Once you have effectively sourced and qualified your candidate’s current situation, you can transition the candidate interview to screening and qualifying your candidate’s technical skills and experience.
Screening and qualifying your candidate's technical skills and experience is arguably the
To ensure you keep your candidate engaged in the conversation and interested in the opportunity consider the following:
Finally, when selling the opportunity remember that 93% of communication is not what you say but how you say it. Your candidate will be paying close attention to your tonality including your confidence and conviction in the opportunity. Be sure to be enthusiastic and excited when you sell the opportunity. If you don’t sound excited then your candidate will not get excited either.
Assuming the candidate expresses interest, then you need to ask him or her:
As I mentioned in my blog, qualifying the candidate's current situation, understanding why your candidate is interested in the opportunity gives you great insight into how your candidate thinks and what is important to them, both of which will help you and your sales team position him or her more effectively. Your candidate also needs to convince you of his or her interest in the opportunity. Remember, candidates will tell recruiters what they need to hear in order to get submitted to as many jobs as possible, but it doesn’t mean they actually want your job.
Now is time to start screening and qualifying your candidate’s technical skills and experience. The screening process helps to verify the information on the candidate’s resume and obtain additional background information. Through this process you learn about a candidate on additional levels such as personality, communication skills (both verbal and non-verbal), self-esteem, enthusiasm and attitude toward employment. While you may not be as technically qualified to screen the candidate (for technical positions) as the hiring manager, you can still ask a number of technical screening questions to make a determination of whether or not the candidate possesses the right technical skills, aptitude and experience to do the job.
Preparing Your Technical Screening Interview Questions
Before you begin screening your candidate for their technical skills and experience you need to make sure you understand the client requirements that you’re clear on exactly what it is you’re (and your client) looking for to ensure that you’re asking the right interview questions. This process should begin when the sales rep takes and qualifies the job order. You can begin planning your screening questions by first understanding:
Once you understand the answers to these questions you can begin to ask your candidate where (on their resume, past work experience) they have done these things. Go through each project or place of employment on the candidates resume to qualify your candidate’s relevant technical skills and experience.
Assess Whether or Not Your Candidate Can Deliver Real Solutions
Don’t waste your time on questions like “what are your strengths and weaknesses?” You might as well just say to your candidate “just lie to me.” Instead you need discern how your candidate would handle real situations related to the job. Imagine you had to hire a chef to cook you and your family a meal. How would you hire a chef? I would
Key Action Items
To improve your ability to screen and qualify your candidates technical skills and experience consider the following:
Looking for additional insight into interviewing candidates? Download the eBook titled "Executing the Candidate Interview, Five Pillars to Effective Qualification."