TOP 10 Effective Recruitment Interview Methods – Pros and Cons of Each Method

Effective interview questions, as well as popular interview methods, are always topics that HR professionals research with the goal of recruiting high-quality candidates. So, how can you apply effective interview methods in your company’s candidate interviews? Follow this article by 1Office to learn about the pros and cons of the 10 most effective recruitment interview methods today.

I. What is an interview method?

A recruitment interview method is the way recruiters and candidates interact, either directly or indirectly. The main goal of an interview method is to select a candidate with the right skills and personality for the company’s open position.

By applying various interview methods, recruiters can better understand the candidate’s short-term and long-term goals, and thus assess their suitability for the company’s development direction.

II. The 6 steps of the recruitment interview process

Typically, an interview, whether in-person or online, goes through the following 6 basic steps:

Step 1: Introduction and opening: This is where both the recruiter and the candidate introduce key points about themselves for easier address and conversation.

Step 2: The interviewer introduces the organization and explains the job

Step 3: The interviewer asks questions to clarify information in the candidate’s resume

Step 4: The interviewer asks questions to assess the candidate’s abilities and suitability

Step 5: The candidate asks questions, if any; this part helps to partially assess the candidate’s thinking ability

Step 6: Closing the interview: The interviewer summarizes the information and informs the candidate about the next steps.

Thus, the main and most important purpose of these 6 steps in the interview process is to select candidates who are capable of performing the job now and can also meet the company’s future needs.

See more: How to build a detailed and standard HR recruitment plan

III. The 10 most effective recruitment interview methods today

1. Behavior-based interview

This employee interview method is also known as a “competency-based interview” and operates on the STAR model:

• Situation
• Task
• Action
• Result

With this interview method, the interviewer will assess soft skills such as communication, leadership, teamwork, etc. Through this, the recruiter can see how the candidate’s attributes align with the job position.

Pros:

Helps recruiters see the candidate’s thinking ability and agility when handling questions. It also reveals the candidate’s eloquence.

Cons:

With this interview format, some candidates can easily game the system. Specifically, those who have prepared in advance and have good speaking skills will leave a strong impression on the interviewer.

2. Stress interview

In this interview method, the recruiter will continuously question the candidate’s abilities, interrupt and ask probing questions, demand specific figures, etc.

Pros:

• Reveals the candidate’s personality and abilities quite authentically.
• Through the answers to probing questions and the recruiter’s way of asking interview questions to create pressure, they can quickly find a candidate’s weaknesses, helping the recruiter screen for the highest quality candidates.

Cons:

Being too harsh when applying the stress interview method can often cause candidates to lose their composure and fail to reveal their true professional capabilities.

3. Trick question interview

Instead of asking monotonous, standard questions, recruiters for senior positions often challenge candidates with difficult, perplexing questions. Jobs that require this interview method are often positions that demand creativity and agility, such as in marketing or communications.

Pros:

• Effectively screens for high-quality candidates in terms of both skills and professional knowledge.
• Increases the competitiveness of the interview.

Cons:

• Only suitable for positions that require creativity and agility.
• Can sometimes tarnish the recruiter’s image in the eyes of the candidate.

4. Situational recruitment interview

In a situational interview, the interviewer can test the candidate’s reflexes and true personality. Recruiters can use this to evaluate their problem-comprehension skills, and observe their mindset and how they handle situations.

Advantages:

• Evaluates the candidate’s problem-comprehension skills
• Close observation reveals the candidate’s mindset and how they handle situations
• Provides a basis for determining if the candidate’s personality is a good fit for the position

Disadvantages:

It only assesses the candidate’s skills and cannot be the sole factor in determining the right person to hire. Therefore, recruiters will need to use additional methods.

5. In-person Interview Method

Simply put, an in-person interview is when the candidate comes directly to the company/business to meet the recruiter. They will ask and answer questions and exchange information directly during the interview. A face-to-face meeting will help the recruiter get the most authentic view of the candidate’s personality and communication skills.

Pros:

• Recruiters can easily observe factors such as body language and the candidate’s attitude
• Direct assessment methods can be applied, such as using physiognomy, communication ability, and problem-solving skills.

Cons:

Requires the recruiter and candidate to arrange a suitable time and place

6. Phone Interview

Unlike in-person interviews, phone interviews help recruiters save a lot of time. This method is often used by businesses recruiting for mass positions such as sales.

Pros:

• Saves time, costs, and preparation procedures
• Fast, concise, and quite effective for positions that can be done remotely

Cons:

• It is difficult for recruiters to control the atmosphere of the conversation over the phone
• Cannot determine if the candidate is truly competent

7. Interviews via Online Platforms

The development of the internet has greatly supported recruiters by allowing for a variety of interview methods. Platforms that allow online calls and interviews such as Skype, Google Hangouts, Zalo, and Zoom are becoming more popular and convenient.

Pros:

• Interviews can be conducted anywhere, anytime
• Saves more time compared to in-person interviews and resolves geographical issues
• Many organizations and businesses also prefer using video recordings. They ask candidates to record an interview video, and the HR department can review these videos multiple times for easier evaluation.

Cons:

• Dependent on internet signal and connection speed
• A poor signal will affect the general mood of both the candidate and the recruiter.

8. Group Interview Method

The group interview method involves placing candidates together in one room or at a round table to solve a problem within a given time frame. At the same time, the recruiter will observe from the outside and evaluate the candidates.

Pros:

Candidates will demonstrate their ability to grasp and understand the problem, their analytical skills, their ability to persuade others, and their presentation skills, or even how they assert themselves over their competitors.

Cons:

The recruiter will need to observe many candidates at once, and sometimes it’s not possible to thoroughly evaluate each person to make a selection.

9. Individual Interview

The individual interview is the most common format, where the candidate will speak directly with a company representative.

Pros:

• Helps the candidate feel less pressure as they don’t have to face multiple people
• Recruiters can easily evaluate and select potential candidates

10. Structured Interview

The recruiter will prepare a list of questions before meeting the candidate. This is a tool for the interviewer to best assess the candidate’s abilities. This questionnaire will focus on the skills and competencies the company is looking for. Through this, competencies will be standardized and unified for consistent evaluation across multiple candidates.

Besides these interview methods, recruiters can also use tests to assess an employee’s abilities. One of the employee assessment test methods used by many businesses is the MBTI personality test.

• See more: What is MBTI? Applying personality tests to evaluate personnel and candidates.

IV. Skills for Choosing the Right Interview Method for Your Business

As you have seen, there are more than 10 interview techniques available today, and a single business cannot apply too many of them in its recruitment drives. Therefore, choosing the appropriate recruitment interview method is essential. Recruiters need to base their decision on these factors:

• Recruitment Criteria

Each position in a company/business has different standards for selecting candidates. Marketing requires agility and market sensitivity; sales staff need to be articulate… Based on the pre-established criteria, the business can choose a suitable interview method.

• Job Position

The basic goal of defining the job position is to know the appropriate selection criteria.

• Company/Business Conditions

What is the size of the business? What is the recruitment budget for the new position? Recruiters need to consider these factors to choose a suitable interview method.

• Recruitment Purpose

What are the goals and direction for which the business needs to hire this candidate? This needs to be clearly defined to select and choose the appropriate interview method.

V. 5 important notes for a quality and successful interview

For the interview to be successful and yield the desired results, recruiters must clearly define the interview’s objectives: the job position, skill requirements, etc. From there, they can build a list of standards that the company needs in a candidate.

It’s not just candidates who need to prepare their knowledge and have a neat appearance for the interview; recruiters also need to maintain a professional demeanor and be well-prepared. The professionalism of the recruitment department speaks volumes about the company’s/business’s reputation.

Specifically, recruiters should note:

• Prepare a list of requirements that the business desires. This demonstrates professional expertise.
• Develop a set of questions to assess the candidate’s abilities in order to select the most potential candidates for the position.
• Thoroughly researching the candidate’s CV will help the recruiter make a good impression on every applicant. This, in turn, makes the company’s image more professional.
• Determine the information, time, and location of the interview.
• Other tasks depending on the needs of each business.

Thus, through the article above, 1Office has outlined the basic pros and cons of current interview methods. However, to ensure the candidate interview process is smooth and high-quality, businesses today tend to seek software solutions that support effective recruitment management.

Recruitment management software from 1HRM is one of the most popular and effective software solutions used today. With 1Office HRM, instead of writing a paper-based recruitment proposal for leadership to sign off on, as with traditional manual methods, each department can now proactively create a “Recruitment Proposal” when they need to hire new staff. The system will then automatically send notifications to leadership levels for approval and to the recruitment department to execute the proposal.

Hopefully, recruiters will skillfully apply and combine these methods to enhance the value of the HR profession and help bring the most promising candidates to the business. For more detailed information, please contact:

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