Interviews. They’re a challenge. However experienced you are, however confident you feel, it can be a tricky task to interview a person in a way that gives you all the information you need and allows them to tell you everything they want you to know. You have a limited time to find out what you need about what makes a person tick, their working style and personality, their attitude, career experience, skills, and knowledge. And that’s actually a big ask.
Everyone knows a great interview means you connect well with the candidate, but it isn’t about interrogation. The job is so much subtler than that. If you’ve ever had a disappointing interview yourself, you’ll understand how unsatisfying it is for a candidate. If you’ve ever hired someone who turns out to be totally unsuited to the role, even though their interview seemed excellent, you’ll understand the risks you face as a hiring expert.
As someone with recruitment responsibilities, it’s your job to get the best out of the people you interview. Luckily there are some powerful yet simple ways to make sure you do a really good job. Here are three ways to conduct better interviews.
First, be prepared. It’s great when an interview flows and you find yourselves getting along smoothly, but that can mean you forget to ask essential questions and gather vital insight. Prepare the questions you want to ask your candidates formally, so nothing goes astray. Figure out which questions are the most relevant to assessing and evaluating the person in the context of the vacancy. Pin down the queries that’ll reveal their capabilities as a potential team members. And establish the questions that’ll give you a really good picture of their achievements, skills, and personality.
Second, prepare for a conversation that doesn’t just involve you asking questions, but also includes giving answers to candidates. Being human is so much more powerful than just asking someone a list of dry questions. While it’s essential to be prepared, it’s also important to put people at ease. A conversational interview is a good way to do it, much better than sticking to a formal script. When genuine conversations develop, you get a much better overall sense of what makes the person tick – and what turns them off. You’ll understand the basics of them better, and you’ll get hints about the way they’ll fit into your team as human beings, not just a talented employee. Conversation-led interviewing also means you naturally listen better, so sense better and learn more.
Third, boost your hiring performance with psychometric assessments. Testing people online at home is an excellent way to create a shortlist you can rely on without having to call everyone in for a formal interview. It helps you identify the most relevant candidates with the best skills and attitudes. Because it’s very hard to ‘play the system’, the tests you choose – as long as they’re relevant to the role and to your business – will reveal all, preventing unscrupulous candidates from misleading you. It saves you trawling through tens or hundreds of CVs and covering letters. Any unconscious prejudices you might have been taken out of the equation. And all this saves you time, hassle, and money, as well as minimizes employee churn. Result!
