The recruiter’s guide to assessing candidate responses

Key Takeaways 

• Effectively evaluating candidate responses starts with a clear understanding of the key skills and attributes a candidate needs for a role. 
• Use structured questions and rubrics to assess responses and clearly define what makes a great answer.
• Leverage Metaview’s Hiring Studio for customized questions and consistent evaluation tools to streamline hiring.

Interviewing candidates goes beyond just checking qualifications — it’s about grasping the nuances in their interview responses to reveal true skills and potential. While testing and assessing technical skills is often relatively straightforward, soft skills can be tougher to get a handle on just through conversations alone. That's why it's especially important for recruiters, and hiring teams, to get smart on how to assess candidate responses for questions about these types of skills, like problem-solving, attention to detail, and communication.

The best way to determine a candidate’s core abilities is by asking the right questions and defining a rubric for what makes their responses great,  and not so great. And don’t worry—we’ve got some tools for you that can help make this easier. 

How do you know what candidate skills to look for?

You can’t identify “excellent” candidate responses if you don’t know what you’re looking for. The first place to start is your job requisition. 

Align with hiring managers to identify key attributes

To effectively identify the skills and traits you’re seeking in an ideal candidate, it’s essential to align closely with hiring managers at the start of the process. A well-run intake meeting is your opportunity to go deep and uncover what truly matters for the role.

Focus the conversation on what the hiring manager sees as essential for day-one success versus what can be developed over time. Are there technical skills, like Java programming, that are non-negotiable? Or are there softer attributes, like adaptability or time management, that will be just as critical for the candidate to thrive in the role and company culture?

This alignment not only ensures that you’re prioritizing the right skills but also helps build clarity across the hiring team. It can prevent misaligned expectations later in the process, saving time and enabling you to source and assess candidates more effectively.

Tools like Metaview can support this process by helping you capture and organize unstructured input from these discussions. Metaview can summarize key points from intake meetings and help you generate questions to explore the most critical attributes identified. With clear priorities in hand, you can develop questions and rubrics to assess whether a candidate truly aligns with the skills and traits your team values most.

Transform desired skills into interview questions

Once you know the characteristics and skills you’re seeking in your ideal candidate, you can shape your interview questions to bring these traits to the forefront of your interview process. The best interview questions “test” these key skills and competencies within your candidates. 

Some of the most important skills candidates can demonstrate — regardless of specific position — are soft skills like problem-solving, attention to detail, and communication. And in order to assess each of these core skills, you have to create questions that provide valuable insights into these factors.

Take advantage of technology

If you don’t know where to begin, or if you just need a little help creating questions that dig into these competencies, you can check out Metaview’s Hiring Studio. This AI-powered large language model (LLM) tool is designed to help hiring teams create structured interview questions and response rubrics tailored to their job requirements.

The Hiring Studio tool automatically generates relevant questions based on a company, specific role, and identified skills within a job requisition. This helps recruiters save time and ensures consistency across different candidate interviews. 

Hiring Studio offers rubrics and audio samples that can help you evaluate candidate responses — especially when assessing ambiguous or complex answers.

3 soft skills every job needs

There are a few soft skills that are important and applicable to virtually any position, regardless of the specific organization or job duties: problem-solving, attention to detail, and communication.

Let’s dig into some of the top questions that can help you uncover these core competencies, and then we’ll look at examples of how to assess responses to questions about these attributes.

Problem-solving

Problem-solving questions provide insight into a candidate's ability and willingness to navigate challenges independently. 

Top 3 questions to gauge a candidate’s problem-solving skills

There are a few questions that can help you gain the best insight into a candidate’s problem-solving skills:

• “Describe a time when you solved a problem without input from a senior team member.”
• “Tell me about a time when you proactively addressed a complex issue before it escalated.”
• “Share an example of how you solved a problem with limited resources or information.”

You’ll want to seek out answers in which the candidate demonstrates they understand the full context of the situation so they can show the most logical thinking for the scenario. Answers should illustrate an analytical approach, a creative solution, and a measurable impact.

Attention to detail

A candidate’s attention to detail affects the quality and accuracy of their work, which, in turn, impacts outcomes and overall efficiency.

Top 3 questions to gauge a candidate’s attention to detail

Here are a few questions that can get right to the heart of the matter:

• “Can you provide an example of a time when attention to detail significantly impacted a project’s success?”
• “Describe a situation where a small oversight could have led to a major problem and how you prevented it.”
• “Tell me about a time when your meticulous approach helped catch an error or prevent a risk.”

The best answers and responses to these prompts provide a clear context of the challenging situation and explain the concrete actions the candidate took to produce measurable results. 

Communication

Effective communication is key to any position because it facilitates clarity, collaboration, and, ultimately, better decision-making. This is particularly important in diverse team environments where each member has strong opinions.

Top 3 questions to gauge a candidate’s communication skills

Of course, you should shape your specific questions around your organization and the role, but there are a few top prompts that can help you assess a candidate’s communication skills quickly:

• “Describe a time when you had to explain a complex concept to an audience of diverse stakeholders.”
• “Tell me about a situation where clear communication led to a successful outcome.”
• “How do you approach communicating complex information to someone without a technical background?”

Top responses to these prompts will set the context clearly, demonstrate how the candidate tailored their communication to their audience, and use examples or analogies to reflect their adaptability.

How do you determine a good candidate response?

For each candidate response, you should pre-determine what makes an “excellent,” “good,” and “bad” answer. These will obviously change depending on the question, and if you don’t know where to begin, the Hiring Studio can help.

Here’s an example of a “problem-solving” question and answer rubric generated by the Hiring Studio:

As you can see, the rubric highlights a few key things to look for, like a clear description of the problem, the steps they took to remedy it, and sufficient level of detail. Although these examples are specifically for a “problem-solving” question, many of these apply to any interview question (e.g., clear and detailed descriptions versus a lack of depth and vagueness).

These AI-generated rubrics provide a strong starting point for developing evaluation criteria, but it’s essential to tailor them to your specific needs. Share them with your hiring manager to align on what “excellent,” “good,” and “bad” responses look like, adding a layer of human judgment to ensure they reflect your team’s expectations and the unique context of your role and organization.

‘Excellent’ response rubric

• Sets the context well by providing a clear, specific description of the situation, challenge, or problem.
• Follows a structured approach like STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result) to clearly demonstrate their actions and impact. 
• Demonstrates critical thinking and analysis when addressing the problem or challenge.
• Shows resourcefulness, creative problem-solving, or proactivity. 
• Quantifies or qualifies the positive outcomes, clearly associating their actions with the results.
• Emphasizes the candidate’s personal role in the achievement, reflecting their ownership of the issue and their individual impact.
• Reflects on the approach, adaptability, or overall learning — which adds insight into their personal growth or strategic adjustments made.

‘Good’ response rubric

• Provides general clarity but lacks detail in the description of the situation or actions taken.
• May follow a loose structure but lacks depth when explaining specific actions or outcomes.
• Demonstrates basic problem-solving skills but lacks detailed analysis or critical thinking attributes.
• Mentions a positive outcome or learning but doesn’t always link directly to the candidate’s individual actions.
• Illustrates initiative or adaptability but may lack specific examples that can offer supporting evidence.
• Slight vagueness or other weaknesses may be present, but they don’t significantly detract from the candidate’s overall answer.

‘Bad’ response rubric

• Likely lacks specific details or context and provides a superficial overview of the situation. 
• Information is presented in a disorganized way with minimal structure or logical flow.
• Lacks critical-thinking attributes — provides little to no insights into their thought process.
• Either fails to mention the outcome or provides an unclear link between their actions and the results.
• Shows weak ownership and often lacks evidence of personal contribution.
• Does not reflect on lessons learned, adaptability, or strategic insights — responses appear less convincing.

How do you know if a response is bad?

Even equipped with a rubric, you may still be unclear about what a “bad” response entails. And we hope it doesn’t come to this, but you may also need to be keen in sniffing out lies. There are subtle cues and techniques that can help you identify dishonesty and other negative values, as well as tactful strategies that can help you uncover a candidate’s real story. 

Lack of specificity 

If the candidate gives vague or overly general answers that don’t contain relevant details or supporting evidence, it’s typically a clear indication of a poor response. 

Minimal structure or flow

A response that lacks logical organization (like the STAR method) or one that skips critical steps can signal an inadequate thought process and/or poor communication skills. The absence of structure could indicate that they’re not prepared or their critical thinking is weak. 

Absence of outcomes or impact

When a candidate links their actions to outcomes or measurable results, it typically demonstrates a “good” response. A “bad” response fails to demonstrate the result of the candidate’s actions, making it difficult to assess their value or effectiveness.

Poor self-reflection

Superficial or incomplete answers often skip lessons learned or insights gained from the candidate’s experiences. Lack of self-awareness or unwillingness to acknowledge areas in which they could grow can indicate immaturity or limited adaptability. 

Inability to connect to the job requirements

If the candidate’s answer doesn’t tie back to the role’s duties or priorities, it can be a sign of misalignment with the position or misunderstanding of job responsibilities.

Overly rehearsed language

Responses that sound rehearsed or scripted may lack authenticity or candidate adaptability. If an answer sounds “canned,” it can suggest the candidate lacks true insight into their experiences. 

If your candidate shows signs of any of the above in their responses, using follow-up techniques can help you determine where the truth of the matter lies. Maybe they’re willfully dishonest, maybe they’re lacking in self-awareness or skill, or maybe they’re just plain nervous. A few follow-up techniques include:

• Probing deeper into a candidate’s response by asking clarifying questions
• Requesting additional (concrete) examples of a specific candidate skill
• Encouraging candidates to describe how they worked through specific steps in detail

Understand the value of your candidate’s responses with Metaview

The best responses to candidate interview questions and prompts demonstrate depth, self-awareness, and logical thinking. No one is expecting robotically perfect answers — but you should be looking for a candidate’s willingness to take ownership and learn from challenges. 

Start by collaborating with hiring managers to identify the key skills and attributes that are essential for success in the role. Use this alignment to build targeted questions to evaluate these qualities effectively during interviews. Our Hiring Studio can help by generating rubrics for “grading” candidate responses, providing a consistent starting point for assessments. 

By tailoring these rubrics to reflect what “excellent” looks like for your team, you can better identify the soft skills and attributes that aren't always evident on a resume.