How to Perfect Your Job Interview Questions

Good interview questions offer a clear measurement to determine if a candidate will perform well in their role and fit well with the team. To accomplish this, interview questions must be clear and intentional. Before we delve into the criteria for effective interview questions, let's cover some poor interview questions and why they are bad.

• Too Vague. "What's your biggest weakness?" It does nothing to help understand a candidate's qualifications.
• Aggressive. "Why should we hire you?" It puts people in a hot seat and is overly open-ended.
• Asking discriminatory questions. "Will you have to pick up kids from school every week?"

Some of these questions are simply not effective, and others are actually illegal. It's best to design interview questions to be clear, intentional, and quantifiable.

Clear:?What are you hoping to understand through this question? Asking yourself that with each question can help add clarity to the question. You can clarify your interview questions by examining how often candidates must pause to respond. A 7 to 10-second pause is natural, but if you find most of your interviewees pause longer on a particular question or if they repeatedly ask for clarification, that is an indicator that your question needs to be simplified.

Intentional:?Each question should line up with a qualification, rigor of the position, or aspect of the company's culture. When designing a question, ask yourself: how will this question help me understand this person's history with a role like this and their potential fit with our culture? Asking this will help keep your questions intentional.

Quantifiable:?Ask questions that make it easy for the candidate to quantify and measure their previous accomplishments. Before interviewing, you and your team should know what answers you are looking for. An evaluation criteria rubric can help a team objectively score a candidate's responses. That way, the selection is made objectively and not based on personal preference.