What is Behavioral Interviewing?
By Adrian.Wood on April 25, 2014 / 0 Comments
Behavioral Interviewing – simple concepts for hiring with big rewards for hiring better candidatesThis week, two companies asked us our thoughts on behavioral interviewing, so I thought perhaps there are more of you out there with the same question. It’s actually a straightforward process that can be highly effective at increasing your hiring success but, like most things, it’s not a silver bullet and it needs to be done right to effective. So, what is it and how does it work?

You may already be an apprentice behavioral interviewer and not even realize it. Think back to your last interview and the questions you asked the candidate. I’m sure you asked all about their experience, what drives them, why they want to work for you, etc. All these questions are important, but when you think about it, wasn’t the most important thing you were trying to discover was WHAT they were likely to do in their intended role?

Here is the essence of behavioral interviewing. It’s simply the process of asking work related questions regarding specific, relevant, examples of previous behavior to try and predict future behavior. After all, regular readers will know that habits and behaviors are the critical factor in trying to predict candidate success. In balance, we would argue that interview questions related to behavior are far more critical than most others, and especially compared to personality. Do you really care more about the motivation behind a candidate’s behaviors compared to the actual behaviors themselves?

So, if you’re with me so far, your next question should be, “Ok – what do I ask the candidate?” (score one point if that actually was your next question). Clearly, you need to know what work behaviors you’re looking for in the role, and that have been demonstrated to drive success for the employees that have them. That’s something that you can attempt yourself if you have a developed skill of assessing employees, or you could use … I don’t know … some sort of behavioral benchmarking solution perhaps? In either case you need to make sure you clearly identify the specific behaviors for the role, and not make aggregate assumptions the behaviors are common across multiple roles, or just seem like something “you think the role should have”.

If you pull it off, you get some great benefits. Some companies have reduced short term turnover by 20% or more, or improved the rate of hiring top performers many times over. Interestingly, it also significantly strengthens your hiring process in general, and helps to remove personal bias and adverse impact from the process.

Now you have the scoop, take a look at your current process and see how behavioral interviewing could help your hiring process. Or, give us a call if you still have more questions.

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