No matter what you do to make sure that you get a sound employee, everything will still come down to the interview process. Since it’s often your first look into the applicant’s personality and it allows you to get a better feel for their skill set, it’s the most important part of finding a new hire.
Even though it’s an important part of the process, the interview itself doesn’t have to be boring and typical. Every staffing agency should have a list of out-of-the-box questions that they can ask during interviews. While you can maintain a great staffing agency by maintaining through traditional aspects, it’s meaningless without the right employee. Here’s some of the best unconventional interview ideas, courtesy of Inc.com:
Goals In Mind
There are some things to keep in mind when interviewing a potential employee, beyond just learning about their experience and professional skills. Hiring the right people is everything, so during the selection process, your goals should be to:
- Reveal the personality behind the resume;
- Find out if the candidate is a cultural fit;
- Understand the aspirations and motivations behind the candidate;
- See what happens when the potential employee is put under pressure;
- Find out if a candidate is a potential innovator or good leader.
In order to find out if someone is a true fit for a particular company, it’s best to look past conventional interview tactics, as they’re likely to provide a very standard, canned response to these inquiries.
Questions to Ask
Though interview questions should always be kept tasteful, you can still branch out into unique and interesting questions. The candidate is less likely to have rehearsed an answer to these questions, so you’ll be able to see how they react to an unexpected question and see what their personality is really like. Some questions to ask a candidate are:
- What’s your favorite joke?
- What’s your superpower?
- What would you do if there was a zombie apocalypse?
- Where do you envision yourself in five years?
- What’s one of the toughest decisions you had to make?
- What book would you recommend the other to read?
- Who is the smartest person you know? Why?
- Teach me something I don’t know in the next five minutes.
- What is one thing I wouldn’t guess about you from your resume?
Behavioral Questions to Ask
Not only can you ask unusual job interview questions, but you can also behavioral interview questions as well. Shake things up with different questions depending on the position. If math is part of the job, ask a math question. Some questions you could ask include, courtesy of The Balance:
- Describe a situation where you took a risk professionally. What happened?
- Was there ever a time where coworkers disagreed with your actions? How did you convince them and what were the results?
- Describe a situation where you worked effectively as part of a team to accomplish a goal on time and within budget. What role did you play during this and what did you learn?
- How would your current boss/team member describe you? What would they say are your greatest strengths or weaknesses?
About World Wide Specialty Programs
For the last 50 years, World Wide Specialty Programs has dedicated itself to providing the optimal products and solutions for the staffing industry. As the only insurance firm to be an ASA commercial liability partner, we are committed to that partnership and committed to using our knowledge of the industry to provide staffing firms with the best possible coverage. For more information about Staffing Professional Liability Insurance or any other coverage, we have available to protect your staffing business, give us a call at (800) 245-9653 to speak with one of our representatives.