The objective is to conduct forward-looking interviews  about what this person would do in short and long term coming on board.  Many recruiters lack depth in screening, interviews, assessments; rarely discover how a candidate will affect team dynamics.

This causes the Hiring Team to waste valuable time in an interview performing screening of candidates’ background and experience.  This tells you that the recruiter failed to do their job.     Which begs the question – exactly WHY and HOW is your recruiter earning a fee?

Why do Forward-Looking Interviews Work?

The recruiter should provide detailed documentation about relevant experience, accomplishments, leadership/staffing abilities, budget/P&L performance, analysis of industry expertise; depth of industry relationships.

For Engineering and Product Management roles, the recruiter needs to document patents and intellectual property development.  In addition, address how they affected product or service R&D, delivery, market impact;  customer / vendor relationships, GTM strategies.

For sales and business development roles it’s all about how did the candidate grow existing or creating new markets, quota vs. actual, average sales volume / sales cycles.

For senior executives the recruiter needs to determine key accomplishments such as turnarounds and growth types; industry leadership by being a major speaker at industry trade shows / conferences and relationships w/ customers, vendors, analysts, and investors.

Doing these allow for the  Board or CXOs to conduct forward-looking interviews.

Forward-Looking Interviews Get the Best Candidates

If the recruiter began the search by identifying the short and long term objectives of the role. everything  else falls into place.   Combine that with scientifically based team profiling and determining a strong team fit.  It is important to know the leadership qualities, relational communications style, decision making traits, selling of ideas or products / services, and conflict resolution skills.  These types of interviews will reveal much more than rehashing what is on a resume.

For an in-depth look at how to utilize proper recruiting methods that will prepare your team to schedule time ONLY the best candidates in forward looking interviews,  please view of download the PDF titled Why Forward-Looking Interviews Work Best in Recruiting.