Just as job candidates must prepare for a job interview, so should you as the interviewer. Preparing for the interview ensures that you and your candidate have a great interview experience. It also allows you to make the best hiring decision for your company.
Recruiterbox can help you take a collaborative hiring approach that involves your whole team. It helps you make hiring choices that benefit everyone while giving your interviewee a better look at your company. Let’s talk about how this tool can improve your hiring process and job interview preparation.
Step-By-Step Guide to Preparing for a Job Interview
Step 1: Prepare Your Questions
Before you go into an interview, know which skills you want to evaluate. Preparing your questions helps you stay organized and accurately evaluate your candidate.
Build your questions around the skills you’re looking for, such as:
- Communication
- Leadership
- Organization
- Time management
- Teamwork vs. independent work
Avoid questions about the candidate’s general strengths and weaknesses. Instead, ask about specific situations, behavior, and other areas that require your candidates to give a thoughtful response.
You want them to offer natural, honest answers. That way, you see how they think on their feet and how they apply their strengths.
You’ll also want to avoid yes-or-no questions or ones that have one-word answers and ask things more open-ended. A bad question would be something like, “Would you say you are good at prioritizing tasks?” This is a question with a yes or no answer. Instead, try something more like, “How would you go about prioritizing tasks if you have four or more with varying deadlines and importance levels?” or “What are the methods you use to ensure things are done on time?”
Using recruiting software during the hiring process will help you prepare before you even contact your first candidate. It organizes your information, brings the best candidates to you. Many, like Recruiterbox, have an applicant tracking system (ATS) to keep track of applicants and use data to make your decisions.
Recruiterbox gives you a place to put your job descriptions for easy reference. Its organizational system also ensures you have all the information ready for each candidate.
Recruiterbox also has unlimited job openings and hiring managers, customizable hiring workflows, bulk openings, candidate management tools, and one-click posting to the job boards most likely to bring in quality candidates.
Recruiterbox doesn’t list specific pricing online, as it depends on the size of your team, the features you choose, and the number of openings you post. However, the site says that the minimum price per year is $3,499, averaging about $291 per month.
The software is pricey for some businesses, but you get plenty of features for the cost. If you can afford it, it’s an excellent investment to take your hiring process to the next level.
Step 2: Determine Who Will Ask Questions
Decide in advance who will ask which questions. This organizes the interview process and makes hiring more efficient.
Recruiterbox improves the collaborative interviewing process, too. It delegates specific roles to different team members, creating a cohesive hiring system.
Collaborative hiring also allows everyone involved in the interview to learn about the candidate. Each person can offer their own thoughts in Recruiterbox’s collaborative system about whether the candidate is a good fit.
Determine early on who will handle which topics in the interview. That may mean different team members ask about different parts of the job, or you all alternate asking one question at a time. You could also divide the questions by specialty. For example, one interviewer might be particularly good at managing people and their questions focus more on management.
Make sure everyone evaluates the candidates without asking the same questions. Repeating questions or subjects can make your team appear disorganized and waste interview time.
Recruiterbox allows you to delegate hiring tasks so that everyone knows their role in the interviewing and hiring process. It reduces confusion and clarifies each person’s designated duties to maximize efficiency and fill positions faster.
Step 3: Review Candidate Details
Before the interview, research and review the materials the candidate submitted with their application. That doesn’t always require a deep dive, but can include things like:
- Reviewing their cover letter
- Reading their resume and noting things you want more information about
- Checking public social media profiles, like LinkedIn
Search for any pertinent information, like their qualifications, work style, and seeing how they interact with clients and colleagues.
Use the person’s resume and provided information to inform your interview questions. Look for unique qualities to ask about, use their work samples to encourage further discussion, and check the validity of their claims if necessary.
Reviewing candidate details makes candidates feel like you put effort into the interview. It shows you care about who you hire and gives them a look into your company culture. Remember that you are not only interviewing them to see if they will be a good fit for your organization, but the candidate is also interviewing you to see if they would want to work at your company.
Recruiterbox helps you research candidates by giving you a place to keep resumes, organize candidate information, and access everything quickly, so you know who you’re interviewing and can study up.
Step 4: Have Your Answers Ready
Candidates will have questions, and you should be prepared to answer them.
People want to find out if your company is a good fit for them just as much as you do. Preparing to answer candidate questions shows that you know your company and care about who’s on your team.
Be prepared to answer questions about:
- The job description, responsibilities, requirements, and what a typical day would look like
- Company mission, vision, culture, and goals
- Benefits and/or any perks you offer
- Next steps in the hiring process
- Positive aspects of your company, like what employees enjoy about working there
You should also know which questions involve the candidate speaking to HR or include confidential information that you can’t provide.
Preparing to answer questions shows that your company is organized and creates a better interview experience when candidates see that you have confidence in your business.
Recruiterbox allows you to store this information in one accessible location. You can include the same consistent information for each interview and keep notes to not forget the details.
Step 5: Keep Track Of Time
Time tracking allows you to give your candidates your full attention and make them feel valued before they even get hired.
Make sure you have enough time before and after the interview, so you neither keep your candidate waiting nor rush them out to get to your next obligation. Managing your time lets you both get the most out of the interview.
Create an agenda for the interview. The schedule should contain what you want to cover, when to cover it, and how long the interview will take.
Planning your time prevents the interview from running too long. You can also tell candidates what to expect, and an agenda will help guide the interview toward an informative discussion. You may also want to plan time for your introduction and closing for the meeting.
Step 6: Know Your Company’s Selling Points
Prepare to be honest while selling your company to candidates. In other words, know your company’s best points and talk about them. But don’t pretend it’s perfect, either.
When talking about your company, keep the following in mind:
- What makes your business unique
- Projects you’re proud of
- Great parts of company culture
- Why employees enjoy working at your company
- Challenges the candidate might face in the posted role
- Why the candidate would be important to the company in their role and the impact they’ll have on the company
You will also want to ask what the candidate is looking for in a position. Learning that information will tell you more about whether they’re a good fit and allows you to elaborate on aspects of your company that might appeal to them.
Remember to be genuine and enthusiastic. Know what makes your company special and what would make someone want to be a part of it.
3 Top Benefits of Preparing for a Job Interview
Preparing for a job interview helps you create a better interview experience for candidates and your team. Here are a few benefits of doing the prep work before you meet your interviewee.
Hiring Better Candidates
Preparing for a job interview means presenting your company in a way that attracts the best candidates.
Recruiterbox helps you source high-quality candidates who align with your needs and company culture. It screens candidate information and automates recruiting with customizable steps to highlight the best fits for you.
When you have software that helps you hire better candidates, you waste less time finding them. It also ensures you have a cohesive business.
Better candidates mean more innovation, faster business growth, and people who really care about your company’s mission.
Improving the Interview Experience
You want candidates to have the best possible interview experience, even if you don’t hire them. A candidate who gets rejected after a good experience will still say positive things about your company. They may also encourage someone who fits the position better to apply. And you never know, they may be a better fit for a position down the road!
Recruiterbox’s ATS helps you create a collaborative hiring process that involves all the right people and gets everyone on the same page. You can search, filter, organize, and tag candidates, so you can always find their information when you need it.
Preparing with Recruiterbox helps you get to the heart of the interview faster. With better organization, you can stay professional, friendly, and on track with your interview agenda.
An Efficient Hiring Process
Recruiterbox tracks applicants throughout the interview process through offer letters. It has email templates for when you need to send offers or rejections.
Efficient hiring means you get the right people in your company faster. Fast hiring means more company growth and fewer delays in company projects and innovations.
Recruiterbox saves time on interviewing lots of people, so you can get back to running your business the way you want. Without preparing for your interviews, you might lose track of people and processes, create poor interview experiences, and cause company delays that you could have avoided.
3 Biggest Challenges of Preparing for a Job Interview & How to Troubleshoot Them
When preparing for an interview, you may face many challenges that get in the way of finding your ideal candidate. Here are a few challenges to keep in mind and how to handle them if they arise.
Creating an Interview Structure
Structure keeps your interviews running on time, avoids conversation detours, and ensures everyone stays on the same page. Not having it can cause issues like running late, repeated questions, and disorganization, which can all impact your hiring process.
Creating an interview structure involves every aspect of prep work, which is where Recruiterbox comes in handy. It stores all the information you need in one place and includes only the necessary team members in the process.
Use Recruiterbox to schedule the interview, note who will ask which questions, and block out how much time you’ll spend on each part of the interview. It also helps you know how to pitch your company to candidates and explain different aspects of the company. Above all, it avoids wasting anyone’s time.
Understanding Interview Etiquette
As the interviewer, you set the tone for the meeting. You want to give the candidate the right impression.
Avoid being so friendly that you hire the person for their personality and not their qualifications. Personality may factor in, but you must set boundaries early to maintain a professional atmosphere.
Remember to offer basic courtesies, like asking if the candidate would like something to drink. Make them feel comfortable in a neutral location, whether that’s a meeting room or a café in your building.
Use active listening and build your conversational skills before the interview. The candidate’s experience depends in part on their first impression of your company culture. Be careful not to overtake the conversation and allow the candidate plenty of time to speak and ask questions.
Recruiterbox lets you attach notes to specific candidates so that you remember important details in an interview. They might have specific preferences or other information that helps you connect with them. Making these notes in Recruiterbox will improve your interactions during the hiring process.
Applying Your Interview Strategy
Sometimes, you know what you want to say and how things should go, but things don’t always go according to plan.
If you lack experience with interviewing, you risk going over time, forgetting topics you wanted to cover, and asking important questions. That leads to wasted time and inadequate information—and potentially losing out on a fantastic new hire.
Practicing interviews with coworkers can help less experienced interviewers learn to stay on track and feel more confident. It helps you get an idea of what can happen during an interview, how people talk, and how to progress through various situations.
You also receive feedback before the real deal. Coworkers can tell you how you can improve, and help you figure out how long different parts of the interview will take. Then, you’ll apply what you learn to the actual interview.
Plus, once you interview the candidate, Recruiterbox has space where all team members can collaborate and give feedback. With a centralized system, everyone’s voice gets heard. You can also use that feedback for future interviews to help develop a consistent plan that works across the board.
Other Options for How to Prepare for a Job Interview
Recruiterbox won’t work for everyone. For some, it’s too pricey. Others may not need so many features.
Here are a few other excellent options that provide similar features to help you prepare for job interviews.
JazzHR attracts high-quality candidates while giving you the resources you need to onboard them. It also has plenty of guides and training resources for new hires and your existing team.
ClearCompany is ideal for bringing in great talent and giving you an excellent talent pool. It’s great for when you need to manage a lot of candidates. It also gives you lots of user-friendly customization features.
BambooHR is known for its ATS. It goes beyond the hiring process, though it works well for that too. The software includes payroll and culture management along with recruiting.
Recooty has a free option that works well for small and growing businesses. It also has an affordable paid package and helps you create a smaller talent pool for when you’re hiring. It makes scheduling and sending notifications simple.
- ClearCompany – Best for talent management
- JazzHR – Best for high-quality candidate sourcing
- BambooHR – Best applicant tracking system
- Recruiterbox – Best for collaborative hiring
- Recooty – Best free recruiting software