Maintaining eye contact with the interviewee can help you see whether he is being truthful or lying.
Interviewing is an art. It requires careful preparation and fine-tuning your strategies over time, finding what works best for your personal style. When you consciously use strong interviewing techniques, you'll learn more about the people you talk with, even things they may not want you to know. Keep these tips in mind to hire a strong team.
Use an Icebreaker
Start with an icebreaker, talking about something you have in common with the person you're interviewing. This will help to put the other person at ease, showing you what she is like when she isn't being guarded. As Steve Weinberg says in "The Reporter's Handbook," good investigative reporters use this strategy. If you're interviewing a prospective hire, the same strategy can work for you.
Watch Body Language
Use body language, including eye contact and expressions, for clues that let you know whether the interviewee is being truthful or not. Having put the candidate at ease with your icebreaker, you'll notice if your questions make him tense. Look for twitching facial features, or a quickly passing look of discomfort, as Ulrich Boser says in "Three Ways to Tell If Someone is Lying." If someone uses closed body language like folding her arms, that may also mean the subject at hand makes him uncomfortable, he adds.
Target Key Competencies
Every interview requires its own set of questions that target the key competencies you're looking for in a candidate. Don't rely on general questions. After determining which competencies you're looking for, like computer skills or communication skills -- which can be narrowed down to strong mediation, teaching, writing or listening skills -- develop a set of questions that help you determine whether the applicant possesses these skills. For example, you could say, "Tell me about a time when you were part of a team but didn't agree with how others were handling the project" to learn about the candidate's leadership skills and philosophy.
Ask Leading Questions
Asking leading questions might seem tricky, but it can give you the information you need. A question like, "Working at Company X must have been challenging" can catch candidates off-guard, because you essentially provide the answer in the question, asking the interviewee to confirm it. However, the answer in the question isn't necessarily the one you want to hear. This strategy tests a candidate's ability to remain composed and show how she handles difficult situations. When you ask the question, you want the interviewee to say something like, "Yes, it was challenging, but I enjoyed being challenged by the dynamic environment" and then go into more detail about why. Always prompt interviewees to provide more detail, including anecdotes, to answer your questions.
