Should employers send out interview questions in advance?

Larger Companies such as John Lewis and Waitrose are now publishing their interview questions in advance as a way to create a fairer recruitment process.

This move will not only give all candidates a chance to prepare more effectively, but it will also support neurodivergent candidates who might experience nerves or anxiety as a result of uncertainty around the interview process, thus ensuring a more equal footing between neurodiverse and neurotypical candidates.

Having questions available in advance also has other benefits, such as saving time for both candidates and recruiters.

Candidates will be able to research and prepare more effectively, and the questions can even help candidates understand the role better and whether the role is for them.

While this is considered a positive move by most, there are also some concerns expressed about publishing the questions in advance.

One concern is the potential to use external resources when preparing answers.

This could be contributions from family, friends and online.

With the advancement of AI technology, this raises real concerns around the authenticity of answers, and how much of an answer can be attributed to the candidate’s own experience and opinions, compared to the contributions of others.

There are further worries as to whether answers will become more rehearsed, and not as representative of the candidate’s genuine perspective.

However, there have been plenty of ways suggested to deal with these potential issues:

• Provide a list of potential questions, only some of which will be used at the interview;
• Publishing the interview topics rather than the full questions;
• Having a few follow-up questions that are not disclosed in advance;
• Providing the questions on the day and/or an hour before the interview; or
• Only publishing questions that require more time to consider (e.g., situation-based questions).