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• How to Conduct a Job Interview Home
• Planning the Interview
• Questions You May/May Not Ask
• Conducting the Interview
• Post Interview
• Documentation
• Sample Interviewing Questions
• Interviewing Check Sheet

Planning the Interview

There are seven critical areas to focus on before meeting with the candidate:

1. What the Job Requires
   • Define the job and what qualifications are required.
   • Identify the essential duties and responsibilities of the position and any working conditions that have a significant impact on the performance of those duties and responsibilities.
   • Prepare to discuss the job briefly, in terms that the candidate can readily understand, remembering that the candidate is also making an employment decision.
2. Information You Need From the Candidate to Predict His or Her Success in the Job
   • Develop a limited set of specific questions pertaining to the essential duties and responsibilities of the position to probe for the candidate's strengths and weaknesses.
3. Outline the Interview Process
   • Include the basic elements discussed in the Conducting the Interview section. This will provide you with a framework for interviewing all candidates on a consistent basis and ensure that all important areas have been covered. It will also make it easier for you to observe and assess each candidate and keep the discussion to the point. This plan can be modified as the conversation progresses.
   • Preparation, combined with a review of the candidate's application and/or resume, demonstrates that you have looked at the information the candidate supplied. This can be encouraging to the candidate and can assist in establishing rapport. Notify co-workers that you are not to be interrupted for matters that can wait until after the interview. Your focus and attention is centered on the interview.
4. Record and Summarize Observations about Each Candidate
   • Develop a form or standardized format to use in the interview See the Evaluation Worksheet
5. Schedule Interviews
   • Enough time should be scheduled with each candidate to allow for a relaxed, unhurried interview. Whether or not you have a Personnel Office to assist you, it is your responsibility to see that all the steps in the interview process are carried out within a sufficient time period.
   • Do not schedule too many interviews for one day.
   • Do not take weeks to conduct interviews that can be handled in a few days.
   • Consider the location of the interview site, its accessibility to candidates with disabilities and the distance a candidate will have to travel. Make arrangements for a meeting room to conduct the interviews, if needed.
   • Consider days of religious observance that might affect a candidate's availability.
   • Arrange for any reasonable accommodations that are requested by candidates.
   • Develop a schedule that does not adversely affect your other office responsibilities.
   • Notify co-workers that you are not to be interrupted for matters that can wait until after the interview. Your focus and attention is centered on the interview.
6. Notify the Candidate
   • Typically, the Office of Human Resources telephones the candidate to invite him or her to an interview. The invitation should include the following information:
     • Title of the position and the salary offered.
     • Status of the position (permanent, temporary, etc.).
     • Time, location of the interview and directions.
     • Name of the interviewer.
     • Where the candidate should report.
     • Any information required at or prior to the interview, such as a resume or samples of prior work products.
     • Notification that it is your agency's policy to provide reasonable accommodation to people with disabilities to effectively participate in the interview process and directions for requesting a reasonable accommodation, as required by the Americans with Disabilities Act.
     • Procedures for cancellation (if necessary) and rescheduling, including the telephone number of the contact person.
     • Consequences of not responding or failure to appear for the interview.
7. Review the Candidate's Application, Resume or Other Related Material
   • Typically, the Office of Human Resources will:
     • Review all candidate materials before the interview.
     • Provide blank personal history/interview forms to the candidates before the interview, if necessary.
     • When reviewing personal history forms, it is important to note:
       • Vagueness about employment history--i.e., starting and ending dates, duties and titles.
       • Insufficient responses to questions/items.
       • Inconsistencies or gaps in employment/education background.
       • Reasons for leaving the previous job (if appropriate).
       • Spelling and/or vocabulary errors.
       • Incorrect interpretation of instructions.
     • When reviewing resumes, look for:
       • Work and education experience from which you can develop evaluative questions.
       • What the individual considers important in his/her background, which may enable you to better understand the candidate's personality and goals.
       • How the candidate may have prepared the resume to show him or herself in the best possible light.