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How to Interview Hourly Applicants: Best & Worst Questions
Workstream Blog

How to Interview Hourly Applicants: Best & Worst Questions

By Nigel Seah

February 05, 2020 | 2 min read

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A recent study conducted by the Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) found that the average cost-per-hire for hourly employees is $4,129 when you factor in recruitment and training costs. The best way of reducing this cost? Smarter hiring. Hiring managers need to ask more questions to understand whether an applicant is a good cultural fit and likely to stick around. 

In this interview pack we've compiled top indicator and interview questions to help you identify the best applicants. Interview indicators help you better interpret and evaluate your applicants’ responses. Use them to build your own a rating scale of applicants’ responses.

Availability 

  1. Are you legally eligible to work in the US?
  2. Have you previously worked in the same industry?
  3. Are you looking for a: Full-time Position / Part-time Position / Seasonal Position
  4. Which days of the week are you available to work? 
  5. What shift(s) are you available to work? Morning (8:00 am to 12:00 pm); Afternoon (12:00 pm to 5:00 pm); Evening (5:00 pm to 10:00 pm)
  6. Total Hours Available Per Week?
  7. Are you available to work on: Weekends; Holidays; Neither?

Salary

  1. What is your salary expectation?

Work History

  1. Please indicate the Current/Last Employer details: Job Title, Address (street, state, city, zip)
  2. What were your major responsibilities and what is/are the reasons for you to leave your previous/current position?
  3. Work reference (at least one, with name, phone number, relation, years).

Scenario Questions

  1. What would you do if you disagree with your superior?
  2. What did you do when you encounter stressful situations with your teammates? 
  3. How would you deal with a situation when your coworker is unresponsive?
  4. When working with people, in general, describe your preferred relationship with them.
  5. Tell us about an occasion when you believe that you delighted a customer, either an internal or an external customer.

Attendance

  1. Give an example when you weren't able to be at work on time?
  2. Give an example when you weren't able to meet your work schedule requirements?

Education

  1. What is the highest level of education you've received? Or currently enrolled in?
  2. Are you currently enrolled?
  3. What is your school name, years attended, and field of study?

Job Description Questions

  1. What is your understanding of the skills necessary to perform this job?
  2. What special training have you completed that qualifies you for this job?
  3. Name one skill that makes you qualified for this position?
  4. What is your understanding of the skills necessary to perform this job?

General Questions

  1. Have you ever felt like you are not qualified for a job assigned to you?
  2. How do you handle a situation when you made a mistake?
  3. What motivates you to come into work every day?
  4. What attracted you to this company?

Problem Solving

  1. Provide some examples when you need to work under a lot of pressure. How did you get through it?
  2. Give an example when you were forced to improvise a solution to solve a problem.

What NOT to Ask in an Interview

When interviewing job candidates for your open hourly positions, be sure to stick to questions that will give you insight into the kind of person you are hiring. Avoid questions about personal or sensitive information.

Avoid any questions about:

  • Race
  • Religion
  • Sex, Gender Identity, or Sexual Orientation
  • Disability
  • Age or Genetic Information
  • Citizenship
  • Marital Status
  • Number of Children or Pregnancy Status

It's common for interviews to feel more like conversations - this is a good thing. You'll get more honest answers from applicants. No one wants to feel interrogated. When this happens, it's common for hiring managers to slip in some inappropriate questions. Make sure this doesn't happen to you.

Top 5 questions hiring managers should not ask (but often do): 

  1. How many years ago did you first start working? <-- this is age discrimination
  2. Do you need time off for church on Sunday?
  3. Do you have kids / what's your childcare situation?
  4. You have a unique last name - what's the origin?
  5. Is that your married name? 
By Nigel Seah
Nigel is not just a marketer at Workstream, he is also a graduate of Psychology and Marketing of Singapore Management University. He has multiple experiences in various areas of marketing - advertising, email marketing, and content writing. Fun fact, prior to joining Workstream, he took a semester off school to intern at SAP in Brazil.

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Personal Information and Sensitive Personal Information

Before we discuss the right to limit and the right to opt-out, we must first define personal information and how it relates to sensitive personal information.

Personal information is any data that identifies, relates to, or could reasonably be linked to you or your household. A few examples of personal information include:

  • Name or nickname
  • Email address
  • Purchase history
  • Browsing history
  • Location data
  • Employment data
  • IP address
  • Profiles businesses create about you, including pseudonymous profiles (“user1234”)
  • Sensitive personal information

Sensitive personal information or “SPI” is a subset of personal information, defined as:

  • Identifying information (e.g. social security number, driver’s license)
  • Financial data (e.g. debit or credit card numbers)
  • Precise geolocation (within a radius of 1,850 feet)
  • Demographic or protected-class information (e.g. race/ethnicity, religion, union membership)
  • Biometric and genetic data (e.g. fingerprints, palm scans, facial recognition)
  • Communications and content (e.g. mail, email, text messages)
  • Health and sexual orientation (e.g. vaccine records, health history)

Right to Opt-Out

Californians have the right to opt-out of the sale and sharing of their personal information. That means you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties (e.g. data brokers, advertisers). You also have the right to opt-out of the sharing of your personal information to prevent the targeting of ads across different businesses, websites, apps, or services.

CCPA-covered businesses must provide a link to allow you to exercise this right. It is usually found at the bottom of a webpage and will say “do not sell or share my personal information” or “your privacy choices.” Sometimes businesses offer privacy choices through a pop-up window or form

To opt-out of the sale and sharing of your personal information, click on the link or use the toggle provided by the business and follow the directions. Doing this on every website you visit can feel burdensome, but to ease the burden you can automatically select your privacy preferences for every website by using an opt-out preference signal, or OOPS for short.

An OOPS is a user-friendly and straightforward way for consumers to automatically exercise their right to opt-out of the sale and sharing of their personal information with the businesses they interact with online. An OOPS, such as the Global Privacy Control. It can either be a setting on your internet browser or a browser extension. With an OOPS, consumers do not have to submit individual requests to opt-out of sale or sharing with each business.

Right to Limit

Californians also have the right to direct businesses to limit the use and disclosure of their sensitive personal information.

Businesses covered under the CCPA must provide a link on their website that allows you to request the limiting of your SPI, if they plan on using it in certain ways. That link will also typically be at the bottom of a webpage and will say: “limit the use of my sensitive personal information” or “your privacy choices.” Once you send this request, the business must stop using your SPI for anything other than to:

  • Provide requested goods or services
  • Ensure security and integrity
  • Prevent fraud
  • Maintain system functionality
  • Comply with legal obligations

Bringing it Together

In summary, the CCPA gives you the right to opt-out of the sale and sharing of your personal information and gives you additional rights to further limit the use and disclosure of your sensitive personal information.

When you exercise these rights together, you exert greater control in protecting your personal data which is important for your identity, safety, and financial health.

If you are on a business’s website and you can’t find the links to exercise your rights, remember to check their privacy policy. The privacy policy should tell you how you can exercise your rights under the law.

If you find your rights being violated, you can submit a complaint to CalPrivacy.

Next in the LOCKED series, we will explore the right to correct and right to know. Follow us on social media to get live updates or check back in one week for the next post.

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Targeted Advertising

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Personalization

Allow the website to remember choices you make (such as your username, language, or the region you are in) and provide enhanced, more personal features. For example, a website may provide you with local weather reports or traffic news by storing data about your general location.

Analytics

Help the website operator understand how its website performs, how visitors interact with the site, and whether there may be technical issues.

Right to Limit Use of Sensitive Personal Information

You also have the right to limit how we use sensitive personal information (such as precise geolocation, financial data, etc.).

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