Understanding the interviewer report, and how to use it with candidates
Purpose
The interviewer report is designed to supplement the interview process by providing advice and questions that are specific to the candidate allowing you to explore their personality profile and assessment results to get the most out of your interviews. This can be used by anyone who might need to interview the candidate, such as recruiters, interviewers, assessors or hiring panels to determine the extent a candidate might be a good match with the role and/or company culture.
How it works
The report summarises the key findings of the personality profile by drawing on the strongest aspects of the candidate’s personality to highlight potential strengths and concerns based on their tendencies and preferences. Based on these, some potential interview questions are suggested, determined by the sten score on that particular scale. The report also draws on ability test information, to describe how aptitude in certain areas may affect their ability to deal with the demands of the role. The interviewer report indicates sten scores, strengths/concerns, interview questions, and advice and is also compatible with the candidate matching facility on Clevry.
A few useful tips
- This is just a support tool
- There are no rights or wrongs, everyone has a unique personality
- The report indicates styles and preferences. Individuals may flex their approach depending on the circumstance
- Personality is not fixed, it can change over time
- A low score is not bad, it simply indicates preference towards the other end of the scale
- Try to make it a two-way conversation
Structure of the Interviewer Report
Page 3 – highlights the 5 strongest preferences of the candidate
Page 4 – tailored advice on how to approach the effects of self-presentation
Page 5-9 – interview information for the two strongest scales within each aspect of personality (e.g interpersonal style)
Using the Interviewer Report with Candidates
The Interviewer Report shows how candidates answered the assessment per personality scale and provides you with Interview Questions you can use as guidance. When interviewing the candidate using the Interviewer report, you can probe into specific areas that otherwise would’ve remained hidden. There are a couple of steps to take, which are:
1. Prepare
2. Introduction: Set the scene
3. Discussion around the hypotheses
4. Explore
5. Conclude
1. PREPARE
Form hypotheses
Forming hypotheses means identifying the most interesting results from the report that you’d like to discuss, preferably related to the role. Look at different personality scales and create one or a couple of hypotheses by combining results and trying to describe what type of behaviour the candidate will show, which can then be tested during the interview with the candidate.
Below is an example from the Interviewer's Report:
Decide on questions
Based on the hypotheses you are drawing; decide which questions you would like to ask the candidate. These could be questions suggested in the interviewer report, or these may inspire similar questions that better relate to a specific job role. During the interview, a candidate’s answers may inspire new follow-up questions, or open a new avenue of discussion, but it is always best to go in with at least some questions prepared to keep the conversation going.
2. INTRODUCTION: SET THE SCENE
- Make the candidate feel comfortable, break the ice
- Explain why the assessment is taken and that the assessment is a self-report
- Explain that answers will be handled confidentially
- Explain that candidates are compared to a norm group
- There is no right or wrong answer
- The questionnaire is very reliable, but not infallible.
- Explain that the assessment measures personality in the Work environment
By covering these topics, you are not only educating the candidate about the assessments to ensure there is no misinterpretation of results but also putting them at ease. Some candidates may find an interview particularly nerve-racking so being reassured that these assessments are as much for their benefit (i.e. being placed in an organization that has a good person-job fit, will allow a candidate to flourish) as the recruiter/ organisation’s will be reassuring.
3. DISCUSSION
Before you delve into asking questions, you may wish to describe a candidate’s personality profile. When giving feedback to the candidate, make sure to describe the result so that you use the right interpretation language and so include:
- It is a self-report: “Your responses” or “You see yourself” – instead of your results, your report shows
- Status of the results: “Indicates”, “suggests” or “may”
- Norm comparison: “Compared to others”
- Strength of tendency: “slight”, “very”, “fairly” or “strong”
- Language of scale behaviour: avoid using scale labels to describe results
Examples describing the results
“Your responses suggest that, compared to other people, you see yourself as having a strong tendency to make decisions quickly”
You might prefer to describe results as you explore them. This is ok as long as you make sure to use the appropriate language.
4. EXPLORE
This is your opportunity to gather further information about the candidate and test any hypotheses you have made during preparation. Remember that while a personality questionnaire uses a self-report method, it can’t tell you everything. This is your opportunity to fill in any gaps and discuss any strengths or concerns.
By using the questions given in the Interviewer Report, you can read out the statements from the Interviewer report, found in the purple box. These already use the recommended style of phrasing and are used as a follow-up to your description of the hypotheses.
Here is an example from the report to discuss and explore the hypothesis regarding Decisiveness:
You can of course also use your questions at this point. This could be slight tweaks to the suggested questions or using them as a basis to ask some which are completely your own.
5. CONCLUDE
Summarise the conversation and find out if there are any questions still. If a candidate disagrees with some of the results in the assessment, that is fine, and there should be room to discuss this openly, and will provide further insights into their preference at work.
Checklist for using the Report in Interviews
Use this checklist when using the Interviewer Report.
To see an example of an interviewer report, click here!
Last Updated: January 2024