Giving a great candidate experience
Pre Interview
- Please actually read the candidates resume. Identify one bullet point on the resume to ask a particular question about.
- Review the guide for the question you are about to ask
- Make a notes document for the candidate
During the Interview
We break the interview experience down into 3 phases:
- The introduction, where we try to set the candidate at ease
- The question, where we ask a prepared question
- The close, where we do our best to convince the candidate to join
Some tips:
As much as possible, “mirror” the candidate (e.g. sit or stand if the candidate is sitting or standing, using the candidates exact words, etc). Done well, these actions build a sense of psychological safety and help the candidate perform well.
Take notes while the candidate responds and record as much as possible exact quotes, words and phrases that stand out and inform your understanding of the candidate and helps paint a picture of what happened during the interview.
Things to avoid: while a bit of small talk is expected to break the ice, do not to ask directly or indirectly about things that reveals protected information! For example, asking about someone’s commute could accidentally reveal socio-economic status, etc.
The Introduction
The goal of the candidate is to set the candidate at ease and set context on both sides.
Ask the candidate if they need a break, water, restroom, etc.
Explain the structure of the interview to the candidate:
Hi, my name is
Let me give a quick overview of how the interview will look today.
First, we’ll do about 5m of introductions. Then, I have a prepared question to ask you that should take about 40m. Last, I’ll make sure we end with 5-10m for you to ask me questions.
Introduce yourself with time at the company, role, team, and what your relationship would be to the candidate.
Let me start by introducing myself.
My name is $NAME and I’ve been at $COMPANY for 3 months.
I am an engineer on the Cloud Infrastructure team, which means you and I would report to the same manager if you were to join us.
Don’t forget to explain your relationship to the candidate if they were to join! This is the single most forgotten step to make a helpful interview.
Ask the candidate to introduce themself:
I know you probably have told other people at $COMPANY this, but I’d still like to get to know you myself. Why not you spend a couple of minutes and tell me about yourself?
It might seem like you don’t need to ask this question, but getting a little overview of the candidate is really helpful for you later when you want to close the candidate.
It may seem repetitive for every interviewer to ask this question, but thats why we do the “accusation audit” of explicitly calling that out.
(Optional, but encouraged for senior candidates) Ask the candidate to talk about a recent project:
The $PROJECT_NAME project from your resume looked pretty interesting — would you please tell me a little bit about it?
It is really powerful to look at their resume before the interview, pick an interesting bullet point from it, and ask about that by name.
The question
Thanks for giving me that introduction, I really appreciate it!
Why not we go ahead and start the prepared question, and I’ll make sure we have time at the end for any questions you might have for me?
- When you ask the question, follow a guide for specific hints and phrasing.
- Make sure you tell the candidate what specific dimension you’re looking for (this should be in the guide as well).
The close
The goal of the close is to convince the candidate that this company would be a good place to join.
Try to “close” even when the candidate did poorly — it is good practice for you and hopefully leaves them with a great experience so they tell their friends about us.
Why not we go ahead and wrap it up here. I really want to make sure you have time to ask me any questions you might have about $COMPANY. If not, I’m also happy to tell you my favorite part about working here.
Answer their questions
When you answer questions, the most powerful you can do is to remember what you learned about the candidate during the “tell me about yourself” question in the introduction and tailor your response to them, using their exact words and phrases if possible.
For example, if they indicated that they really liked working on cool hard problems, you should talk about the cool hard problems at $COMPANY (assuming it is appropriate in the context of the question they ask you).
At this point in the interview we are in “the close” where we are trying to convince the candidate to join.
If you thought they did well — tell them!
Wrap up by telling them you sincerely appreciate them spending the time with you. Bonus points if you personalize this by saying “in particular, I appreciated …”
Ping the next interviewer and wait for them to show up (don’t leave the candidate alone)
Post interview
Put your feedback in Greenhouse as quickly as possible! Our goal is to be able to do the hiring “huddle” within 1d and get back to the candidate within 3d. If your feedback is in Greenhouse early, the hiring manager will have a chance to read detailed notes
If there is something interesting to follow up on, please ping the hiring manager ASAP so they can adjust the interview loop while the candidate is still “onsite” (remember, our goal is to get all the information we need during this pass). For example, we can specifically follow on gaps in projects, cultural red flags, etc.
Please ping the hiring manager ASAP if you are going to be a veto for the candidate. We don’t currently cut interview loops short for poor performance, but we want to start gathering information in case we do.
Try not to discuss the candidate with other interviewers until after everyone has submitted their feedback in Greenhouse. We want to avoid biasing each other as much as possible.
An important exception to this rule: if one engineer is shadowing another interview to learn how to ask the question, they should try if possible to meet before submitting feedback formally to calibrate expectations.