A Recruiter's Guide to Controlling a Perfect Interview

With this step by step guide, we at MockQuestions will give you all the tools, and everything you need to know, to not only hire a model employee, but to build upon your reputation as a rock-star recruiter, while increasing the culture appeal of your company.

A Recruiter's Guide to Controlling a Perfect Interview

THE GOALS OF THE RECRUITER

The Recruiter's Job

The sooner a recruiter onboards their ideal talent, the less payroll hours they’ll dedicate to the recruiting effort. If a model candidate slips under their radar, they’ve failed at their job. If they hire the wrong person, they’ve failed at their job.

Recruiters are constantly challenged by categorizing each candidate as either a good or a bad investment. Therefore, every hire is a calculated risk. The consequences of a poor hiring decision are far-reaching, often negatively impacting the entire workplace. Someone who does not have the skills or experience to do the job well, or has the wrong attitude and is not motivated or excited about the opportunity, will probably cause damage to the company’s reputation, may impact team morale, and even possibly contribute to further attrition. Long-term or repeated vacancies cause fatigue, burn-out, and turn-over among the rest of the team. Decreased morale undermines performance, company culture, and reputation.

What To Do When Your Unsuccessful At Attracting Your Ideal Talent

If, after interviewing the most attractive applicants in your talent community, you find that your strongest candidates barely meet your expectations, it’s time to re-evaluate. In most cases, this is the result of:

• A condition of the prevailing job market, and may require stronger incentives.
• The marketing behind a company’s recruiting efforts is missing the mark.
• Steps need to be taken to improve the company’s employee satisfaction scores on leading job board sites.

Choosing Which Applicants To Interview

Recruiting requires an acute attention to detail. Start by evaluating their consistency. If you can find inconsistencies at the first stage of the selection process, it suggests their performance would also be inconsistent, and that they don’t have a strong attention to detail. So, scrutinize every detail of their resume and CV.

Look for any inconsistencies with their formatting. Did they capitalize entire words in one section but only capitalize the first letter in another? Do they punctuate every bullet point or only some of them? Does the message of their resume align with the messaging of their cover letter? Does it seem like they customized their resume and CV to the company and this role?

How well each candidate’s behavior, inside and outside of working hours, reflects upon your company’s reputation must be taken into consideration. To evaluate how professional their image and conduct is, approach researching a candidate’s online and social media presence ethically, respectfully, and discretely.

Research the applicant’s work history. Learn what you can about each company they worked for. Are those companies’ values and work environments anything like yours? If they worked for a competitor or in a highly sought after position, does it make sense why they left? The more you know about their work history, the more insights you will have throughout the interview. This will also help with customizing some of your questions specifically to them.

How To Prepare For An Interview

• Do your homework and put your attention to detail to work!
• Study the presentation of their cover letter and resume.
• Evaluate how consistent their narrative is.
• Examine the professionalism of their online presence.
• Examine how their previous employers’ company cultures and work environments compare to yours.
• Determine how aligned their goals, skills, integrity, values, and character seem with your company.
• Be systematic when selecting applicants to interview and don’t waste time interviewing unqualified candidates.

How To Represent Your Company’s Interests

Even though they are interviewing you as much as you are interviewing them, remember, they aren’t getting paid to do it. So approach each candidate with gratitude for setting aside the time to interview with you. Treat them with enthusiastic respect. The better a candidate’s interviewing experience is, the better the word of mouth, especially in online forums, such as Glassdoor and LinkedIn. Good word-of-mouth increases competition in your talent pool and helps build a culture of being a desirable place to work. And don’t forget, if they are not already a loyal customer, they are a potential customer. So treat them as if they are a loyal member of your tribe, and demonstrate appreciation.

• A company’s greatest assets are its people, its customers, and its reputation.
• Protect your company’s assets.
• Treat every candidate as a loyal customer and a star employee.
• Be respectful of the time and efforts of each candidate, and take note of when they treat you with equal respect.
• You want them to want to work for you.

Remember To: Be Friendly & Thoughtful

Don’t try to entrap them or catch your candidate in a lie. These aren’t supposed to be trick questions. Remember, it’s an interview, not an interrogation. The purpose of this interview is to get to know them, while mitigating any personal bias. If you are unsuccessful in getting to know each candidate, you may be missing the opportunity to hire your ideal talent. So, you need to maintain a degree of empathy while being open, friendly, and accepting. You are the hiring ambassador of your company, and any missteps can jeopardize the investments that went into the company’s recruiting efforts. All it takes is a few bad reviews on Glassdoor to damage a company’s reputation.

• Create a wow interview experience for them.
• Represent your company well by being friendly, open, and honest.
• Share what you love about working for the company.
• Make each candidate feel welcome, comfortable, valued, liked, and included.
• Practice active listening, mirroring, asking questions, and empathizing with them.
• Speak their language. Make them feel at ease.
• Don't try to trick a candidate, or to catch them in a lie.
• Your engagement is a more valuable recruiting tool than any of the company’s other efforts.
• Take your time. Don't rush through the interview, even if you feel like they aren’t the right fit for this position. They still might be a good fit elsewhere in your company, or worth referring to someone in your professional network.

How To Mitigate Your Bias

You are looking for recruits who can ably represent your company while preserving, and building upon, its reputation. So, go into every interview assuming each candidate sitting across from you is your target talent and ideal recruit. Treat them as if they are a top performer, and start recruiting them as soon as the interview begins. You want them to have a positive interview experience from the start. If they don’t, they’ll be more likely to accept a competing offer elsewhere. If you want that ideal recruit to know what it is like to work with you, show them. Embody your company’s culture. You, in all aspects, are a representative of your company, so lead by example.

Remember To: Be Methodical & Take Your Time

Determine a candidate’s investment value by calculating their professional worth. This is subjective to each business. Yet, professional worth is dependent on the supply and demand of qualified candidates in your field, with the relevant experience and skill level, contrasted by how much you’ll have to invest in training and development, and how quickly they’ll be able to meaningfully contribute. Additional considerations are their work ethic, brand of innovation, unique contributions, and brand and culture fit. Their leadership potential, and how long each professional relationship may last, are also important considerations.

The best tool for calculating a candidate’s professional worth, and for taking notes for each question, is to create a Performance Indicator Worksheet. This will help establish consistency between all the interviews you conduct, while determining the supply and demand of qualified candidates in your talent pool. A Performance Indicator Worksheet will help you identify top performers by comparing each worksheet side by side, mitigating your own bias, providing informed decision making, and reducing risk. Leave room for additional notes with each question as well.

INTERVIEW PERFORMANCE INDICATOR WORKSHEET

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: HOW TO MAKE EACH QUESTION HIGH IMPACT!

Similarly Phrased Questions

Throughout the interview, use similarly phrased questions:

• To test their attention to detail and active listening skills.
• To test the consistency of their narrative question to question.
• To evaluate their sincerity.

For Example:

• "Why do you want to work for our company?"
• "What is your ideal working environment?"
• "Why should our company hire you?"
• "What can our company do for you?"
• "What motivates you?"
• "Where do you see yourself in five years?"

Questions Open To Interpretation

Leave some questions open to interpretation. How they respond will inform you of whether they ask questions or whether they lead with assumptions (a productivity performance indicator for rework and lost payroll hours). How they interpret the question may offer insights into:

• Their EQ and how self aware they are.
• Their attitude or world view.
• Their experience level serving as their only common point of reference.

For Example:

• "What would you do if you were running late to work?"
• "Tell me about a time you experienced a work related conflict."
• "Tell me about a time you had a disagreement with someone on your team."
• "What can our company do for you?"
• "What motivates you?"
• "Where do you see yourself in five years?"

Remember To: Note Red Flags & Concerns

Anything a candidate says that causes you to pause, make a quick note of it without triggering their defenses. You want to consistently maintain a friendly and safe atmosphere where the candidate retains their dignity and confidence. So be strategic in your approach, and circle back later on without raising alarm. Make them feel as if they are delivering a great interview, even when they are not. Also, don’t allow any single answer they deliver to make up your mind on their candidacy. Mitigate your bias and give every candidate equal opportunity to turn things around.

For Example:

• Do they answer a question with a question?
• Do they come across as uncomfortable, or confused by a question?
• Do they assume their opinions and perceptions are aligned with yours?
• Do they make jokes, over share, or exhibit a lack of boundaries or discretion?
• Do they blame others, or external factors, for their situation?
• Do their posts on their social media contradict their narrative?

Use Followup Questions When The Answer Is Unclear

Consistency is key, and anytime a candidate says something that piques your curiosity, contradicts the facts they’ve presented about themselves, or raises a red flag, take note of it. Maintain a friendly tone and keep asking more discovery questions. Dig deeper strategically throughout the interview.

For Example:

• Early on in the interview: Q.) “What is your availability?” A.) “Wide open. I don’t have any personal conflicts. I can work anytime, anywhere.”
• Towards the end of the interview: Q.) “Do you have any hobbies that you are passionate about?” A.) “Actually, I play lead guitar in a band. We’re really good. We play twice a week at the Showbox, and have rehearsal three nights a week. We’re super dedicated and have quite the following. You should come and see us play!”

How To Ask The Right Questions

It’s your job to ask the right questions. Constructing the right questions is dependent on phrasing them in such a way that gives you more answers than the surface meaning of each question. Also, test their company knowledge. Incorporate your keywords, phrases, and culture statements into your questions for the candidate to pick up on. Sprinkling company specific clues into your interview will guide top performers to the answer and allow you to identify them more quickly. If you touch on a subject they haven’t yet discovered, educate them, and continue to share your enthusiasm for working there.

For Example:

Let’s say one of a company’s core values is to ‘deliver a wow customer experience,’ which they define by making each experience ‘rewarding, eventful, and fun.’ The interviewer asks, “What does a wow customer experience mean to you?”

Prepared Candidate’s answer: “Well, I noticed this is one of the company’s core values, which they define as making every customer service experience rewarding, eventful, and fun. The way a customer feels about their experience, or how they feel about themselves while shopping, is dependent on whether they feel cared for and valued, whether they feel safe, respected, and trusted. In other words, do they feel welcomed and invited to the party, or an unwelcomed party crasher? With as much time as I spend at work, I look at is as my home away from home, where everyone is welcome.”

Unprepared Candidate’s answer: “I would take care of the customer by asking if they were finding everything okay and smiling and being nice at all times.”

Pay Attention To The Details Of Their Answers

To ensure you hire the right person for the job, you’ll need to highlight how their skills and professional experience align with your company’s needs.

• Observe their verbal and nonverbal clues to evaluate the sincerity of their answers.
• Evaluate how well they’d represent your culture and brand identity.
• Consider the needs of the team, and whether they’d build relationships with them.
• Consider their fit for the position, department, and potential growth.

How each candidate answers each question will reveal what they are telling you versus what they are showing you. How eloquently they answer each question will reveal the level of their experience as a professional.

Communication:

• Do they ask for clarification?
• Do they listen and understand before answering?
• Do they adapt their communication style to yours?
• Do they seem prepared for your follow-up questions?
• How well would they communicate with your teams?
• Do they ramble on, or is there structure to their message?
• Can they communicate complicated subjects in simple terms?
• Do they use crutch words, such as using the word ‘like’ compulsively?
• What does their body language tell you, and does it contradict with what they are stating verbally?
• Do they use a lot of qualifiers, such as telling you they work very hard and are extremely efficient, or do the examples they give describe their work ethic and what going the distance looks like for them?

Experience, Skill, Work Ethic & Integrity:

• Do they seem honest and filtered in their delivery?
• Do they seem committed and invested in this opportunity?
• Do they exhibit professional grace, gratitude, and positivity?
• Do they answer every question comfortably and with confidence?
• Do they ask questions which they could easily have answered themselves?
• Do they take ownership and responsibility for their commitments, failures, setbacks, and mistakes?

Consistency and Attention To Detail:

• Do their answers align with what they’ve detailed on their resume and cover letter?
• Do their answers complement or contradict how they’ve answered other questions in the interview?
• Do they choose their words carefully? Pay attention to their choice of words. Do they use words that have negative or positive connotations?

Positive vs. Negative Connotations:

• Negative: "Their advancement opportunities were limited and not as advertised, so I am looking for a better fit."
• Positive: "I am developing and advancing faster than they can currently accommodate my growth, and am looking for an opportunity more in line with my goals."
• Negative: "I don’t have much experience with that. I wanted to learn but wasn’t given the chance."
• Positive: "I have some experience, and would be eager to learn more."

Retain Control Of The Interview

When, after a long search, you finally find a candidate whom you connect with, it can feel exhilarating. But, just because a candidate talks a good game, is charismatic or charming, doesn’t guarantee they’d perform well. Nor does establishing a rapport with a candidate qualify them for the role, nor ensures they’ll get along with the rest of the team.

When few ideal candidates have risen to the top, it is more important than ever to remain vigilant. When a recruiter is desperate, a candidate will know it, and will gladly take control of the interview and steer it where they want to go. So remain objective, otherwise they’ll be leading the interview instead of you.

Make Every Interview Pay Off

From career webpage to job posting, all of the design and marketing efforts that went into crafting careful campaigns to attract talent, now rests on your shoulders. So, make your costly recruiting efforts pay off by asking each candidate how they learned about the job or how they heard about your company. Ask what they found attractive or what incentivized them to apply.

By ascertaining which of the company’s recruiting efforts are most effective at attracting your target talent, you can redirect your resources to what’s working, and reduce costs by finding the right talent at speed. But this cannot be accomplished until your target talent is sitting across from you.

HOW TO DECIDE WHO GOES ON TO THE NEXT ROUND

This is when you are going to compare every Interview Performance Indicator Worksheet, and decide who, out of all of those top scoring candidates will graduate to the next round of interviews. If there are any candidates who come close, but you are still uncertain about, don’t miss out on any chance to find your next ideal employee. Maybe they were nervous and their confidence will be bolstered by a second interview. Any time you are unsure, then it’s time to keep asking more questions… in the next round.

If there was a candidate you liked, but didn’t score as well as others, it is up to you whether they should qualify for the next round. But regardless of whomever you choose, create a second Performance Indicator Worksheet, and average their scores for all of their interviews, to make the ultimate decision of whom you’ll be welcoming onboard and introducing to your new teams.

YOU'VE CHOSEN, NOW CHOOSE TO DO THE RIGHT THING

It’s easy to offer someone a position, to congratulate them, and to welcome them aboard. It is rarely easy to softly let down a candidate by informing them they didn’t get the job. Yet, it is ultimately up to you, as a recruiter, to represent your company, and yourself, as a professional. Showing respect, and gratitude, for their time and their efforts is unarguably the right thing to do. So, never leave a candidate in the dark, especially those who are holding out on other offers while hoping to land this position. Showcase integrity and a strong work ethic by offering feedback to every candidate you pass on. By offering friendly and helpful advice on what they can do better in the future, they just may end up working on their skills, applying for another role down the line, only to be hired in a year.

With this perspective, every candidate is an investment. They may end up being a future customer, or a future employee, as a direct result of your actions and conduct. View every touchpoint in the interview process as an opportunity, and you’ll have nothing but top talent knocking on your door.