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The topic of ‘how to interview’ is a broad one, and one that is incredibly subjective. What we wont do here is cover what we think best practice looks like. Interview techniques, assessment frameworks and approaches all vary and can all be successful in different environments.
What we do want to do here though if provide you with some pointers, things to think about and some resources covering a variety of ways in which you could think about approaching interviews.
We also appreciate of course that your business may already have certain interviewing structures in place too.
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Whilst there’s no firm, universally agreed number of stages that you should follow aiming for something between 3-5 is usually a safe place to be. Too many will drag the process out, but it’s also vital to remember that too few can create uncertainty in a candidate’s mind. Whilst you want processes to move quickly, if it moves too fast it might make them uncomfortable. Remember, this is an opportunity for them to assess you and your business too- they might need a few stages to do that, and often can’t make an informed decision after one meeting.
If you can design something that lands between 3-5 you’re in a good place generally.
💡Google ran some research and landed on the ‘rule of 4’, realising that 4 stages was the optimum number for them when assessing quality of hire. Anything more than that and it was diminishing returns. They drastically reduced their time to hire with this rule.
Again, time-to-hire statistics vary heavily depending on role, business and industry. But if you are aiming for 3-5 stages, it should be achievable to aim for something in the region of 2-3 weeks total between 1st and final. Accounting for some time between application stage, and 1st stage, and then offer to hire, something in the region of 21-30 days is a really healthy aim to aspire to get to
You can help keep this healthy by planning ahead when you’re planning your hiring. Think about:
👉 Who’s involved on the hiring team? What are their diaries like? 👉 Are any of them on holidays during the next few weeks? If so is there an alternative stand-in? 👉 Is there any project work which might slow down the process? 👉 Can you pre-block some time in their diaries to protect some slots?
Try to pencil in the stages into your diary as best as you can. It gives you a deadline to work to, and helps to keep you on track
💡According to data from peoplemetrics.fyi, as of May 2024 average ‘time to offer’ for companies between Seed > Series B globally was 32 days.
Format will vary depending on your role, function, team, and general approach to hiring from the company. Most companies will prefer a blend of formats to help with overall assessment e.g:
👉 Initial, informal introduction call 👉 Deeper dive with team-member / manager 👉 Technical Assessment 👉 Final Stage / Culture Fit
Whatever you decide to do, try to focus on quality of time spent and make sure you are able to make appropriate adjustments for folks who need it, and that you are not testing for testings sake.
💡 There are some incredible, very unique approaches to hiring that include things like paid bounty walls that folks can work on (ref: Cal.com)
We’ve all heard about ‘too many cooks’. It’s very true in the world of hiring. Too many people involved in the process can cause challenges with decision-making later on. You want opinions, and assessment but the right amount. A few stakeholders that are likely to be involved though could include:
👉 People / Talent Team 👉 Functional team member 👉 You 👉 Your Manager or CEO (or alternative Sr Leadership) 👉 Possibly a team member from another functional area of the business (e.g. someone this person is likely to work with regularly on a cross-functional basis)
You should look at identifying who these people are before you start the process. As mentioned in a previous section (‣) it’s super helpful to get this team identified, together and briefed & aligned on what you are looking for. Again, it’s useful to make sure that looking ahead to the next 3-5 weeks that there are no huge issues on diaries that might slow the process down.
Depending on the setup of your company you may have certain team members responsible for delivering direct feedback to candidates and ensuring they communicate with them regularly. Regardless though, even if you have a talent team owning this, it’s your responsibility still to drive and oversee this.
Talent teams can only relay the feedback that they have received from you as hiring manager.
👉 Be thorough, be honest, and give context 👉 Update as quickly as possible 👉 Set out clear expectations in your hiring kick-off with the rest of the interviewers involved. Determine SLA’s for feedback, and expectations on depth and detail.
This hire will join your team. You have a responsibility to care about their candidate experience.
When thinking about format of stages, make sure you consider what accessible alternatives look like for folks who might need it.
e.g. Certain Neurodivergent candidates may struggle with 2-3 hours assessments. Build in some break time if they need it.
This can be hard when it comes to knowing what you should and could offer to candidates. But work with your TA team or other colleagues if you can to look at each stage and consider what you might be able to offer up, and then think about how you can offer that to people transparently.
💡 Example here of a list of example adjustments shown to candidates pre-application
This is hotly contested 🔥. Strap yourself in. There’s a lot of opinions right now on culture fit vs culture add terminology. Ironically, the intention behind both terms is similar, but historically, the application of ‘culture fit’ has caused company’s problems… moving from assessing candidates on their ‘actual’ culture fit, to applying ‘the beer test’ (e.g. assessing people based on hobbies, interests, similarities, personality and ‘can I share a beer with this person?)
Enter, ‘Culture add’ which many companies see is a more progressive, positive, and inclusive approach to assessing culture. As TestGorilla put it..
Culture add refers to the likelihood that a candidate hired by the company will reflect the company’s values and behaviors in everything they’re doing, to the improvement of others in the company.
But a word of caution. Culture Add can be just as dangerous if not applied properly. (This is all about the application!). You still need to ensure there’s some alignment to values, behaviours, and your operational ways of work (tooling, communication, feedback, etc). But you’re instead looking for the ability to bring something ‘additional’ when it comes to ideas, perspectives, problem-solving. Diversity of thought is powerful. And if used well, Culture Add can help with this.
⚠️However, just be cautious of how you present the idea of culture add to candidates. Some companies fall foul of insinuating that ‘’you can come in here and really ‘change’ our culture and ways of work’ and some candidates will take that to mean that they have a genuine opportunity to change tools that are used, processes in place, how a company communicates… often that’s not an option on the table in reality. So….
Be clear on what that term means to you. And get clear on how you define culture.
What you want to look for: ✅ Signs they can thrive in your culture, environment and ways of working