Rejection is not a random act. There is always a reason for it, so look for the “why” behind the “no” before you respond. Now that you understand the importance of finding what’s behind the “no” see if you can find the “why” in the following true story.

The human resource director of a manufacturing company in a remote part of the country received a call from a recruiter that a recent MBA graduate from a top tier university was in town and would be available for an interview. They had been looking for just such a person and were eager to see what this fellow had to offer.

The interview team met with the candidate the next morning excited about the prospects. Although his answers to their questions demonstrated a solid understanding of how he would perform the job, his responses were brief and unenthusiastic. Throughout the interview he appeared disinterested and sat expressionless as if he was bored and didn’t care.

Not wanting to waste any more time, the HR director thanked the candidate for coming in and closed the interview. After a brief discussion, the committee concluded that the candidate was obviously not interested in working for them and decided not to offer him the position.

A few weeks later, the HR director learned that a rival company had hired the candidate who was exceeding all expectations. A follow-up call to the recruiter further revealed that this stellar candidate did poorly in the interview because his father had just died, and he had flown in overnight to arrange the funeral. At the recruiters urging, he agreed to the interview because he was looking for a job in that area to be near his grieving mother.

So, who is at fault here: the candidate for not explaining his circumstances or the interview team for rejecting him based sourly on his behavior during the interview?

No doubt, you could share stories of similar situations like the one above. If you were to dig a little deeper into the cause of rejection in those instances you would likely find that the parties involved didn’t know or trust each other, so neither side put much effort into providing clarification or searching for the “why.”

Likability and trustworthiness are major factors in determining how much effort those on either end of the communication channel are willing to invest in trying to understand each other.