Run a group interview for high-volume roles

1. A high-volume role needs interviewing that never stops

Keep interviewing. If a role you hire for runs at high volume (SDRs, for example), you need to be interviewing all the time. A role of that kind is going to have churn, and falling into a pattern of hiring on and off is called a big mistake.

Change how you interview, too. A high-volume role also means your interview process has to change: screening in groups, not one-on-ones. Meeting candidates one at a time is not efficient, on this view, when the people you are talking to are low level. That phrase is meant carefully: it is about their skill, and not about their "human essence".

2. Why screening one at a time breaks

Too few therapists. One example is a mental health business whose therapy was paid for through a government program, or something of that kind. The money made sense. The trouble was that they could not find good therapists: they could not interview enough people. Every interview was one-on-one, because the business had begun that way.

The advice given was that this was the crux of their business, and that the first interview should be one to many: twenty people at a time, with each person doing sixty seconds. Then you can pick the winners and follow up with them one-on-one. Doing that reportedly took two steps out of the process, and hugely widened the number of interviews they ran and of people they could actually reach.

A thousand interviews, one hire. The report was a thousand interviews, basically picking one person out of every thousand. That was not accepted: among a thousand people, the reasoning went, there had to be more than one who would do for a low-skilled role, where not a lot of aptitude was needed, just attitude. Changing the process was all it took, by this account: the business was unblocked and took off.

Forty screening calls for one rep. The other case comes from one firm, years ago. An outbound sales goal had been missed two quarters in a row and was about to be set again for a third. Sales said the fix was more calls, which meant more callers; but bringing a new caller on took about as long as it took for one to leave. HR reported churn on the role as well below the industry average, so churn was not the issue. The issue was the intake. It took 40 screening calls to find 10 people; four of those 10 were passed on, and one of the four was picked. That came to 40 individual interviews for a single low-skilled rep, who was going to be trained in any case. The model was called broken. From then on they held group interviews, passed the people who seemed to have social skills and a work ethic, and trained the rest. Within six weeks, by this account, they had crushed the goal they had set and missed for the two quarters before.

3. The steps one team follows

For a high-volume role, one team's process runs in this order:

1. Someone applies.
2. If the team likes the applicant, it sends them the script.
3. The applicant sends back a video of themselves saying the script. It can be kept to 60 seconds: the opening, and whatever else.
4. The applicant is invited to a group interview.
5. The team runs a role play of one to two minutes with a group of people.
6. The team gives them feedback.
7. If they do a good job in the role play, they are invited to a follow-up call.
8. They get a job offer.

Learning the script by heart and drilling it, once someone is on the team, belong to SOP 250 — Memorize the script, then drill it in role play.

4. A star closer is not hired this way

This would be a process for SDRs. For a superstar closer, you will probably do the outreach one-on-one, bring the person in, and talk with them on a call of their own.

SOP 163 — Head-hunt and interview for higher-level roles makes you the head-hunter for senior hires, and keeps that heavier process for higher-level roles rather than frontline ones such as sales (its section 7).

5. Everyone starts at the bottom

Once they are in, everyone starts at the bottom. Closers are earmarked to rise faster. They are held to the same KPIs all the same, since, on this view, every rep has to be able to hunt.

How each hire begins as a setter, and how one brought on to close can be earmarked, is in SOP 255 — Onboard a new rep in phases, with a test to pass each, section 7. The steps a rep climbs, and what earns each one, are in SOP 251 — Set sales comp and a career path for reps, sections 6 and 7.

6. When the group format becomes necessary

Outbound roles above all. In the experience here, it has happened so many times, specifically with outbound, because that position has churn as well: SDRs or BDRs, people who do outbound by email, cold call or DM, anything like that. For anyone hiring in that position, group interviews are almost what it takes for an enterprise that big to sustain its volume and scale.

The size at which you feel it. When there are three, four or five people in the role, it will not show. When there are like twenty or fifty, you need it: a leaner way to bring in talent.

A webinar for applicants. It is the same idea as selling. If fifty customers could be sold in one go, that would be the choice, and for that you do a webinar. So you run what amounts to a webinar for a crowd of job applicants, and push them through.

7. What this page does not decide for you

• What the role play tests. What counts as a good job: Not established on this page.
• How big a group should be. This page gives no figure for group size beyond the one example of twenty at a time.
• Who on the team runs the group and gives the feedback. Not established on this page.
• How many should pass. This page gives no figure for a pass rate from a group.
• Where between five and twenty the switch comes. Three to five are named as too few to notice, and like twenty or fifty as needing it. What to do in between: Not established on this page.

8. The checklist

Step	What to do
1	If a role has high volume and churn, keep interviewing all the time, not on and off
2	For a role like that, screen in groups at the first stage, not one-on-one
3	If you follow that team's order: application; the script to those you like; a video of it, which can be 60 seconds; a group role play of one to two minutes; feedback; a follow-up call if they did well; the offer
4	From the group, you can pick the winners, then follow up with them one-on-one
5	Look in the group for people who seem to have social skills and a work ethic, as one firm did, and plan to train the rest
6	If you need a superstar closer, you will probably reach out and interview one-on-one instead
7	Start every hire at the bottom, as that team does; earmark closers to move up faster, but hold them to the same KPIs

9. Where this sits

• Plenty of applications and too much junk, treated as a conversion problem: SOP 201, section 6.2, where a first interview run one-to-many is listed as one more lever.
• Screening for grit and endurance first and teaching the other skills afterwards: SOP 43 — Document, demonstrate, duplicate, section 5.
• Whether to hire experience or train potential in the first place: SOP 44 — Buy or build talent.
• Attitude against aptitude, and which one a low-skilled role leans on: SOP 192 — Hire for the smallest skill gap.

10. What this page does not cover

Interview panels, the same questions for every candidate and a simple scoring rubric are in SOP 174 — Standardize selection and the founder's final interview, sections 3, 4 and 6. Employment law is not covered on this page.