Documenting the Process
Candidates can answer questions in different ways. But you should establish within your organization guidelines that will help you evaluate how appropriate each answer is. When possible, give answers a numeric score so that you can compare candidates more readily. You can score each competency or skill based on responses to certain combined questions, or score each question individually. Use rating scales from 1 (very low) to 5 (very high). An Interview Scoring Worksheet is a useful tool for interviewers and can help streamline the documentation process.

If more than one interviewer is involved in the interview, and if scores vary significantly among interviewers for a specific candidate, the interviewing team should sit down and talk about the answer in question and try to resolve score differences. Once all applicants have been scored, questions should be added and averaged for each applicant so that candidates can be compared, and the top choices identified.

Getting Your House In Order
HR expert and professor of management communication at the University of San Francisco's McLaren School of Business, Arthur H. Bell, recommends that every organization have the following in place for interviewing and assessing applicants. According to Bell, these items are "must-haves" for documentation of the interview process:

1. Documentation of the job analysis process, including job definitions and your criteria for determining the specific behaviors necessary for performing the job successfully.

2. Documentation of the process by which questions were created, including notes on who participated in their creation, why these individuals were deemed competent to create the questions, how each question in the interview relates to a necessary behavior or skill, and how the arrangements of the questions reflect the necessary behaviors and skills for the job.

3. Documentation of the system by which applicant responses were scored or evaluated, including a description of the system, the responses candidates' answers are evaluated against, who authored the responses, and how these responses relate to the actual success of someone performing the job. In addition, document how the scores were determined, and how they were handled statistically.

4. Documentation of your interview process, including how the applicants learned of the job; the criteria for choosing applicants; when and where the interviews were conducted; who the interviewers were; how and why they were selected; how questions were delivered; the length of the interview; and how it compared in time, content, and evaluation method to other interviews for the same position.

5. Documentation of applicant responses and scores, including the notes taken by interviewers.

6. Documentation of the specific process by which one applicant was chosen over others including the various factors involved.

7. Documentation of the validity of the interview process, including the fact that it is a predictor of job performance.

This kind of documentation may seem burdensome, but it is very important. Doing things right can help you avoid legal conflicts—which is far easier than attempting to construct the details after the fact.

In addition to documenting the process, be sure to check the candidate's documents! In other words, check references. If you are working with a staffing partner, this will likely have been handled for you prior to your meeting with the candidate. Otherwise, you should check all references as they may reveal potential problems in candidates. Be sure to compare references given by different sources since a single negative reference may be defensible and a worthy candidate can be given a chance to explain.

Determining "Fit"
Some organizations are finding out it's time to modify the way they determine "fit" in those they hire. If yours is a progressive organization, you may find yourself relying more on abstract methods for determining fit than the tried-and-true interviewing approach. Or, you may find that a combination of progressive and traditional methods work best. As long as you document and follow your process, you can use the method that works best for your organization.

Some organizations are doing away with job titles. Business-based titles that describe functional responsibilities and unique talents, rather than hierarchical standings, are an option for organizations that want to show they are of the "fast company era." These innovative moves will appeal to cutting-edge candidates, which may be the type you are looking for. [For more information on futuristic job titles, visit www.fastcompany.com, and look for the publication's latest "Job Titles of the Future," like the August issue's Kyle Shannon, C3PO (Chief People, Progress, and Potential Officer) for Agency.com Ltd.

Not all individuals will fit well within a less traditional or less formal environment. But the kind of candidate you're looking for just may.