Where can you find qualified {role_name}?

What are the best practices for headhunting {role_name}?

How to shortlist candidates?

Once you have started to get applications from applicants, a thorough screening process and shortlisting of prospects will help you make the most of your time spent with the most qualified ones. 

Automated shortlisting tools :

Automated screening quickly filters out unqualified candidates, saving time for manual review. This allows the manual process to focus on the most promising candidates, ensuring the best ones are considered for further evaluation.

Screening questions to auto-shortlist based on predefined criteria

like qualifications, location, experience, and skills. Either use job board or use an ATS such as whitecarrot. Here are some questions for {role_name}

• How many years of experience do you have working in a production support role?
  • Auto-Reject Criteria: Less than 3 years of experience.
• How many years of experience do you have with incident management processes?
  • Auto-Reject Criteria: Less than 2 years of experience.
• Are you located within [specified location] or willing to relocate/work remotely?
  • Auto-Reject Criteria: Not willing to relocate or work remotely if required.

Skill based question to auto shortlist candidate

Analyze the skill test data to automatically shortlist top-performing applicants. (recommended screening test time - 15 minutes). Here are some skill test questions for {role_name}

Incident Management

Assessing the candidate's ability to manage and resolve incidents efficiently.

• What is the primary goal of incident management?
  • a) To escalate incidents to the development team
  • b) To restore normal service operation as quickly as possible (Correct Answer)
  • c) To update documentation after an incident
  • d) To monitor system performance
• Which of the following is a common incident management tool?
  • a) Nagios
  • b) Splunk (Correct Answer)
  • c) MySQL
  • d) Git
• What is a post-incident review?
  • a) A report generated during an incident
  • b) An analysis conducted after resolving an incident to identify root causes and improvement opportunities (Correct Answer)
  • c) A meeting to discuss upcoming incidents
  • d) A documentation update

Troubleshooting

Evaluating the candidate's ability to diagnose and resolve issues in production environments.

• What is the first step in troubleshooting a production issue?
  • a) Reboot the server
  • b) Identify and define the problem (Correct Answer)
  • c) Notify the stakeholders
  • d) Update the incident log
• Which tool would you use to analyze system logs for errors?
  • a) Excel
  • b) Wireshark
  • c) Splunk (Correct Answer)
  • d) Jenkins
• What is the best approach when you are unable to resolve an issue quickly?
  • a) Escalate the issue to the next level of support (Correct Answer)
  • b) Ignore the issue and move on
  • c) Document the issue for later review
  • d) Restart the system

Scripting

Testing the candidate's ability to automate tasks and improve efficiency through scripting.

• Which scripting language is commonly used for automating tasks in Linux environments?
  • a) JavaScript
  • b) Bash (Correct Answer)
  • c) HTML
  • d) SQL
• What is the purpose of a shebang (#!) at the beginning of a script?
  • a) To comment the script
  • b) To specify the interpreter that should be used to execute the script (Correct Answer)
  • c) To define a variable
  • d) To include a library
• How would you schedule a script to run at a specific time on a Unix-based system?
  • a) Use the at command
  • b) Use the cron command (Correct Answer)
  • c) Use the cp command
  • d) Use the mkdir command

Note - Auto reject candidates if scores less than 70% in this section

One way video interview

Use tools like hirevue, whitecarrot.io to ask candidates pre-recorded questions about their experience and skills.

Use sample question given in scorecard.

Collect other information 

Collect data from shortlisted candidates, such as salary expectations and visa status.

Manual candidate profile shortlisting:

Thoroughly review the CVs of the top scoring candidates from the automated process

Look for evidence of the required skills, experience, and achievements

Review the candidate’s portfolio or GitHub repositories to see examples of their work.