10 Best Practices for Interviewing That Help Identify Top Performers

CEOs and business owners tell me every day that hiring and retaining quality employees is their number one business challenge. Hiring the right candidates is a critical process for any organization; business success depends on the ability to attract, select, and retain individuals who not only have the necessary skills but also fit well within the company culture.

This critical process can be challenging if not approached correctly. In this blog post, we walk you through 10 best practices for hiring success.

1: Define Success

If we don’t know what we’re looking for, we often won’t find it. The essential first step is to identify and define what leads to success in the role you’re filling. What are the success competencies as they relate to the role, the manager, and the culture?

The hiring manager and decision makers must all be on the same page about what they are looking for. One way to accomplish this is by creating an applicant appraisal form that identifies the core competencies required for the role and what the hiring decision makers will focus on with their interview questions.

2: Use a Traffic-Light Mindset

Think of interviewing and hiring candidates as a “spam filter” to prevent “viruses” from entering your workplace and culture. In a sense, hiring means playing the role of steward for your company’s culture as well as for the qualifications specific to the job. Thus, your mindset must reflect this responsibility. The “Traffic-Light Mindset” can help you fulfill this responsibility and remove emotional bias by asking yourself three questions and gathering behavioral evidence to help you evaluate the candidate.

• Can the candidate do the job? = Red Light 

  Here you are asking interview questions and gathering behavioral evidence to decide if a candidate has the skills and competencies outlined in your success target. If the evidence shows they don’t, then we stay at a Red Light for this candidate. If they have the capabilities you’re looking for, then they pass the Red Light test and the interview moves on to the Yellow-Light test.

• Will the candidate do the job? = Yellow Light 

  Here you’re asking questions and gathering behavioral evidence to decide if the candidate has the drive and motivation to do the job. There are many talented candidates, but not all talent is motivated internally and consistently. In addition, a given role or position will probably motivate some candidates more than others. Identifying core motivations and determining a candidate’s level of enthusiasm for the role are the keys to passing the Yellow Light test.

• Does the candidate fit our team and culture? = Green Light 

  We often hire based solely on whether the candidate can do the job, but this attitude omits the equally critical question of personality and culture fit. This risks interpersonal issues and unwanted turnover if the candidate later turns out to be incompatible with the team or the company culture. To pass the Green Light test, you must be enthusiastically in agreement with the following: they can do the job, they will do the job, and they fit our team and culture.

  
  

3: Ask Behavioral Interview Questions

A person’s past behavior is the best predictor of his or her future behavior in similar circumstances. This is the basis for asking behavioral interview questions. These are questions intended to get the candidate talking about the past, especially by giving examples of real situations they have experienced that are relevant to the situations they will experience in your open position.

A typical standard interview question might be “Did you meet all of your goals last year?” However, this question format is likely to elicit a yes-or-no answer with no context or behavioral examples—and that’s not enough.

The behavioral interview way to ask this question is, “Give me an example of some of your goals and expectations over the past year. Tell me where you ended up. What specific actions did you take that contributed to the success or failure of that goal?” Asking the question this way encourages the candidate to provide some kind of narrative that includes specific information about the situation, as well as to provide behavioral and motivational evidence that you’re looking to uncover.

Try to avoid asking yes-or-no, or hypothetical interview questions and instead, use the behavioral interview approach. Start your questions with phrases such as “give me an example,” “tell me about a time,” etc.

4: Apply the STAR Interview Method

By implementing the Situation, Task, Action, Result (STAR) behavioral interview method, you find out much more than what is on a person’s resume, such as how they performed and made decisions in a specific situation. The STAR method yields good indications of a candidate’s likely performance in your organization.

To use the STAR method, ask the candidate these questions:

• Situation: What was the goal? Ask the candidate to describe a situation, with appropriate context, in which they were assigned a project or asked to achieve a goal. Ideally, ask them to talk about a situation that is likely to occur in the role they are interviewing for.)

• Task: What tasks were they asked to complete?Ask the candidate to provide examples of the tasks and responsibilities they contributed towards the project or goal.

• Action: What actions did they complete?Ask the candidate to explain how the tasks were completed, including the process, timeline, their thought process, and if others were involved.

• Results: What were the outcomes?Ask the candidate to summarize the results of their actions and explain whether or not the goal was achieved and successful.

5: Prepare for the Interview

Review the candidate’s resume ahead of time and consider the core competencies you’re looking for. Use this information to prepare pertinent interview questions that address those areas. Just as candidates need to be well prepared for an interview in terms of knowing the role and what the company does, all people conducting an interview should be equally prepared regarding the candidate they’re sitting across from. Keep in mind that you and your company are being evaluated as much as you’re evaluating the candidate. Put your best foot forward in being professional and that you take hiring seriously.

6: Plan the Interview Setting and Process (Four Phases of an Interview)

Key preparation steps for interviews ensure that your organization presents a professional, secluded setting. This might be an office, a conference room, but not the lobby and/or where there are distractions.

Create a structural plan for the flow of an interview. The Four Phases of an Interview are as follows. It’s important to follow these in order.

Introduction

The goal here is to introduce yourself, put the applicant at ease, establish rapport, establish expectations of the interview process, and put yourself in control of the interview.

Techniques for accomplishing this are to smile and be friendly, remove barriers (computer screens, phones etc.), use small talk, and also acknowledge receipt of their resume, references etc.

The opening phase of an interview should be brief and only account for about 5% of the interview time.

Gather Information

This is where you are asking your behavioral interview questions to determine if the candidate can do the job, will be motivated to the job, and they fit the culture and the team (Traffic Light Mindset).

The information gathering phase should take about seventy to eighty percent of the total interview time. This is the “meat” of the interview.

Give Information

This is where you’re answering questions that the candidate has about the opportunity. Many interviewers make the mistake and do this before the information gathering phase (asking behavioral interview questions) because they can’t wait to tell the candidate about the company and opportunity. However, by doing that you have just told the candidate much of what you’re looking for and then they end up “parroting” back to you what you just told them.

You want to conduct the Information Gathering first to avoid this. Additionally, by learning more about them before you tell them all about the company and the opportunity, you’ll be in better position to “sell” the company and opportunity to the right candidates by being able to communicate what would be of interest to the candidate.

The information giving phase should take about ten to twenty percent of the total interview time.

Conclude the Interview on a Good Note

Close out the interview by explaining the next steps to the candidate, and remind them of anything else needed from them. Think in terms of keeping them engaged, and thank them for their time.

Keep in mind that every interview candidate will potentially contribute to your company’s image by telling others about their interview experience, including via social media. A candidate might even be a current or future customer. Regardless of whether an individual person is a viable interview candidate, be kind. Thank them for their interest and the time they committed to the application and interview.

The closing phase should take less than five percent of the total interview time.

7: Take Good Notes

Notes are essential memory aids later on when comparing candidates. Take notes with a separate notepad, not on the candidate’s resume. If you’re interviewing with a coworker, you can take notes for each other’s questions, allowing the questioner to focus on the candidate and listen actively for opportunities to follow up with secondary interview questions.

8: Control the Interview

As the interviewer, the interview is your meeting and, in order to make good use of this time with the candidate, there will be situations where you need to control the interview and keep things on track.

We’ve all met people who like to narrate in detail, go off on a tangent, or stray away from answering the question. These conversation techniques can help you gain control and redirect the conversation.

-     “Let’s move on to the next question…”

-     “I’d love to hear more, but I also want to know about…”

-     “That’s an interesting story, but let’s get back to the question…”

-     “Earlier you mentioned… “

-     “I’d like to go back to… “

-     “Hold that thought and tell me more about…”

-      “Okay, I understand your thought on that. What can you tell me about…”

9: Communicate Next Steps and Follow Through

Candidates may turn down job offers and remove themselves from consideration if the next steps they expect don’t happen. If you tell the candidate the next step in your hiring process within an expected timeframe, then make sure that happens consistently.

Being inconsistent in this process is not only unprofessional and inconsiderate, but it can also cause the candidates to have to reach back out to check in, which also takes time away from those having to answer these questions.

10: Use an Applicant Appraisal Form

Here, we loop back to Tip 1 in this process, defining success for the role in question. Once you have defined the success target and conducted a good behavioral interview that targeted those success competencies, you’ll want to then incorporate the interview findings into objective decision-making.

An applicant appraisal form serves as a guide for the interview and selection process that helps maintain objectivity and reduce emotional bias from the overall hiring decision.

Read more about using an appraisal form along with a template to use in your hiring process:

• How to Use the Applicant Appraisal Form

Set Your Team Up for Interviewing Success

Interviewing and hiring is a core leadership competency: a critical part of a company’s long-term success. Done right, you can set your team and your company up for success while building a great culture.

If you’d like to provide a 3-hour workshop for your interviewers and hiring managers, please contact us at https://www.zeroriskhr.com/contact.

Learn more on our Behavioral Interviewing Workshop page.