How to Run a Great Interview Without an HR Background

Most small business owners who interview candidates for the first time do the same thing: they have a loose conversation, mention the role, ask if the person has questions, and then try to decide based on a gut feeling they cannot quite explain. Sometimes it works. Often it produces a hire who seemed great in the room and struggled on the floor.

You do not need an HR certification to run a useful interview. You need preparation, a small set of reliable questions, and a way to take notes you can actually use when you are comparing candidates later. This guide covers all three.

Before the interview: do the preparation

The most common interview mistake is walking in cold. Read the candidate’s resume before they arrive - not in the parking lot, not while they’re sitting across from you. Read it the night before and write down two or three things you want to follow up on: a gap you noticed, an experience that is relevant but unexplained, a job they left quickly.

Also prepare your questions in advance. You do not need a long list. Four or five good questions is enough for a 30-minute interview, and you will ask better follow-ups when you are not improvising the main questions.

Finally, write down what “good” looks like for this role before the interview. Not a formal rubric - just a sentence or two: the things you most need this person to be able to do well. That anchor helps you evaluate candidates against the role rather than against each other.

The questions that tell you the most

There are three types of interview questions. Two of them are useful. One of them is not.

Behavioral questions - the most useful kind

Behavioral questions ask about past behavior: tell me about a time you did X. The premise is that past behavior is the best available predictor of future behavior. They are more reliable than hypotheticals because they require a real example rather than a coached answer.

Useful behavioral questions for small business hiring:

• Tell me about a time you had to handle a difficult customer or situation. What happened and what did you do?
• Can you describe a time you had to figure something out without much guidance? How did you approach it?
• Tell me about a job where things were often busy or unpredictable. How did you handle that?
• Have you ever had to tell a manager or coworker something they did not want to hear? What did you do?
• Tell me about a mistake you made at work and what you did about it.

Listen for: specificity (a real story with real details), how the candidate describes their own role in what happened, and whether the outcome was constructive. Vague or hypothetical answers (“I would usually try to calm the customer down”) are weaker than “there was this one customer who...”

Situational and role-specific questions

These are hypotheticals grounded in the actual job. Unlike generic hypotheticals (“where do you see yourself in five years?”), good situational questions test judgment about something the role actually requires.

• If you came in on your first Monday and the previous person left no notes and no handoff, what would your first hour look like?
• If two customers needed help at the same time and you were the only one there, how would you handle it?
• If you noticed a regular process that was wasting time, would you just fix it or talk to me first? Why?

These questions reveal how someone actually thinks about the role, not just whether they can describe past experience.

The questions that tell you the least

Generic hypotheticals like “what is your greatest weakness?” and “where do you see yourself in five years?” produce coached, performative answers that reveal almost nothing about how someone actually works. Skip them. Use the time for a second behavioral question instead.

Similarly, questions that lead the answer (“you’re comfortable with fast-paced environments, right?”) are useless. Every candidate will say yes.

What not to ask

Certain questions are legally off-limits in the US regardless of your intention. Do not ask about age, national origin, religion, marital status, pregnancy, disability, or whether someone has children. These are not just polite omissions - asking them creates legal liability.

If you are curious about availability, ask about availability directly: “This role requires occasional Saturday coverage - is that something you can do?” Do not ask why someone might not be available. If you want to know whether someone can stand for long periods or lift regularly, ask in terms of the job requirements: “This role involves standing for most of a shift - is that something you can do?”

When in doubt, ask yourself: is this question about whether they can do the job? If not, skip it.

How to take notes you will actually use

You will not remember the details of five interviews a week later. Notes taken during the interview - even rough ones - are significantly better than trying to reconstruct your impressions from memory.

What to note: direct quotes or paraphrases of what the candidate said (not your interpretation of it), specific examples they gave, any gaps or inconsistencies, and anything that stood out as notably strong or concerning. Keep your notes factual and work-related. Notes that describe appearance, mannerisms, or anything unrelated to the job are not useful and can create problems if you are ever asked to explain a hiring decision.

An applicant tracking system that lets you take notes on a candidate from your phone during the interview - and share them with anyone else involved in the hire - makes this much easier. Notes that stay in the tool with the candidate’s record are more useful than notes in a separate document that gets lost.

Give the candidate time to ask questions

Reserve the last ten minutes of the interview for the candidate to ask you questions. What they ask - or do not ask - is informative. A candidate who asks nothing is either intimidated or not that interested. A candidate who asks specific, thoughtful questions about the role, the team, or the business is usually more engaged.

Answer honestly. If the job has a hard part - a challenging customer type, a physical demand, a peak-season pressure - say so. Candidates who take the job knowing about the hard parts are more likely to stay than ones who discover them on week two.

After the interview: decide without second-guessing

Write up your notes and make a provisional decision within 24 hours while the interview is fresh. The decision criteria should come back to the role definition you wrote before you started: what are the three most important things this person needs to do well?

If you are comparing multiple candidates, compare them against the role, not against each other. The question is not “who did I like most?” It is “who is most likely to succeed in this specific role?”

A simple decision framework

After each interview, answer three questions in writing:

• Can they do the job? (Skills, experience, relevant examples)
• Will they do the job? (Motivation, engagement, why they want this role specifically)
• Will they fit the team? (Working style, communication, what their references said)

You need a confident yes to all three. A strong “can they do it” does not compensate for a weak “will they.” Waiting for the perfect score on all three is also impractical - make the best decision with the information you have, check references, and move quickly. Good candidates do not stay available for long.

What to do when you are not sure

Doubt is normal, but it is a signal worth reading. If you are not sure whether to move someone forward, ask yourself what exactly is uncertain. If it is a skills question, a practical test or work sample can resolve it. If it is about reliability or work ethic, reference checks are your best tool - call the previous manager and ask directly.

If the doubt is vague - “something just felt off” - be careful. Gut feeling is sometimes pattern recognition and sometimes bias. Try to name the specific behavior or answer that gave you pause. If you can name it and it is work-related, trust it. If you cannot name it, give it less weight.