When to Use a Phone Screen during the Interview Process

Today, a colleague of mine called me excited about having secured an interview with an industry leader in his profession. He was so pumped and had been doing his homework on the company from what we were discussing. One thing, however, made my eyebrow raise a little as he was describing what the interview entailed. My colleague told me that this was not a face-to-face interview or something he would be able to Skype, but a 90-minute phone screen with one of the key decision-makers.

Say what?!?

As a recruiter, I often put on my consulting hat and advise hiring managers on how to conduct a smooth interview process. Personally, I think the last time I was on a 90-minute phone call was when I was in high school chatting away with my girlfriend. In today’s demanding job market and economy, I’d like to know who really has the time to conduct a 90-minute interview, let alone one entirely over the phone? I find this to be a little excessive and would want to sit down with hiring managers and devise a new strategy.

Phone screens are great tools and an integral part of today’s interview process. When used properly, a hiring manager can break out the conversational part of the interview while setting the benchmarks to further refine a qualified pool of candidates. This way, the pool of qualified candidates can easily be managed. These candidates should speak with a decision-maker on the phone for no more than 30-40 minutes, depending on how technical the conversation can get. The key is to develop a questionnaire tailored to unraveling the core requirements and how the candidate matches up to those.

Common sense should come into play when budgeting time for interviews. If you have a pool of five candidates that you want to spend an hour and a half speaking with, that means that you want to take roughly over seven hours of your work week interviewing. Let’s say after those screens you would like to bring in all five candidates for a face-to-face. At five candidates multiplied by four decision makers at an hour each means that you are tying up your staff for twenty hours, a half-week’s worth of time. Since resources are being spread too thin as it is, I have found it to be most prudent to use a phone screen to speak to those candidate for a half hour each (which would last two and a half hours) and bring in only the top two or three that best qualify for the role. Take three key members of the team, two managerial, and subordinate or peer, and conduct the interview as such. Three candidates at the max times three hours is nine hours of time. By effectively using the phone screen process, you can shave nine hours or one work day off of interviewing and in the long run, make more sound hiring decisions.