Summary
Virtual interviews can help organizations reach a broader talent pool and make hiring more convenient, but they can also introduce bias and inconsistent candidate experiences. Effective virtual interviewing starts with a structured process, clear job-related competencies, behavioral questions, and trained interviewers. These seven best practices help hiring managers gather meaningful evidence, evaluate candidates fairly, and make more informed hiring decisions.
Virtual interviews make it easier for organizations to connect with candidates across locations, reduce travel, and streamline hiring. But conducting an interview over video doesn't automatically make the process more effective or fair.
The same challenges that affect in-person interviews, from unconscious bias to inconsistent questions, can also undermine virtual interviews. Video also adds considerations around technology, distractions, and glimpses into candidates' personal environments that shouldn't influence hiring decisions. A structured interview process can help hiring managers address these challenges and make more informed decisions.
The following seven best practices show how to reduce bias and make virtual interviews more effective.
How Do First Impressions Influence Interview Decisions?
Do we really not get to know people well enough unless we see them in person? Or does meeting in person just make it easier for us to form judgments based on outside (or irrelevant) criteria?
Any time we meet someone new, we make snap judgments. We read their body language. We make assumptions based on how they look and dress. We might even make judgments based on a handshake.
These impressions form quickly and often subconsciously, but they can strongly influence hiring decisions. An interviewer may feel confident about a candidate after just a few minutes, even without enough evidence to assess their qualifications or potential.
That's certainly not enough time to make a data-driven decision based on capabilities or motivations. Instead, we take shortcuts and make decisions likely influenced by personal preferences, hunches, and biases. That's why a structured interview process matters. It helps interviewers look beyond first impressions and focus on the evidence needed to make informed hiring decisions.
Virtual Interviews Can Introduce New Biases
Virtual interviews can introduce additional opportunities for bias if hiring managers aren't careful. While interviewers may have fewer opportunities to observe in-person cues, they now have a glimpse into candidates' personal lives they never had before.
During a virtual job interview, they may catch a glimpse of a person's home interior, hear a dog barking, or see a child running in the background and reach some pretty wild conclusions. They may judge a job candidate based on a picture or poster hanging on their wall in the background.
A positive candidate experience means communicating clearly, respecting a candidate's time, and giving them opportunities to ask questions in order to understand the role.
These details have little to do with a candidate's ability to perform the job, yet they can influence an interviewer's perceptions. The key to reducing bias is to bring more structure to the interview process, using the same evidence-based practices that make in-person interviews effective.
How to Structure a Virtual Interview
In many companies, hiring managers are left to their own devices to structure an interview, which can lead to inconsistent candidate experiences and evaluations. Without training or structure, they typically revert to what they've experienced in their own interviews. Or worse, they treat the interview like any other virtual meeting.
Without a clear process, interviews can become unfocused, leaving hiring managers without the information they need to evaluate candidates fairly. Candidates may also walk away with a poor impression of the organization if the interview feels disorganized or impersonal.
A consistent interviewing process helps hiring managers gather meaningful evidence while creating a more positive candidate experience. Here are seven best practices for conducting an effective virtual interview:
1. Define Competencies and Prepare Behavioral Questions
Before you go fishing, it's always good to know what you're fishing for. Make sure your hiring managers have a set of well-defined behavioral competencies that matter for success in the role. Also, give them behavioral interview questions that let them reliably assess candidates against those competencies.
And always remember to interview every candidate for the role using the same competencies and the same set of questions. This consistency helps ensure that candidates are evaluated against job-related criteria rather than individual interviewer preferences.
2. Choose Reliable Technology and Prepare for Disruptions
Even with virtual meetings now commonplace, job seekers may feel added pressure to navigate technology smoothly during an important interview. Minimize the likelihood of technical difficulties by testing your technology before the interview and ensuring you have a strong connection. Confirm that the candidate has received instructions for accessing and using the video platform.
Have a backup plan in case the connection fails, such as switching to a phone call or rescheduling when necessary. Technical problems shouldn't prevent candidates from having a fair opportunity to demonstrate their qualifications.
3. Create a Positive Candidate Experience
While you may make "at-a-glance" judgments of the candidate, remember it's a two-way street. Dress as professionally as you would if you were interviewing in person. Make sure your space is neat and organized. Ensure privacy during the interview and turn off potential distractions such as email and chat. Look at your camera, not the screen, to make eye contact.
The key to a great candidate experience is meeting the interviewee's personal and practical needs. Build rapport as soon as the interview begins by greeting the candidate (on time) and making them feel welcome. Remember those "life" interruptions I mentioned earlier—put the candidate at ease by saying in advance that these eventualities are not a problem.
Maintain or enhance their self-esteem and listen and respond with empathy by showing that you understand the candidate's feelings and the facts of the situation.
On the practical side, set expectations for the interview. Tell the candidate that you will be taking notes, and if you plan to type, let them know so they don't think you are multitasking if they hear keyboard clicks. Give an overview of the job and company, and manage time so you and the candidate get what you need from the interview.
A positive candidate experience means communicating clearly, respecting a candidate's time, and giving them opportunities to ask questions in order to understand the role.
4. Involve Multiple Trained Interviewers
With only one interviewer, the decision rests solely on their opinions and the data they gathered. With multiple interviewers, each person brings different perspectives on the candidate, which can reduce individual bias when interviewers use consistent evaluation criteria. In addition, an interview panel can help the candidate see a bigger picture of the company culture, which is especially important in virtual interviews.
When using a panel, each interviewer should review the data individually and rate each competency. Then, they'll need to meet (probably virtually!) to discuss their impressions. This step is critical to making an unbiased decision. Independent evaluations help prevent one interviewer's opinion from influencing the others before they've assessed the evidence themselves.
5. Focus on Past Behavior
Success in most jobs isn't just about what gets done. It's about how it gets done. Behavioral interviewing questions focus on what candidates did and how they solved problems. While it may sound simple, past behavior can predict future behavior, and hiring managers need to ask the right questions to gather examples. You might think of these questions as the ones that start with phrases like "Tell me about a time when…"
Ask follow-up questions to understand what the candidate personally did, why they chose that approach, and what happened as a result. This helps interviewers distinguish demonstrated capabilities from general or hypothetical answers.
6. Use the STAR Method to Gather Complete Examples
The STAR method helps you to collect complete stories that show how someone acted in a situation. It's a simple, effective way to gather accurate information and reduce bias in how you evaluate the candidate. (And you might not know it, but DDI actually invented it!)
STAR stands for Situation or Task, Action, and Result. Interviewers can use this framework to gather the context of a candidate's example, understand the specific actions they took, and evaluate the outcome. Using the same approach across candidates makes it easier to compare evidence against the competencies required for the role.
7. Assess Motivational Fit, Not Just Qualifications
Behavioral questions and STARs can help us determine whether a candidate can do the job, but how do you know whether they will? Motivational fit is about finding out how the candidate's likes and dislikes relate to the job. For example, do they enjoy travel if the role requires it? Do they like the job's location? By assessing motivational fit, you can see whether they will be motivated and satisfied by the job and the company.
Note that motivational fit is about understanding a candidate's likes/dislikes and determining how they align with what the job and organization offer. Too often, we hear hiring managers use the term "poor culture fit" to describe a gut feeling that a candidate just wouldn't "fit in" with others at the company. But managers usually don't have objective criteria for what cultural fit means, which can introduce bias.
Instead, focus on the role's responsibilities, expectations, and working conditions. This helps hiring managers assess motivational fit without relying on subjective impressions about whether someone seems like the right kind of person for the organization.
How Effective Virtual Interviews Improve Hiring
Virtual interviews do pose a few unique challenges, but the good news is that they can be addressed with preparation and practice, provided your organization has a sound interviewing process in the first place. While face-to-face interactions remain valuable, video interviews present organizations with tremendous opportunities.
For example, virtual interviews let you source candidates from anywhere without paying for travel. That dramatically expands the talent pool. A bigger talent pool also means access to a more diverse group of candidates. As an added bonus, it often makes it easier for candidates to make time for the interview because they don't need to travel.
But these benefits depend on how well organizations conduct their interviews. A structured approach helps hiring managers look beyond first impressions, gather consistent evidence, and give candidates a fair opportunity to demonstrate their capabilities. When organizations combine that structure with a positive candidate experience, virtual interviews can become a more effective part of the hiring process.
Have a Question?
Frequently Asked Questions About Virtual Interviews
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What is a virtual interview?
A virtual interview is a job interview conducted remotely via video conferencing. It lets employers and candidates connect without meeting in person to discuss job requirements, experience, and qualifications.
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How do you conduct a virtual interview effectively?
Start by defining job-related competencies and preparing structured behavioral questions. Test the technology, create a welcoming environment, gather specific examples of past behavior, and evaluate candidates using consistent criteria.
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What questions should you ask in a virtual interview?
Ask behavioral questions that prompt candidates to share specific examples of how they've handled job-relevant situations. Questions beginning with "Tell me about a time when…" can help interviewers understand a candidate's actions, decisions, and results.
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How can hiring managers reduce bias in virtual interviews?
Hiring managers can reduce bias by asking consistent questions, focusing on job-related evidence, using structured evaluation criteria, and involving trained interviewers. They should avoid drawing conclusions based on candidates' backgrounds, home environments, or other irrelevant details.
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Are virtual interviews as effective as in-person interviews?
Virtual interviews are effective when organizations use a structured process and trained interviewers. Both formats require clear competencies, consistent questions, and evidence-based evaluation. Virtual interviews also offer greater flexibility and access to candidates across locations.