As a hiring manager in the life sciences industry, conducting effective interviews is crucial to securing top talent for your organization. The interview process can be time-consuming and stressful, but with the right preparation, you can make the most of your valuable time and resources.

To help ensure you're fully prepared for your upcoming interviews, we've created a step-by-step interview preparation checklist for hiring managers in the life sciences industry:

• Start with the end in mind: Determine when you need to have a new employee in place and work backward to create a timeline for the interview process.

• Identify who will be involved in the interview process and ensure that their availability corresponds with your timeline. Make sure you include sufficient time to debrief and make decisions after the interview.

• Brief your recruitment company on the timing of the process so that they can ensure candidates are available.

• Book a venue for the interview and communicate this to internal colleagues. If you are using PowerPoints or flip charts during the presentation, book these in advance.

• Discuss and agree with colleagues the structure and format of the interview and clarify their role in the interview process. If the candidate is required to prepare a presentation, decide on the outcome of the presentation, for example, to demonstrate their knowledge, presentation expertise or what they can add to the organization.

• Brief your recruitment company on the format of the interview, including a presentation brief where required.

• Ask the recruitment company to confirm that they have communicated with and briefed the candidates.

• Review all the CVs for the candidates you will interview on the day, in-depth. In addition to the briefs and notes made from any conversations, you have had with your recruitment consultant.

• Review the job description and decide on what questions to ask. Include a series of rapport-building questions for the start of the interview. Based on the roles of colleagues in the interview, a delegate who will ask what questions. Agree on ‘must-have’ versus ‘nice-to-have’ skills.

• Decide on a scoring system related to the key competencies you are validating and communicate this to colleagues.

• After the interview, review the results of the scoring system and the interviewer's feedback.

• Decide on each candidate and if they are unsuccessful in progressing to the next stage or job offer, agree on what feedback the candidate will be given. Decide who will give the feedback, you or the recruitment company.

• Do you have another role? It is not uncommon to have more than one ideal candidate for the position. In a skills-short market, do you have another opportunity in your organization that they can fill?

• Decide on the offer that will be made to the successful candidate, if this is the final interview, and who will make it.

• Communicate your decisions to the recruitment company and agree on who will give feedback to unsuccessful candidates and who will make the offer to the successful candidate.

• Debrief with your recruitment company about the recruiting process. What worked well? What could have been better? What will happen next time?

At the heart of a successful interview process is preparation, and our interview preparation checklist can help ensure you're fully prepared to find the right candidate for your organization. If you need any additional support or have questions, please do not hesitate to contact us. We are here to help you make the most of your hiring process and secure the top talent your organization needs.