What is the STAR Method?
A Guide for Hiring Managers
For hiring managers looking for new talent, it’s about more than finding the candidate with the strongest skillset, it’s about finding the right fit for your team. Behavioural interviews are an essential step in any hiring process, and the STAR interview technique helps you understand a candidate at a deeper level than simply what’s on their CV. So, what does STAR stand for?
• Situation: A specific situation a candidate had to deal with.
• Task: A task they had to complete in these circumstances.
• Action: What they did.
• Result: What happened following all the above.
What are 5 STAR interview questions?
To better understand the STAR interview method, let’s look at a few common STAR-based interview questions:
- Tell me about a time when you had to work as part of a team
- Tell me about a time when something went wrong and how you approached it
- Tell me about a time when you had to deal with conflict
- How do you advocate for your role across the business?
- Give me an example of how you set a work goal and achieved it
The main goal of the STAR interview method is to get the heart of what’s important for a role. By guiding the candidate to answer such specific questions, you can better understand how they behave in the workplace and if their work style is a good fit. STAR format interview questions also give a candidate the perfect opportunity to talk about their achievements in a natural and structured way (proven to be vital for hiring success).
How do I prepare for a STAR interview?
For hiring managers preparing to use the STAR method of interviewing, make sure your questions are relevant to the role and also to the candidate you’re hiring. For example, if your candidate has a more creative background, you might want to tailor your STAR format interview questions to ask about the more functional areas of the role, and vice versa if someone is moving into a more creative space. Here are some things to keep in mind:
• Know what you’re looking for: Asking questions with the STAR interview technique is all well and good, but you should know what you’re looking for in an answer. Think about what sort of situations a candidate might come up against in the role they’re applying for and shape your questions around that. Make a list of the sort of key phrases you’d expect to hear for an answer to be considered positive.
• Remember, everyone is different: The STAR method is great for sniffing out ideal behaviours, but remember, everyone behaves differently. Your assessment criteria shouldn’t be so strict that you’d eliminate a candidate for not saying the same thing as your last hire. Company cultures thrive on unique points of view, and that starts from day one of hiring.
• Make sure you use the ‘Tell me about a time…’ set-up: This is the essential set-up for STAR interview questions and ensures that candidate answers will be about a specific event and not a high-level overview of their current role.
• Let the candidate know it’s coming: The STAR method isn’t about tricking your candidates, it’s about helping them shine, so let them know that you’d like to hear about specific times they demonstrated skills like teamwork or conflict or time management. Some companies even give candidates the questions ahead of time, so they can prepare fully realised answers. Remember, your candidate is likely facing around three interviews, so this also helps you both avoid repetitive answers over the whole process.
• Don’t trap candidates with your questions: Asking about goal setting and meeting those goals is a great start, but make sure you give the candidate space to comfortably talk about times when things failed (due to things that may be beyond their control). So, you could ask, “Tell me about a time you set a goal at work — were you able to achieve it? How did you work with any blockers that may have stopped you ultimately achieving it?” Essentially, you’re asking candidates about their experience, so don’t imply that there is such a thing as a wrong answer.
What is the STAR approach in other formats?
It’s worth noting that the STAR technique can also be used in writing and may have already been used by your candidates in their CV, cover letter, or portfolio to describe different case studies. You don’t want to accidentally make them explain situations they’ve already shared, resulting in a redundant interview, so brush up on the information they’ve already shared before you head into your meeting.
Find your next star hire
At the end of the day, it’s always important to remember that you’re hiring a human, not a stock answer or a statistic. The STAR method can help you get to the human-centric way people tackle their workplace problems and with the increasing demand for recruiters, it’s a great way to make your process more efficient, too.
LinkedIn Recruiter offers tailored candidate recommendations so you can quickly and easily find people with the ideal skillset and can concentrate your search on the truly important behavioural traits of your perfect hire.