How do you simplify your interview process?

1 Define your hiring criteria

Before you start interviewing candidates, you need to have a clear idea of what you are looking for in your ideal hire. What are the essential skills, qualifications, and traits that you need for the role? How will you measure and compare them across candidates? Having a well-defined hiring criteria will help you create a consistent and objective interview process, as well as reduce bias and confusion. You can use a job description, a scorecard, or a checklist to document your hiring criteria and share it with your interview team.

2 Use structured interviews

A structured interview is a type of interview that follows a predefined format and set of questions. It is designed to assess candidates on the same criteria and in the same way, regardless of who conducts the interview. Structured interviews can help you simplify your interview process by making it more efficient, reliable, and fair. You can use behavioral, situational, or competency-based questions to elicit relevant information from candidates and evaluate their skills and fit. You can also use rating scales or rubrics to score candidates' responses and compare them easily.

3 Automate your scheduling

One of the most tedious and time-consuming aspects of the interview process is scheduling. You have to coordinate with multiple candidates, interviewers, and calendars, and deal with rescheduling, cancellations, and no-shows. To simplify your scheduling, you can use automation tools that can sync with your calendar, send invitations and reminders, and allow candidates to book their own slots. Automation can save you hours of back-and-forth emails and phone calls, and reduce the risk of errors and miscommunication.

4 Optimize your interview length

How long should your interviews be? There is no definitive answer, but you should aim to optimize your interview length based on the role, the level, and the stage of the process. You don't want to make your interviews too short or too long, as both can affect the quality and outcome of the process. Too short interviews can prevent you from getting enough information and rapport with candidates, while too long interviews can cause fatigue, boredom, and repetition. A good rule of thumb is to keep your interviews between 30 to 60 minutes, depending on the complexity and depth of the questions.

5 Collect feedback promptly

Feedback is a crucial part of the interview process, as it helps you gather insights, opinions, and impressions from your interview team and candidates. However, collecting feedback can be challenging, especially if you have a large or dispersed team, or if you delay the process. To simplify your feedback collection, you should use a standardized format and tool that can capture and store feedback in one place. You should also collect feedback as soon as possible after each interview, while the memory and impressions are fresh. This way, you can avoid forgetting or losing important details, and speed up your decision making.

6 Review and improve your process

Finally, you should always review and improve your interview process based on the results and feedback you get. You should analyze your hiring metrics, such as time to hire, quality of hire, offer acceptance rate, and candidate satisfaction. You should also solicit feedback from your interview team and candidates, and identify what worked well and what didn't. By reviewing and improving your process, you can simplify it further, eliminate inefficiencies and bottlenecks, and enhance your hiring performance and experience.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?