How Self-Paced Interviews Can Help Recruiters

It’s no secret that our lives can get pretty chaotic from time to time. This is true no matter at what level you look, be it personal, national, or global. That’s why the modern employee has grown to expect a certain level of flexibility.

But what about candidates? What do they expect? To the surprise of no one at all, candidates have come to expect the same. And with the Great Resignation of 2021 continuing to affect the labor market for the foreseeable future, it’s time for recruiters to shift to a more candidate-centric approach.

Recruiters can now adopt a candidate-centric approach to recruitment by offering candidates flexibility and convenience in the hiring process that provides a better candidate experience. After all, is the hiring process not the candidates’ first impression of the company?

Enter stage: The self-paced interview. This self-paced interview emerged in recent years to provide the flexibility candidates crave. Better yet, this flexibility goes both ways. It frees both the recruiter and the candidate from the tedium of scheduling an interview, a process that 67% of recruiters reported taking up to 2 hours for a single candidate.

And that’s only the very least of what the self-paced interview has to offer to candidates and recruiters alike.

With that in mind, let’s dig deeper into this interview solution.

What is a self-paced interview?

So, what is a self-paced interview? In short, a self-paced interview is an interview process that provides the candidate with a prerecorded interview that they can respond to at their leisure. Qualifi’s research found that this method allows candidates the flexibility to answer interviews outside of typical business hours. In fact, this brought 75.5% more responses outside typical phone interview hours.

Eliminating scheduling and providing this level of flexibility grants candidates a greater degree of control over their interview process, creating a better candidate experience. What’s more, this automated solution empowers small teams of recruiters to reach and quickly screen large candidate pools that would be otherwise unmanageable through traditional phone interviews.

Also known as an on-demand interview, this solution provides an interview solution for recruiters that allows teams to screen candidates seven times faster than before. Rather than spending 30 minutes on each candidate, recruiters can screen applicants in 3-5 minutes per interview. This allows you to shortlist candidates quickly, improving the speed of the entire hiring process. That offers a major advantage as 60% of recruiters report regularly losing candidates before they are even able to schedule an interview with a candidate. With Qualifi, recruiters can interview hundreds of candidates in a single day with one-way interviews, increasing the candidate pipeline by up to 5 times while freeing hours out of every week.

How it works is that a recruiter records the interview, maintaining the human touch despite automation. This self-guided interview is in turn sent en-masse to likely applicants. Candidates in turn respond, within an average of one day, on their own time. As a result, recruiters interview hundreds of candidates within minutes, improve their output and increase their screening efficiency by 80%.

On-Demand Interview Questions

So, what should you use for self-paced interview questions? For one-way interview questions, it’s important to remember that the candidate will not be able to ask questions in return. Therefore, your questions should be concise, clear, and not demanding of the traditional back and forth. Be clear with exactly what you’re asking. Avoid meandering or adding unnecessary commentary on the questions. Both you and the candidate will benefit from this conscious approach to on-demand interview questions.

Such questions can include:

• Tell me about yourself.
• What are your greatest strengths and weaknesses?
• What attracted you to this position?
• Tell me how you’ve gone above and beyond on a job.
• How do you define success?

You may recognize many of these questions already, as they’re standard to the traditional interview. However, what do they have in common? They’re open-ended, short, and to the point. Which is essential to picking the right questions to include in your self-paced interview.

The same can be said of on-demand video interview questions. However, the prerecorded video interview questions and answers format comes with disadvantages that you just don’t see with the phone interview. Check out our blog for more information on the difference between on-demand video and audio interviews.

Why Do Recruiters Use Self-guided Interviews?

I hear you ask, “Why do recruiters use self-guided interviews?” It’s a good question. With all the hiring solutions available to the modern recruiter, why is this the one for you? Well, let me tell you.

There are times when hiring managers are tasked with the herculean task of recruiting hundreds or thousands of candidates at a time. That is what we call high-volume hiring. During these periods, recruiting teams can face upwards of 250 clients or more. This can easily overwhelm smaller teams and spells out the necessity for efficient tools such as Qualifi’s on-demand interview platform.

Additionally, self-guided interviews improve the vital time-to-hire. On average, this rate is 3-4 weeks across all industries. With vacancies costing companies an average of $98 per day, that means filling the average position costs employers an average of $4,129 according to Zippia. That is why reducing the time-to-fill for vacant positions has become one of the best means of reducing the overall costs of the hiring process.

With a one-way interview solution, recruiters can achieve both high-volume recruiting and reduce the time-to-hire in the process. Rather than screening thirty or more applicants for a single position with thirty or more separate calls, recruiters can send the same interview to all of these candidates at the same time. What’s more, recruiters can then review and screen interviews rather than conduct them themselves.

With qualifi, you can use these on-demand interviews to recruit as if your team is 7 times larger. Plus, you get the added benefit of mitigating bias in your hiring process. On-demand phone interviews allow recruiters to give candidates an equal opportunity to shine in the hiring process.

Candidate Experience

As we mentioned before, the importance of a positive candidate experience in the hiring process has never been higher. Many candidates already enjoy access to easy and mobile-friendly application processes that improve their experience. It is only natural to extend that convenience to the interview stage. In fact, it is a necessary step to stay competitive for top talent in the modern labor market.

According to Small Biz, 73% of job seekers consider looking for a job one of the most stressful events in their life. What’s more, according to Top Echelon Network, 40% of candidates reject offers specifically because another employer made an offer faster. Providing the best means to alleviate this stress put employers in the best position to compete for top talent. This means recruiters need faster hires, faster interviews, and a focus on improvising the candidate experience.

You, your recruiters, and your company get all of this and more when you integrate Qualifi into your hiring process. Try for Free Today to see how you can improve the candidate experience, reduce time-to-hire, and streamline interviews today.