If you are reading this article, you are struggling to conduct interviews and looking for tips for scheduling interviews with candidates effectively.

Scheduling interviews with candidates is the biggest challenge that every recruiter faces. Things can become hectic, and sometimes unexpected things can happen. This forces recruiters to reschedule the interviews, which lengthen the recruitment process.

Today, the recruitment process is all about candidate experience. If you successfully provide an immense candidate experience, you can easily hire and retain the top talent in your organization. Candidates appreciate when they feel valued by their employer and create a positive perception of your organization.

Undoubtedly, scheduling interviews is a nerve-wracking job for recruiters. But when you are equipped with the modern tools and technologies and the right approach, you can hire many of them.

If you focus on a candidate-driven approach in today’s competitive job market, you’re all set to hire and retain the top talent.

A positive candidate experience is supreme for every organization, which will help create a positive employer brand and enhance brand reputation.

Candidates appreciate when the employer values them, gets timely responses, and has a hassle-free recruitment process. On the other hand, candidates with a bad experience will give a bad review about the company, affecting the employer brand and brand reputation in the market.

With that in mind, here we will discuss some of the best practices and tips for scheduling interviews with your candidates.

Set Your Goals

First of all, you need to set your interview scheduling goals. Setting goals doesn’t only mean scheduling the date and the time; you need to cover the basic objectives of your interview process, such as total interview rounds, types of interviews, who will be taking the interviews, etc.

All the interview details must be considered depending upon the size of your company and its requirements.

Provide All The Relevant Details About The Interview

One of the most important tips for scheduling interviews is – be clear. You must provide all the details about the interview (via email or phone call) to avoid confusion among the candidates. The details you must provide include:

• Interviewer details
• Social media profiles of the interviewer
• Office address
• Date and time of the interview
• Dress code
• List of certificates and documents they must bring in
• Mention how long each interview round will take

Leverage The Right Interview Scheduling Tool

We live in a modern world full of technologies, and it's high time to reap their benefits. There are many interview scheduling tools available that streamline the recruitment process. You can schedule the interview using Google Calendar and automate the email sent to the candidates.

For example, suppose you need to schedule a coding interview for a tech role in your organization. In that case, you can use Intervue – an ideal tool to conduct live coding interviews. It integrates with Google Calendar, where you can schedule an interview with the potential candidates from the calendar itself.

Be Responsive

According to Human Capital Institute, more than 60% of candidates didn't respond to the company after an interview. When candidates apply for a job, they apply to multiple companies, and if you don’t respond to them on time, they will move on to other opportunities. As a result, it’s crucial to respond to them on time (either positive or negative); otherwise, you will miss out on hiring the top talent.

Additionally, when scheduling interviews, it’s common for candidates to reschedule interviews several times. Therefore, you should be flexible and respond to them on time and create a great experience.

Encourage Self-Scheduling

8 out of 10 recruiters waste a lot of time in scheduling interviews when multiple interviewers are involved. If you’re the one – then it's high time to stop it. Instead, you can empower your candidates to schedule an interview at their convenience.

Self-scheduling works best for passive candidates. Passive candidates are those who are currently employed and seeking new opportunities. It’s a challenge to match up the schedule with passive candidates. However, encouraging self-scheduling will allow them to schedule their interview with their availability so that they don’t have to leave their office.

Use Applicant Tracking System (ATS)

Most recruiters say that scheduling interviews with the candidates are a time-consuming process in recruitment.

An ATS integrates with multiple calendars such as Outlook and Gmail, and it becomes easy for recruiters to schedule the interview. It also uses a candidate service portal through which a candidate can schedule the interview with their availability.

Using an ATS can save a lot of time, and recruiters don’t have to communicate with the candidates to know the exact time and date.

Get Feedback From The Interviewer

After each interview, it’s crucial to gather feedback from the interviewer on each candidate to identify top talent. It can be challenging for interviewers to give feedback quickly when they have to meet multiple candidates in a day.

So how to give timely feedback to the interviewee?

It’s always better to leave a buffer period between multiple interviews. For instance, if the interviewer has a 30-minute interview at 10 am, schedule the next one after 11 am. This gives the interviewer time to submit feedback to the candidate and prepare for the next one.

Have Standardized Interview Questions

Before you schedule your interview, it’s essential to structure the process and create a list of standardized questions. It will help you get feedback on the same data points. Also, it will help you reduce bias and hire the right candidate for a particular job role.

Summing Up

Scheduling interviews is exciting and challenging at the same time as your hiring needs evolve, so too your scheduling process. It’s crucial to focus on the candidate-driven approach to improve candidate experience and your brand reputation.

With the above-mentioned tips for scheduling interviews, you can easily schedule an interview with your potential candidates effectively. These tips will help you hire the top talent and create a positive employer brand in the market.