Eka Putri Hardayanti

In the professional world, a headhunter is a recruitment expert who provides employee search and recruitment services for a company. When interviewing candidates, headhunters use investigative interviews.

An investigative interview is a technique used to dig deep into the suitability of a candidate with regard to the technical requirements, culture, and values of the client company. How do headhunters conduct investigative interviews?

To understand the stages of the interview process carried out by headhunters, let’s explore this article!

Preparation

Before conducting an interview, headhunters take the following steps:

• Information Gathering: Headhunters study the culture of the company using their candidate search services and understand the responsibilities that the candidate will undertake.
• Qualification Determination: Headhunters set the qualifications for the position to be filled, including educational requirements, work experience, and other technical and non-technical skills.
• Candidate Research: Headhunters conduct thorough research on the candidates moving to the interview stage, such as analyzing resumes, checking LinkedIn profiles, professional references, digital footprints, and more.

Interview Execution

After screening and selecting the most suitable candidates, the second stage involves the interview, which includes:

• Interview Opening
  At this stage, the headhunter must create a comfortable atmosphere to reduce the candidate’s nervousness and anxiety. Methods include:
  • Initiating conversation and speaking warmly with the candidate.
  • Explaining the purpose of the interview and the process that will take place.
  • Informing the candidate that the interview is confidential and the information shared will be used only for recruitment purposes.
• Structured Questions
  Types of interview questions that headhunters should ask include:
  • Background Questions: Headhunters explore the candidate’s employment history, education, relevant experiences, and ask about their greatest career achievements.
  • Competency Questions: Headhunters ask candidates to provide concrete examples of how they applied skills and knowledge in real-world situations, especially in a work environment.
  • Situational and Behavioral Questions: Headhunters use the STAR technique (Situation, Task, Action, Result) to assess how candidates handled specific situations in the past to understand their problem-solving processes and thinking abilities.
  • Technical Knowledge Questions: Headhunters evaluate the candidate’s technical knowledge and the relevance of their skills to the position through various methods, including technical tests, case studies, and work simulations.
• Using Probing Techniques
  The third stage involves asking follow-up questions using probing techniques. Probing aims to dig deeper into the candidate’s initial responses to:
  • Explore the candidate’s experiences, skills, and motivations more thoroughly.
  • Clarify unclear information.
  • Understand the context of the candidate’s actions or decisions.
• Evaluating Soft Skills
  At this stage, headhunters assess soft skills by asking questions to gauge:
  • Communication Skills: Headhunters evaluate how the candidate interacts during the interview, including their ability to explain experiences, answer questions, articulate ideas, and listen.
  • Leadership and Teamwork: Headhunters inquire about the candidate’s experience in leading projects or teams.
  • Interpersonal Skills: Headhunters ask questions to get a sense of how the candidate interacts with others, resolves conflicts, and handles workplace pressure.

Interview Closure

Once all necessary information is gathered, the headhunter concludes the interview by:

• Summarizing the discussion points from the interview.
• Allowing the candidate to ask questions about the position, company, and other relevant topics.
• Explaining the next steps in the recruitment process, such as additional interviews, tests, or evaluations, and providing an estimated timeline for when the candidate will receive feedback.

Post-Interview

After the interview is complete, the headhunter’s final tasks include:

• Documentation: Taking detailed notes on the candidate’s responses, including their experiences, skills, and perspectives, as well as the headhunter’s impressions of the candidate’s behavior, confidence, openness, and motivation.
• Information Verification: Verifying candidate information through professional references, including former supervisors or colleagues, and checking identity, education, work experience, certifications, licenses, digital footprint, criminal records, and credit (if relevant).
• Evaluation Report: Compiling an evaluation report based on interview findings, covering:
  • Candidate strengths and weaknesses.
  • The candidate’s fit for the position in terms of technical skills and soft skills.
  • The candidate’s alignment with the company’s values, team dynamics, and leadership style.

Recommendations

The final step involves:

• Providing a detailed report to the client, including evaluations of the candidate’s strengths and weaknesses.
• Assisting the client in making the final decision regarding whether to hire the candidate, consider them for another position, or not proceed with them.
• Making the final hiring decision based on discussions and agreements with the client.

In essence, headhunter companies are significantly different from regular HR recruiters. Headhunters possess broader experience and networks in recruitment, and have access to high-quality talent that is less available in the general job market.

Therefore, if your company is struggling to find the right candidate for a specific position, consider using the headhunting services from RecruitFirst Indonesia.

As one of Indonesia’s headhunting firms, we have extensive experience and networks across various industries, enabling us to reach candidates with the qualifications, experience, and potential to significantly contribute to your company’s long-term growth.

So, what are you waiting for? Contact us now for further discussion!