How to reduce interview no shows

In this extremely candidate driven market, the best candidates are busy people. If they are currently employed, their time for interviewing is limited. They may have multiple companies vying for their attention, and as recruiters and potential employers, we are just one of many.

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On the other hand, young candidates may be more nervous and intimidated by the interview process, and may assume that we have plenty of people to consider, and why would we care if they don’t show up…

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Will this do?

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Whatever their level, candidates today are focused on one thing: finding the company that gives them the best feeling and makes getting hired easy.

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As recruiters, the best way to prevent cancellations and no shows is to really invest time in building rapport with a candidate, going into great detail of the job to them, and gaining a firm buy-in from them regarding their interest in working for the company. By building rapport with a candidate, we earn their trust, learn about their career goals and how those goals align with the opportunity on offer.

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It’s equally as important to be able to articulate what the career path is within the hiring company, so we can provide candidates with a bigger picture of where this current position might lead them in the medium to long term.

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It is also really important to really understand what the candidate’s salary requirements are and how that relates to the position they are going for. If the candidate’s expectations are out of range, do they still want to interview for a job that offers less money? If so, we need to really vet this with candidates or risk having them decide at the last minute that the pay cut won’t work.

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The same thing is true of relocation. Are they truly willing to relocate? How committed are they to that decision? We need to establish as much as we can about what are deal-breakers for candidates to ensure that only candidates who are truly willing to work at the job, where it’s located, for the salary offered, are the ones who interview.

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In addition to that, we also try to follow the below to help reduce candidate cancellations and no shows:

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ACS Top Tips

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1. Reduce interview lag time – work with hiring managers to schedule interviews as soon as possible, try not to go beyond two weeks as the market is moving so quickly, good candidates will be snapped up fast!

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2. Advise hiring managers on the importance of not rescheduling interviews – this gives candidates the impression that their time is not valued.

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3. Make sure that we are in receipt of all the facts up front with candidates – we find out if they are interviewing elsewhere, try and gauge their true interest level in the role and company they are interviewing with, and ask them to contact us as soon as possible if they need to cancel or withdraw from consideration.

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4. Provide flexible, upcoming interviewing schedules – the best candidates receive many interview offers and often have tight schedules to work around. So we need to work with our clients to consider other options such as interviewing via Skype/by phone, offer after-hours or weekends.

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5. Maintain communication with candidates – provide candidates with answers to questions, interview prep, what to expect at the interview, the format of the interview and of course as much information on the company and the role. Email and phone candidates to confirm interview.

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6. Find out why candidates are dropping out – if possible, we survey those who cancelled or failed to show to try and understand what factors are causing this. Was a recruiter rude? Did the timing just not work? Were they treated better somewhere else? Did they feel unprepared? Ask questions and report on it on a regular basis.