Ask ten interviewers what a great interview looks like and you’ll get ten different answers. Structured interviewing is what’s left when you filter all of that advice down to what actually works. In this short clip, Craig della Penna — Founder of Aesop Partners and creator of the HireBest® methodology — explains it in under a minute.
In Craig’s words
“We’ve taken a whole jumble of different interview advice that’s out there… and filtered that down to what actually works, what actually matters. And that is a structured process built off of a cipher, that has a clear way you ask questions, that gets the best answers, and is decided through a high-quality debrief process to make sure that you’re making the right decision.”
That’s the whole idea in one sentence. Structured interviewing means:
- A shared definition of success — a cipher that spells out what the role must deliver, agreed before anyone is interviewed.
- A clear way of asking questions — every candidate is explored against the same criteria, so answers can actually be compared.
- Evidence over gut feel — interviews gather specifics, not impressions.
- A high-quality debrief — the decision is made deliberately, with every interviewer’s independent assessment on the table.
And as Craig says in the clip, none of this should be the purview of the top tier of an organization — it’s something everyone at any level of a company can learn and use.
Want to go deeper? Start with why structured hiring works, or learn the full method in HireBest Foundations On Demand.