You're asking too many questions at interview

Pick the right questions, then shut up

As interviewers it is our job to "discover" the person sitting across from us. For a job interview this means professionally trying to find the right fit (i.e. best performer having the most fun performing), hopefully trying to control our human biases, and secretly trying to uncover a disqualifying truth no one else but us could have noticed. I call this last my Columbo fantasy!

These motives play into our performance. We are paid to make the right hire for the business. We need a new person to fill a hole on our team or we have been asked to help judge a potential new teammate. We have limited time to do this, competing priorities in our heads and often not enough definition on what it is we really need.

Add to this the unique circumstance of a job interview with the tacit assumption that the person across the desk is exaggerating at best, and it becomes easy to fall back on a tough set of questions designed to weed out the wrong types. The more questions there are (and the tougher the questions) the more likely we'll be left with just one candidate standing and we will have done a good job. As if each extra question is another success filter.

Here's the problem. Your questions are unlikely to be doing more the confirming your thin slice bias. Your questions are likely to be making the candidate uneasy or defensive and by asking too many questions you are not allowing the conversation to flow as it ought and therefore are missing out on some really profound information the candidate would offer if you were to simply let them talk.

On questions

Questions at interview should follow a few set rules:

• Pick no more than seven questions, but preferably five.
• As you are limited in total questions, think hard about which five questions truly capture the work to be done and the character to enjoy doing it at a high level.
• All the candidates get exactly the same five questions to help limit your bias.
• Someone else in the interview takes notes (or record the interview) to compare answers afterward
• Once you've asked the question, shut up and let the candidate talk.

Questions are difficult to invent. It's hard to get them exactly right, but the effort you put in designing them as part of the interview process means that these questions are solid, effective questions which address the point. Good answers to these questions correlate to a high probability of success in the role.

If the questions are good, it makes sense to let them run. Don't jump in because the candidate sounds like they know their stuff. Let them keep talking. The real value in these conversations comes in developing a wider understanding of the person across the table. Why interrupt this glimpse into their thinking style to get to the next question?

Letting people talk without accidentally steering the conversation is a hard but vital skill to master in order to understand the human being sitting across from you. Listening with intent requires patience and concentration and tuning senses to hear without attempting to divert. Helping a conversation to continue involves proactive shutting up. Encouraging the interviewee to talk via body language, nods and murmurs rather than direct or leading questions. A couple of key ideas can be really useful as you practice:

Biographer, not investigator

Think of yourself as a biographer, rather than an investigator. A biographer is innately interested in breadth and texture as much as detail. Be fascinated with your subject and their replies, and encourage them to keep on talking. Statements such as "go on" or "tell me more" or "and after that?" are useful crutches to help you learn the skill, but nods and grunts can work too. This stuff is all very Columbo by the way.

Look deeper than the stock answer

In the same spirit, look for the second and third explanations. How many times have you started an interview with a question like "Why move on from your current place?" and got a boilerplate answer, only to learn the real truth much later in the interview on another subject once you have established rapport with the interviewee? These later answers are far more relevant and revealing to their real motivations.

Concentrate

Pay attention. We're very used to multitasking, carrying on two or more tasks at once. Video interviews make this problem worse by giving screen space to distractions like emails and Slack messages. As an interviewer your primary responsibility is to truly listen to the answers to the key questions which will demonstrate whether the interviewee is the best hire. Turn off distractions, lean forward slightly in your chair. Hostage negotiator Richard Mullender calls this the "It cost how much? position". Full attention to the subject at hand because it has suddenly become vital to learn the next piece of information. This position, and the philosophy behind it, allows the interviewer to truly hear what is being said, both the words and the intentions.

You are not entitled to your opinions

You are a professional interviewer, paid to pay attention to what is actually being said, not what you would like or expect to hear. A candidate's exact choice of words speak to their distinct personality, and your only role is to capture this. Not to agree or disagree, but to chronicle. You can do analytics and review of your recording or notes later on. Turn off your opinions in the room, and concentrate on understanding instead.

Tie it all together at the end

Columbo had "just one more thing". For him this was the big reveal of all the pieces he'd tied together, to let the criminal know he was on to them. For us interviewers our "one more thing" is more of a synopsis to make sure we have truly understood the candidate and their motivations. Begin with a phrase like "It seems to me", or "Have I understood you fully?" and then recap or summarise everything covered in the interview. Our job here is to ensure we didn't miss anything, give them another chance at those second and third versions of answers, and most importantly, to let the candidate know they were heard.

Not only do these techniques more effectively solve the problems around hiring the right person, they also boost your chances of securing the candidate you want to hire. It turns out human beings really like to be listened to, and have a deep need to be heard. By simply doing your job well you can create meaningful bonds with a candidate that express the values of your organisation. This bonding reassures a candidate that this is a good choice for their career. If you can help find the right person whilst at the same time helping them to understand and appreciate why this is likely the right place for them you can build considerable competitive advantage over time.

The benefit of this practice is better interviews, and better interviews means better hiring, higher performing teams, better retention, and thus even better choice of applicants in the future. We make our own success when we start truly listening to the human being across the desk. To do this we need fewer questions.