Interview is a great way to assess candidates in a real-time technical interview. You can have multiple hiring managers/engineers join the session and work on a problem with the candidate, connecting voice and video as needed.
Adding Participants
When creating your Interview you can assign a candidate and an interviewer(s) to it. Please note that an e-mail will not be sent to the candidate unless the interview is scheduled.
If adding an existing candidate, you can select the "Add candidate's assessment report" in order to include their tasks from a previous session.
Add Content
When creating your interview, you are able to add specific content such as a pre-built assessment, interview questions, and/or a Miro Board.
You can save your content selections as a template for future interviews; this approach will help standardize the process when interviewing multiple candidates for a specific role.
Scheduling an Interview
You can choose the date, time, and duration of an interview when creating the session. If a candidate and interviewer are assigned, they will receive an email with a calendar invitation. E-mails will not be sent to the candidate if the interview is not scheduled. You can schedule an interview either when creating it or at a later time through the Interview dashboard.
If the arrangements on your end change and you need to reschedule an interview, you can do so in the Interviews dashboard.
When an interview is rescheduled, participants are notified about the changes.
When you're setting up a session without scheduling it, you will need to send your candidate the session URL. When it's time for the interview, the candidate will open the URL, click "enter as candidate" and fill in their details before entering the session.
Please note, only once the interviewer has entered and clicked "Start interview" the candidate can enter the interview.
List of Interviews
When reviewing your list of scheduled and completed interviews, you can see specific details of them, as well as make modifications to scheduled interviews. You can:
- Modify the interview name
- Add interviewers
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See the status
- By hovering over the status, you can see the status date
- Review the different types of tasks and questions within the interview
- Date and time for scheduled interviews
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Go to the room to make prepare the interview, such as adding individual tasks
- Results will appear here upon completion of the interview
- Copy the link to send to the candidate or other interviewers
- Copy or delete the interview
AI Assistance Settings
Account admins and interview creators can now control whether AI assistance (the AI Assistant and AI Copilot) is available during interviews from a centralized Interview Settings page. To access it, navigate to the Interviews dashboard and click Settings.
- The Default State toggle sets whether AI assistance is on or off when an interview begins.
- The Interviewers can toggle it off during the interview toggle controls whether interviewers have the ability to turn AI assistance off during a live session.
You can also lock these settings to prevent them from being overridden at the template level.
If your organization uses teams, these settings apply at the team level, meaning each team can have its own AI assistance configuration.
Interviewer Notes
Interviewers with a Codility seat can now take notes during an interview directly in the application. Notes can be reviewed and edited in the interview report. In-app notes make the interview process more streamlined by reducing the number of tools needed and are a convenient way to consolidate feedback and notes on candidate performance.
- Interviewer notes are not visible to candidates
- Interviewers can only edit their own notes, and can only see others’ notes on the interview report if they have an admin seat.
During an interview, interviewers can set a Global Timer to help manage their time effectively and gain better insights. The duration is customizable and will be shared with both the interviewer and candidate once active.
An audible countdown and notification will alert both the interviewer and candidate when the timer hits zero. This feature allows tailored time management based on the conversation flow, ensuring smooth transitions between different stages of the interview.
Please keep in mind that the expiration of the timer does not automatically end the interview. It is simply a tool to help interviewers manage the time spent on an interview or sections of an interview.
Whiteboard
Using Whiteboard, both the interviewer and candidate can quickly draw diagrams and shapes to translate technical questions on a high level.
Whiteboard details are then reflected in the final interview report.
Excalidraw Whiteboard (Private Preview)
For system design tasks in VSCode interview environments, you can now use Excalidraw which is a purpose-built drawing surface embedded directly inside the interview. No tab-switching, sign-in, or IT whitelisting required.
To enable, please go to the following:
- My Account > Settings > Account Settings.
- Scroll down to Excalidraw whiteboard and enable as needed.
All participants share the same canvas in real time with live cursors and instant sync. Unlike the global Miro whiteboard, each interview task gets its own dedicated Excalidraw canvas. Canvases are auto-saved and become read-only after the interview for review.
Image insertion and candidate report integration are coming in future releases.
Video/audio
You can join the interview with audio and video for a live interview. As an interviewer, you can enable fullscreen video mode so the interviewer(s) can minimize distractions when coding isn’t happening and focus on speaking with the candidate directly.
Candidate Practice Session
Candidates can now join a practice interview session before their actual interview begins. During a practice session, they can:
- Take a guided tour of the platform.
- Understand how to work on a task and code effectively.
- Learn how to join a call and use the chat feature.
- Get familiar with the whiteboard tools.
Why This Matters:
- Interviewers’ Feedback: Candidates often need time to adapt to the platform’s features, which can reduce the time available for meaningful interaction during the interview.
- Preparation Questions: Candidates frequently ask questions about the platform, which can take up significant time for our customers to address.
- Candidate Stress: Many candidates report feeling anxious when navigating an unfamiliar environment for the first time during the interview itself.
Live Proctoring Signals for Interviews
This significant update integrates real-time behavioural integrity signals directly into the Interview experience, providing interviewers with immediate visibility into candidate actions that could indicate dishonest behaviour.
Core Functionality and Benefits:
Real-time Notification: Interviewers are now notified live during the session, facilitating better awareness and faster intervention when integrity issues arise.
Immediate Visibility: The system delivers immediate sight into integrity-related behaviours as they occur.
Enhanced Response Capability: Interviewers gain the ability to respond and address potential issues in real-time, supporting a fairer and more transparent decision-making process.
How the System Works:
Interviewers receive real-time notifications for specific behavioural events, which are tracked across all interview environments. These events include:
Switching browser tabs.
Losing browser focus.
Attempting to copy the task description.
Copying code from an external source into the solution (supported only in the basic IDE).
All generated events also appear in a session sidebar, allowing interviewers to easily review them chronologically during the session.
Candidate Experience and Key Limitations:
Candidate Experience Unchanged: The candidate experience remains exactly the same, as the signals are not visible to them. They are only visible to interviewers.
VSCode Environment: All currently supported behavioural signals are shown in VSCode environments, with the exception of copy-paste code detection.
Copy-Paste Details: When copy-paste code detection is active, the system displays both the number of lines of code pasted and the code itself.
If you have any additional questions about Interviews or would like to leave your feedback, please contact us at support@codility.com.