Interview Feedback Forms

Companies use feedback forms to collect general and specific feedback from interviewers. They play a critical role in helping recruiters know whether to move candidates along in the hiring pipeline. Interview feedback forms can be used in many different ways, but they’re especially useful when it comes time to decide between multiple candidates who all seem like good fits for the job.

What Are Interview Feedback Forms

A feedback form is a rubric that interviewers fill out after interviewing candidates.

These forms have questions about how well candidates matched the job requirements but may also contain questions about candidates’ communication skills, company and culture fit, engagement, professionalism, and even attire. Feedback forms are vital to the hiring process. Documenting interviewers’ impressions helps HR and the rest of the selection committee decide whether or not to move candidates forward in the hiring process.

Collecting feedback can be an arduous task for recruiters since many interviewers are busy with their day jobs. Creating standardized templates can accelerate the process and make it easier to collate everyone’s remarks when it’s time to make a decision. Having feedback form templates also gives interviewers a script they can follow during the interview, ensuring that they (1) ask questions that get to the root of a candidate’s experience and qualifications and (2) avoid asking or saying anything that could invite legal problems.

This doesn’t mean that every interview for every position will be the same, so templates should be customizable. After all, you’ll want to ask different questions based on the technical and soft skills required for each position. But establishing a sense of uniformity in your interviews helps your interviewers stay on track and makes your company appear more professional and organized, which can boost your candidate NPS score.

General Feedback

General feedback is any information you’d like to get from the interviewee about their experience.

This could include things like whether or not they felt comfortable talking about themselves and their work, if they seem to find the interviewer’s questions interesting and thought-provoking, if they were enthusiastic about the role, etc.

Some general feedback form questions might ask include:

Did the candidate communicate well?
Did they ask good questions?
Did they seem to demonstrate good cultural fit?
Do you think their personality will work well with other team members or direct reports?
Are their values aligned with the company’s mission?
Was the candidate on time?
Did he or she seem organized and ready for the interview?
Did he or she express genuine interest in the company and the role?

Skills Feedback

Besides assessing the candidate’s general fit, you have to know if they have the skills and experience to excel in the role they are applying for. Questions on the skills section of feedback forms could be something like:

Did the candidate demonstrate good customer service experience in other roles?
Could the candidate walk panelists through their case study effectively?
Did the candidate show logical reasoning on their coding test?
Did the candidate answer situational questions in a way that gives you confidence in their leadership?
Was the candidate good at mental math?
Did the candidate demonstrate an understanding of X concept, and could they think of use cases specific to the industries we serve?
Are the candidate’s writing skills above and beyond others in their peer group?

You might also use skills assessments to automatically generate some of the answers to these questions.

Feedback Forms Can Refine Sourcing Efforts and Streamline Hiring Workflows

Interview feedback forms are used by companies to collect information on interviews and help them screen candidates, hire better employees, and make better hiring decisions.

It’s important to keep in mind that feedback forms are just one way to gather feedback on interviews. You can also use other methods, like surveys or post-interview meetings. Check out Chatkick’s Interview Insights for more information.