More than 90% of all organizations use some sort of selection interview. Why are interviews so popular? Interviews give you a chance to discuss areas that are important to job performance. This is true whether they are used alone or with preemployment selection tests. For example, if you are looking for a candidate with great oral communication skills or with a lot of work experience, a job interview can
probably add to the information you can get from a test. In fact, interviews can measure certain things better than tests.

The goal of an interview is to learn something about the candidate that you do not already know and need to know to decide if they can do the job. To do this, a job interview must contain meaningful questions that get factual, job related answers. A structured interview provides the questions to be asked each applicant and a preset scoring scale. Since the best predictor of someone’s future behavior is their current and past behavior, interview questions designed to get descriptions of the candidate’s behaviors and experiences are particularly valuable. Structured interviews help you make better hiring decisions and are defensible. This is important because under US law, interviews are held to the same standards as tests. Properly developed and implemented interviews result in:

•     A review of federal equal employment litigation shows that a judgment for the defendant is up to 11 times more likely than a judgment for the plaintiff when the interview in question is structured and job-related.
  
•     In a study of 14 organizations (including international finance, energy, and health care organizations) that began using behaviorally-based structured interviews, turnover decreased an average of 44%.
  
•     Division general managers in a Fortune 50 company who were selected with a structured behavioral interview exceeded their revenue growth goals by an average of 12% more than executives selected without a similar interview.
•     In a nationwide retailer, a CMI designed structured interview reduced turnover by 45%, increased minority retention by 54%, and saved the company $7 million in 2 years.

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