bar-raiser-interviewinglisted

# Bar raiser interviewing A bar raiser is an interviewer with no stake in filling the seat and one job: protect the company's long-term hiring bar against the hiring manager's short-term need. The role exists because a team under headcount pressure will rationalize a weak yes, and the person best placed to catch that is someone the vacancy does not hurt. Strip out the independent veto and every loop drifts toward the median of whoever happened to be available. ## Method 1. **Confirm your independence before the loop starts.** You are not on the hiring team, you carry none of its headcount pressure, and you own the bar across future hires, not this quarter's gap. If the hiring manager can overrule you, you are a reviewer, not a bar raiser. 2. **Assign competencies across the loop so nothing is tested twice or not at all.** Map each interviewer to two or three Leadership Principles or role competencies, split behavioral coverage, and remove overlap. A loop where three people probe the same strength has three blind spots. 3. **Collect written feedback independently before the debrief.** Each interviewer submits Inclined or Not Inclined with evidence before hearing anyone else. Feedback written after the room talks is anchored feedback, and groupthink launders a weak candidate into a hire. 4. **Demand evidence, not impressions.** Push interviewers to STAR structure: Situation, Task, Action, Result, and separate the candidate's "I" from the team