.This would be a structure that would allow a systematic approach that eliminated the perceived bias of a panel interview. 

Question: What made our MMI a good fit?

Caleb: We knew the MMI was going to be a good fit based on the positive results we got when we included it in our entrance process. We were confident we could revise it to fit our needs as a tool to help select Captains and Battalion Chiefs.

Question: Can you describe where the MMI fit into your internal recruitment process? At what stage did a candidate encounter it?

Caleb:  There are 3 different phases in the Captain and Battalion Chief process and the MMI was in Phase 1; accounting for 50% of the scores. Using the MMI in Phase 1 put more interviewers in front of that candidate so we could gain a better and clearer perspective of where they fit in terms of  job descriptions and attributes we were testing for. 

Question: What changes did you make to the MMI process with your internal recruitment of Captain and Battalion chief? 

Caleb: For our entrance sessions, we used interviewers from inside Fire Services. For these new sessions, we used external interviewers. These were people from other City teams. The reason we did this was to help remove the perceived bias concern we heard in the fire stations during our initial outreach. . 

Chris: Moving to external interviewers made it more wholesome because the interviewers did not have a previous relationship with the candidates or their background. They had the opportunity to speak to them and take a snapshot of that person, in that moment, grading them on their answer to the words and their meaning, content and intention. 

Question: How did your external interviewers feel about being invited to participate?

Caleb: I think they appreciated being included. It fostered insight into the Fire Department and helped them learn more about the roles and the candidates. At the end of the sessions our external interviewers told us they were impressed by the caliber of individuals that were being brought forward. That’s positive for our department and was a compliment.

Question: Where did you find the external interviewers? 

Caleb: We invited people from many departments in the City: Police, Public Works, Transit, the City Clerk Office, Communications, Human Resources and our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Director, and a retired and current Fire Captain. 

Question: Can you tell us a bit about including the DEI Director?

Caleb: Including our DEI Director helped to instill trust into the process. This sent a message to stakeholders that we believe in an inclusive workforce.

Kari: Our DEI Director liked the MMI from the standpoint of providing a process where everybody is getting a fair chance. 

Question: Any external interviewers from the community? 

Kari: Yes, for both the Captain and Battalion Chief sessions we included two community members. They were a retired Battalion Chief from Alaska and an executive from the Mayo Clinic. 

Question: Did you need to change the stations?

Caleb - Most of the stations were relevant to both the Captain and Battalion Chief process but we needed to change the wording on a few stations to avoid confusion. It was mostly semantics used within our organization that needed to be edited. I’m happy to say, the process of having ProspectHR MMI create new stations for us was simple and Helen was super responsive to any questions or guidance we needed. 

Question: Who trained the interviewers?

Kari: We did our own interviewer training using materials that ProspectHR MMI provided to us. It worked out very well and the interviewers were confident in their role. We have a good system going!

Question: What was the feedback from the candidates? 

Caleb: Overall the feedback was very positive. I heard phrases like, “It was more of a conversation, less of an interrogation” and “The people I talked to work for us, they want to get more involved in leadership and that’s great.” 

There were some nerves and the candidates came all dressed up. It was rewarding to see them in the space we created. They were comfortable. Well prepared. And they were all very positive. This gives them the best chance of success and that’s important.

Kari: Candidates responded positively with the interviewer and that resulted in more conversation and less pressure and nervousness. This process makes candidates a little calmer in a relaxed environment. 

Chris - The feedback was very positive, both from the candidate and the interviewers. I was involved in the MMI for administration positions a few months back. Both times the feedback from participants has been very positive.

Question: We often hear that interviewers don’t feel drained after the MMI sessions like they do after panel interviews. Have you heard this?

Chris: Yes, the interviewers said they didn’t feel like they'd been drained at the end of the process. They were engaged and energized and gave their full effort to the candidate and this resulted in us getting an accurate picture of how the candidate presented. 

Question: Has the experience of your interviewers sparked interest in using the MMI in other departments?

Kari: Our Police Lieutenant expressed interest in the MMI but recruitment for police officers doesn’t have the volume that Fire has.

Question: Any final thoughts you’d like to share?

Caleb: The flexibility and workability of the MMI and the whole process in general gives us peace of mind that, going forward, we’ve got a system that works. We may use it again as soon as next summer. Having this system in place means I’m less stressed because I know it’s easy to duplicate and set up. The MMI makes everything really simple. 

Anytime you’re changing up a long held process, it takes careful listening, planning and execution. Having past experience with the MMI made it more simple. We used the same principles as before and incorporated them into this new process. Of course, there was trial and error; but it did absolutely everything we wanted it to. The MMI turned out to be exactly what we were looking for. 

Chris: The MMI was great, it checked all the boxes.

If you would like to find out more about how ProspectHR MMI can help your team recruit more effectively, please get in touch with us by emailing info@prospecthrmmi.com.