Preparation of an Interview Schedule of Questions

1. An interview schedule should be based on the inherent requirements of the job. The incumbent profile will be helpful in constructing an interview schedule/questionnaire.

2. A rating scale and standards required per category should be set prior to the interview.

3. Discriminatory questions should be avoided.

Areas of potential risk in interview questioning could include:

• Age
• Race
• Gender
• National origin
• Religion
• Marital status
• Gender preference
• Number of dependents
• Child care
• Housing
• Arrest record
• Health or disability status

4. Interview questions should be prepared in advance. They should be used to enhance clarity of responses and to elicit more information. The panel may probe deeper with relevant questions.

5. To ensure consistency and fair treatment for all, candidates should be asked the same questions.

6. On completion of the schedule of questions each of the interviewees should properly prepare by working though each candidates’ resumé and application documentation.

Structuring Behavioural Interview Questions

One particularly useful and popular approach to developing behavioural interview questions is the STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Results) model. The STAR model helps candidates frame their responses to behavioural questions by encouraging them to respond with a story about a past behaviour.

An example framework for developing a structured, behavioural interview question using the STAR model is presented below.

Situation: What was the situation the candidate was in?  E.g., “Tell me about a time...”

Task: What was the task the candidate needed to accomplish? E.g. “...where you were faced with multiple competing deadlines.”

Action: What were the actions the candidate took to accomplish this task? E.g., “What did you do and…”

Results: What were the results of these actions? E.g., “How did it turn out?”

Thus, the complete behavioural interview question presented to the candidate would read:

“Tell me about a time where you were faced with multiple competing deadlines. What did you do and how did it turn out?”

Once preliminary lead questions are developed in association with your competencies, it is recommended that you test their performance by interviewing position incumbents or employees who apply similar competencies in their daily work. This will help to evaluate the appropriateness of questions and will also help to develop potential probing questions to gain more insight about the candidate’s behaviours.

When asked a behavioural question, candidates are expected to provide information, in the form of a short story, not just on what tasks and activities they have accomplished, but how they accomplished them. The interviewer should encourage candidates to provide specific details when responding, asking questions that pull evidence about the candidate’s achievements, how they responded to challenges, and how they differentiated themselves. In addition, candidates should answer questions in terms of what they as individuals specifically did, not what was accomplished as a team (e.g. “when X happened, I did Y to complete the goal” rather than “when X happened, we did Y to complete the goal”). Although structured, behavioural interviews can be a bit flexible as well.

The individual conducting a behavioural interview should use probing questions to dig deeper into a candidate’s responses, based on verbal and non-verbal cues. Typically a behavioural question will trigger 3-4 probing questions based on the candidate’s initial response.

Probing questions are follow-up questions asked of candidates when:

• Initial answers are vague, ambiguous, evasive, or do not fully address the lead question.
• The candidate’s tone changes drastically or word choice becomes negative.
• The candidate seems to have difficulty forming an answer or takes extensive pauses.

Probing questions are not developed in advance of a behavioural interview; they are based on triggers that are prompted through the candidate’s responses to lead questions. These types of questions are grounded heavily on an interviewer’s use of active listening and observation as a candidate relates facts and experiences about how they have behaved in the past. These questions should be open-ended and should not direct a candidate towards a desired response.

Here are a few examples:

• I'm not quite sure I understood. Could you please tell me more about that?
• I'm not certain what you mean by... Could you give me some examples?
• You mentioned... Could you tell me more about that? What stands out in your mind about that?
• This is what I thought I heard... Did I understand you correctly?
• Can you give me an example of...?
• You just told me about... I'd also like to know about...