Easy Small Business HR 1

Hiring Tip:

How to Phone Screen Job

Candidates

Special Report From: EasySmallBusinessHR.com

Many of the questions that you should be asking will be job specific. But

there are other questions that you should ask that will apply to most

applicants that focus on the job applicant’s soft skills.

Soft skills are also referred to as people skills, which are skills that help

you assess the applicant’s ability to communicate, to problem solve, to

give and accept feedback. It helps you to assess their level of motivation,

their listening skills, their judgment, and their decision-making skills

among other things.

Now let’s walk step by step through a typical phone screen using a

hypothetical customer service representative job.

If I were interested in hiring a customer service representative, based on

my job criteria, my ideal candidate would need to have the following

experience:

Easy Small Business HR 2

At least 2 years of experience working in a customer service role

Experience or at least a comfort level with responding to questions

and providing information both over the phone and in person to

clients.

Experience with dealing with difficult customers.

My candidate would also need to have experience and be

comfortable with databases since they will be entering information on

their customer interactions in my company database.

I’m also looking for a candidate that is calm and gracious under

pressure. And the candidate would need to be able to use good

judgment so that they can make basic decisions that are in the best

interest of a customer and in the best interest of my business.

I’d also need to determine whether I can afford to hire the candidate

based on their salary requirements.

Now I’ve reviewed the resumes that I received and I’ve selected ten

possible candidates based on the information that they provided me in

their resumes.

Now it’s time to phone screen these candidates so that I can determine

whom out of the ten I want to bring in for a face to face interview with me.

When I call these ten candidates, I’ll be asking the following questions

based on my job criteria to help me to determine whether or not to invite

them in to meet with me.

Easy Small Business HR 3

1. Why did you apply for the Customer Service Representative

position? What is it about your background that makes you uniquely

qualified for this position?

2. Tell me about a time in your current or past job where you were

confronted with a very difficult customer who would not take “NO”

for an answer. Describe the situation and the outcome.

3. What systems do you use to track information in your current or in

your past jobs?

4. What are your salary requirements?

I chose these four questions because these questions cover many of the

basic things that I need to know about the applicant’s experience based on

the job criteria that I’ve outlined.

Now let’s focus on why these questions are important to ask as part of the

phone screen.

Question No. 1

Why did you apply for the Customer Service Representative position?

What is it about your background that makes you uniquely qualified for

this position?

If this question is answered correctly, it will give me a sense of not only

the applicant’s interest in the job but a general sense of their overall

experience as well as what the applicant sees as his or her strengths.

Easy Small Business HR 4

Question No. 2

Tell me about a time in your current or past job where you were

confronted with a very difficult customer who would not take “NO” for an

answer. Describe the situation and the outcome.

The response to this question requires the applicant to provide a concrete

example of how he handled a difficult situation as well his judgment under

pressure.

Question No. 3

What systems do you use to track information in your current or in your

past jobs?

The response to this question gives me a sense of whether they have used

databases before to track information.

Question No. 4

What are your salary requirements?

The response to this question gives me a sense of what the applicant is

expecting to be paid which is important.

I recommend that phone screens not be more than 15 minutes. Remember,

the purpose of the phone screen is really to determine whether the

experience on the applicant’s resume resonates with you in the phone

conversation. You’ll have plenty of time to ask additional questions during

your face to face interview.

I wish you the best of luck in your hiring efforts!

Easy Small Business HR 5