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Jordan Applegate has been a part of interviews before and thought he knew what to expect from them. Long before he became director of recruiting at Sweetwater, an Indiana-based e-commerce site specializing in musical equipment, he was preparing to conduct a panel interview at another company. He felt confident approaching the interview, but when he entered the room to meet the interviewers, he was in for a shock. He wasn’t the only candidate in the hot seat—in fact, there were already five other candidates there waiting to be interviewed as well.
“We were all competing for the same opportunity in the same room,” he said. “I don’t think any of us were prepared to be in a room with competing candidates. It was as if every candidate was racing to raise their hand to answer the questions.”
It wasn’t a good experience and it’s a perfect example of what not to do when conducting a panel interview, said Applegate, who now conducts panel interviews himself.
“If it was for an aggressive trade position or something like that, you could potentially get a reading on the individual’s confidence,” he said. “But as a hiring professional now, I would not encourage others to conduct such a panel interview.”
When done the right way, panel interviews can be an incredibly useful addition to your recruiting strategy, helping you gauge a candidate’s potential team fit and giving their future teammates a voice in the hiring process. If you’re thinking of conducting a panel interview, you’ll need to understand its purpose, what it can accomplish, and what components you need to make it successful. Here are some tips from leaders in the recruiting world on how to plan the perfect panel interview.
WHAT ARE PANEL INTERVIEWS?
During the hiring process, interviews help recruiters gain a clearer picture of how candidates speak, think and work. Different interview formats serve different purposes and give interviewers insight into different aspects of a candidate’s personality and work style. If a job interview tests candidates on their skill sets and task management, a panel interview tests how well they mesh with their future colleagues and gives their potential peers a say in who should join their team.
There are many advantages to the panel interview that other formats do not offer. Rather than leaving the hiring decision to one recruiter, soliciting input from multiple other employees can help leaders make more informed and fair hiring decisions. In addition, employers may appreciate the transparency in the recruitment process that panel interviews offer.
What is a panel interview?
A panel interview is an interview where a number of different employees meet to interview a candidate. Because panel interviews allow multiple employees to speak with one candidate, they give teammates more of a voice in the hiring process and can reveal how the potential hire fits into the team culture.
But like any interview setting, panel interviews come with their own unique challenges.
“When there are too many stakeholders, one interviewer can overwhelm another,” said Kim Nguyen, vice president of people at New York-based fintech company Alloy. “We need to balance votes and representation. There are biases that can creep into a panel interview.”
How exactly can panel interviews introduce bias into the recruitment process? As an example, Nguyen pointed to diversity and equity in hiring as aspects that can be hindered by a poorly planned interview.
“From my personal experience, I get really scared if I don’t see someone who looks like me,” she said. “For example, if you have a female candidate interviewing for a software engineering role, and if you have an all-white male group, the candidate can be very intimidated by the experience.”
PANEL SELECTION
In a panel interview, the composition of the panelists is as important as the questions they ask. With the right people, candidates will feel at ease and see that they fit into the company culture. With the wrong people, candidates can feel overwhelmed or even ambushed.
“Interviewing is basically maintaining the culture of the company — it’s a big responsibility,” Nguyen said. “They can either disarm and make someone comfortable, or they can make someone defensive.”
“The interview is basically maintaining the culture of the company – it’s a big responsibility.”
The questions you ask yourself in the early stages of planning your panel are key to determining its success or failure. Which people are the best representatives of this candidate’s future team? How big should the panel be? What does each panelist bring to the table and how do their perspectives balance or complement those of the other panelists? Finding the answers to these questions will help you reduce bias and find panelists who are genuinely interested in finding the right candidate.
“You have to ask, is this person going to be invested in interviewing?” said Haley Hastings, director of talent acquisition at Toronto-based AI marketing company Ada. “If someone only puts two sentences on their scorecard, it’s not worth it to the candidate.”
PREPARATION OF THE INTERVIEWERS
As soon as you know your choice of panelists, your next step is to inform them of the panel’s expectations, the applicant’s background, and otherwise prepare them for the interview.
“We want people to know what to expect even before applicants apply,” Nguyen said. “We have interview training for recruiters, so we’re really setting the stage there.”
Each panelist has something unique to offer, so delegating responsibilities and question topics will help each interviewer understand the role to play. It’s also key to train your interviewers on how to conduct the interview properly so they don’t talk over other panelists.
Nguyen explained that HR technology has made training interviewers and organizing candidate information much easier. “We have an applicant tracking system that allows us to share profiles and resumes really easily,” she said. “It’s basically a way for the interviewer to see who’s talked to the candidate before, who’s been assigned to what topics, and how much time they’re spending on certain questions.”
CANDIDATE PREPARATION
Your panelists aren’t the only ones who need to be prepared for the interview. Preparing your candidate for the interview is just as important — a well-prepared interviewee will be able to bring their most authentic self to the interview, which means you’ll be able to maximize the time you spend talking to them.
“At Sweetwater, we view recruiting as a type of customer service, but in this case, our customer is the candidate,” Applegate said. “To create an amazing experience, clear communication and expectations must be set.”
No candidate should feel blindsided by the interview. Make sure you provide applicants with information about what interviews they can expect, the interview schedule, and what criteria they will be evaluated on. You can also offer candidates a tour of your company’s office so that they are familiar with the interview environment in advance.
“We also provide applicants with a preparation kit before they are invited for an on-site interview,” Nguyen said. “We tell them, ‘Here’s what you should wear so you don’t feel uncomfortable. Here are some demos for you to look at, here are some of the topics we’ll be discussing.’We also give them the titles and names of all the interviewers so they can look them up if they want to.’
CONDUCTING THE INTERVIEW
Once you get to interview day, start off strong by choosing the right environment. Interviews are already a little stressful, and putting someone in a room with a lot of people can potentially make the experience even more overwhelming. Focus on making the interviewee feel relaxed and welcome before you start asking questions.
“It’s really important to us to keep the interview process as casual and honest as possible,” Applegate said. “That way, you’ll get as close as possible to the real version of the candidate you’re talking to.”
If you’re worried that a traditional interview location seems too formal or buttoned-down, try different interview locations or formats. For example, Applegate says Sweetwater prefers to hold panel interviews in the company cafeteria during lunch to give the process a more casual feel.
“It’s really important to us to keep the interview process as casual and genuine as possible… That way, you’ll get as close as possible to the real version of the candidate you’re talking to.”
“This allows the candidate to let their guard down and get their nerves out of the way before we can move on to a formal interview,” Applegate said. “To sit in a conference room with everyone in a jacket against a candidate is really not our style.”
In addition to the panelists, an HR manager should also be present to conduct the interview. Their job will be to guide the participants and keep the conversation on track so that all the necessary information is touched upon.
“The role of the human resources manager is to make sure that every person who participates in the interview has an opportunity to ask questions,” Applegate said. “One practice we do that really helps is to create a set of question papers for all the interviewers to write notes on. Individuals can also interact in Slack channels and raise their hand to get involved and ask the questions they think are important. ”
AFTER THE INTERVIEW
You have concluded your panel interview and each panelist has had an opportunity to ask their questions and develop impressions of the candidate. Once all the important information has been gathered, it’s time to debrief with your panelists.
There are several factors that HR managers should consider when gathering feedback from their interview participants. One of them is time – if too much time passes between the interview and the debriefing, interviewers may forget details and takeaways from the interview. Try to contact your panelists as soon as possible after the interview is over so that you can get the most relevant feedback.
“We try to do this within 24 hours of the interview because we want that information to be fresh.”
“We try to do this within 24 hours of the interview because we want the information to be fresh,” Nguyen said.
Another factor to consider when gathering panelist feedback is the potential for bias. When you have multiple people in a room talking to a candidate, it can be easy for interviewers to sway each other’s opinions. Holding a debriefing meeting immediately after the interview reduces this risk, but you should also establish some ground rules that will prevent interviewers from talking together about candidates before they share their thoughts with you.
“We also try to make sure that the interviewers don’t talk about that candidate until the interview,” Nguyen said. “So ATS is really important—when someone submits an interview scorecard, no one else can see it yet.”
Panel interviews are a powerful recruiting tool—in a way, they’re a microcosm of the larger company culture and are a great test of a candidate’s culture and team fit. Because of this, panel interviews can be fun and engaging in a way that regular interviews are not.
“I really like panel interviews because you give candidates an idea of the people they’ll be working with, and through those people they can identify what the company culture is,” Hastings said. “It’s really rewarding when we have candidates say that they had a good time, that they were excited and that they had fun.”
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