Interviewing Tips for Startups – Part 1

This post is part 1 of a 3 part article on interviewing tips for startups

In 4 Killer Startup Team Building Lessons, I mentioned how “I just fail to understand how you can judge people in a 30-45 minute conversation where the person is trying his or her best to impress you anyway.” This perspective is shared by the Jeff Haden, who writes for Inc.com in his article - 3 Interview Questions That Reveal Everything. According to Jeff, “Interviewing job candidates is tough, especially because some candidates are a lot better at interviewing than they are at working.”

That said, more often than not, interviewing candidates is the most feasible option you have for recruitment and it becomes critical to do this right. Here are some interviewing tips that you can use:

Ensure that you know what you are looking for

In our article - 4 Common Pitfalls to Avoid While Hiring – B Mohan Kumar and I shared our woes on “vague and verbose job descriptions”. When hiring, you need to be absolutely sure of what you are looking for in the candidate otherwise your interviews will be an exercise in futility. Avoid the “cover your ass” type of job descriptions (JDs) that contain every single detail about the job.

A good hiring JD should briefly mention key job responsibilities and then elaborate on the skills and competencies required. These need to be specific so that the interviewer can really focus on what needs to be assessed. Instead of just mentioning “good communication skills” for a sales profile, it would be more effective to say - “Ability to influence outcomes by using persuasion and compelling arguments.” This will make it easier to differentiate your required candidate from someone for a social media/ blogging role where good communication skills may mean – “Ability to succinctly communicate different ideas using creative and imaginative language”.

Prepare well before the interview

Many people feel that preparing for an interview is the job of the interviewee only. I have seen so many managers just walk in to an interview, looking at the JD and candidate’s resume for the first time during the initial 5 minutes of the interview itself! Hiring a new employee is a big decision, and especially if you are a startup, you would know the impact (whether positive or negative) that a new recruit can make. You just HAVE to prepare in advance for the interview to ensure that you do justice to the hiring process.

Spend enough time on the JD before-hand to understand exactly what you are looking for. Even if you wrote the JD, go through it again before the interview. Clarify any doubts that you may have. Now go through the candidate’s resume. Identify areas that seem to align with the job requirement as well as areas of concern – frequent job changes, drastic career shifts/ breaks, ‘iffy’ achievements etc. I came across a great article on the Wall Street Journal that goes deep into the kind of interview preparation one must do, including the types of questions to ask. Make sure that you have also prepared a brief about your company and the role to share with the interviewee.

Use a structured interview and assessment framework

Fact and aptitude based questions in an interview will certainly add some value, but are really a validation of whether the points mentioned in the CV are worth their weight. Hence, I would recommend keeping this section short. While assessing, just use check marks against each question and note down any new information/ highlights.

The real value of the interview will come from assessing the candidate’s behaviour, attitude and fit within your company. This is where behavioural event interviews (BEIs) become key. In a BEI, you ask the candidate to respond to open ended questions basis a past event(s) in the candidate’s life. The premise is that past behaviour is really the best indicator of future behaviour and performance. Instead of giving the candidate hypothetical situations where the responses can be ‘gamed’ to what the candidate thinks you want to hear, a BEI goes into specific situations to understand how the candidate behaved. You then ask probing questions to delve deeper into specific areas.

During the BEI, make a more subjective assessment of the candidate, ideally on a pre-defined scale. List down examples of things you heard that justify your assessment. This part is critical since you will probably be meeting multiple candidates and it is important to be able to make qualified comparisons when selecting which candidate to proceed with. Having a pre-defined scale with your comments will also help when you discuss the candidate with other interviewers.

In the next part of this article, I will delve deeper into the specific nuances of the BEI and how to conduct one.

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