You have two final candidates. Both came across as strong in the interview. Both have the right background on paper. But when it comes to choosing, you are left with a feeling rather than a factual basis.
This is where most executive recruitments go wrong. Not in the advertising or the application process, but in the assessment of the candidates themselves. Competency-based recruitment is the method developed precisely to solve this problem. It reduces the scope for gut feeling and gives you a structured, comparable basis for choosing the right leader. In this article we explain what the method involves, what the research says, and how it works in practice.
What is competency-based recruitment?
Competency-based recruitment is a structured method in which candidates are assessed against predefined competency requirements that are directly relevant to the position. Instead of talking in general terms about experience and ambitions, you map out concrete behaviour from the candidates’ past.
The premise: past behaviour predicts future behaviour
The method is built on one simple, research-based premise: the best indicator of how someone will act in a future situation is how they have actually acted in a similar situation in the past. You do not ask what the candidate would have done. You ask what they did, in a specific situation, with a specific result.
That is a significant difference. Hypothetical questions give hypothetical answers. Behaviour-based questions give factual information about actual behaviour.
What sets it apart from an ordinary recruitment process?
In a traditional recruitment process, the interview is often unstructured. The questions vary from candidate to candidate, the weighting of answers happens intuitively, and it is difficult to compare the candidates afterwards on an objective basis.
Competency-based recruitment begins with a thorough job analysis that defines which competencies are actually required for the role. All candidates are then asked the same questions, and their answers are evaluated against the same criteria. The result is a process in which personal chemistry and gut feeling are given far less room.
What does the research say?
Schmidt and Hunter: 85 years of selection research
The most cited review of selection methods is Schmidt and Hunter’s meta-analysis from 1998, which summarised 85 years of research on recruitment and job performance. The analysis ranked 19 selection methods according to their ability to predict future job success.
Structured interviews achieved a validity of 0.51. Unstructured interviews came out at 0.38. By comparison, CV assessment based on experience alone had a validity of just 0.18. The closer to 1, the better the method actually predicts job performance.
The combination of structured interview and cognitive tests gave a validity of 0.63. That is among the highest figures in the entire analysis.
Structured interviews consistently beat gut feeling
More recent research from Sackett et al. (2022), reported by the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, adjusts the picture further: structured interviews may in fact be the single method that best predicts job performance, stronger than even cognitive tests alone.
BI researcher Ole I. Iversen emphasises that long experience of interviewing candidates does not necessarily make you more accurate. What actually helps is training in structured interview technique. The paradox is that those who are worst at it rarely see the need to improve.
How a competency-based interview works in practice
Job analysis and requirement specification as the foundation
The process does not start with advertising. It starts with a thorough job analysis: what is this leader actually expected to deliver, which situations will they face, and which competencies are decisive for success? Without this foundation, you lack an objective yardstick against which to assess the candidates.
The job analysis results in a requirement specification with 5 to 8 competencies that are directly relevant to the role. It is these competencies the interview is designed to map.
The STAR method: situation, task, action, result
The most common framework for competency-based interview questions is the STAR method. The candidate is asked to describe a specific situation, which task they faced, which action they chose, and what result it produced.
An example: “Tell me about a time you had to make a difficult decision with limited information. What was the situation, what did you do, and what was the result?” The answer gives you factual information about how this person actually handles decision-making pressure, not what they think they would have done.
The combination that gives the best accuracy
A competency-based interview is strong on its own. Combined with HR Norge’s recommended selection methods, including psychometric tests that measure cognitive abilities and personality traits, accuracy increases further. It is the combination that gives you the best basis for predicting who will actually succeed in the leadership role.
What is competency-based recruitment suited to?
Question: Is competency-based recruitment only for large organisations or complicated roles?
Answer: No. The method is suitable for any executive recruitment where it is important to choose the right candidate. It is especially valuable in roles with a major impact on the organisation, a high salary level, or situations where a mishire would be costly to put right. For organisations that recruit rarely, it is all the more important to use a structured method. It is easier to rationalise your way to a poor decision when you do not have a system that holds you accountable.
How Habberstad Recruitment and Development uses the method in executive recruitment
All of Habberstad Recruitment and Development’s recruitment consultants are DNV-certified in competency-based interview methodology. This means the method does not vary from consultant to consultant or process to process. It is standardised, documented and quality-assured.
In Habberstad Recruitment and Development’s executive recruitment we always start with a thorough kick-off and job analysis in collaboration with the client. We define the competency requirements, prepare an interview guide and conduct structured interviews with DNV-certified tests as a supplement. All assessments are documented in writing and presented in an evaluation report.
If you are unsure about the final candidates after an internal process, we also offer final interview and final assessment as a standalone service. We then step in with the same structured methodology and give you an independent basis for assessment.
We work across the public sector, health enterprises, banking and insurance and commercial businesses. What they all have in common is that the need for accurate leadership appointments is the same.
The right method gives the right leader
Competency-based recruitment is not a guarantee against mishires. But it is the method that, according to decades of research, gives the best basis for choosing correctly. It reduces bias, increases comparability between candidates and gives you documentable reasons for the decision you make.
Gut feeling does not disappear from a recruitment process. But with the right structure, it does not have to govern it.
Get in touch for an informal chat about how we can help you with your next executive recruitment.
