You read 60 résumés to learn three things. Just ask.
License, shift, driving record. Whatever actually decides it for your shop, ask it on the application. The people who answer wrong never reach your pile, and the ones who are left are worth a phone call.
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5,000+ growing businesses hire on AvaHR without a recruiting team.
Two of your questions are dealbreakers. The software should know which two.
A questionnaire on its own just gives you more to read. Marking the answers that disqualify is what turns it into screening that happens while you sleep.
Ask what actually decides it
Yes or no, pick one, pick all, a number, a short answer, upload a certificate. Build the list for that job, or start from the set your industry already uses.
Mark the answers that disqualify
Flip knockout on a question and choose the answers that end it. No EPA 608 on a job that requires it, no on-call availability when the role is on-call. You decide whether that declines them politely or just flags them.
Read a shorter, better pile
Answers sit on the candidate profile next to the résumé, so you can sort by years in the trade and stop re-asking the same five questions on every phone screen.
Write the question once. It screens for you from then on.
The list on the left is what you are asking. The panel on the right is exactly what the candidate sees on their phone, and what it would have done to the last batch of applicants.
Search candidatesSASummit AirThe question you were asking too late.
“I interviewed four hygienists in one week who did not have an Arizona license. Nobody had lied, I just never asked until we were sitting across from each other. Now it is the first question on the application and that week does not happen anymore.”
Carla at Desert Ridge Dental
Screening is the front door. Here is the rest of the house.
The questions decide who gets through. These are the pieces that handle everyone who does, and everyone who does not.
Applicant-friendly applications
Five good questions on a phone, not a twenty-minute form. Ask enough to screen without losing the people you want.
Explore →Enriched candidate profiles
Where the answers land. Résumé, certifications and every answer in one view.
Explore →Candidate scorecards
Knockout questions answer who qualifies. Scorecards answer who is best, on the same criteria for everyone.
Explore →Automated actions
What happens after a wrong answer. Decline kindly, or move the good ones straight to phone screen.
Explore →Custom hiring pipeline
Everyone who clears the questions lands on the board, in the stage you decide, with their answers on the card.
Explore →Insights & analytics
Which question is doing the work, and whether one of them is quietly costing you good people.
Explore →Before you write your first one.
Still deciding? On a walkthrough a specialist will write your knockout questions with you, for the job you are hiring for right now.
Does a wrong answer reject somebody automatically?
Only if you want it to. Each knockout question can decline the applicant with a polite message, or simply flag them so they drop to the bottom of your list and you still make the call. Most shops auto-decline on hard requirements like a license and flag on softer ones like availability.
Will extra questions scare good applicants off?
A long form will. Three to five sharp questions will not, and the people it does put off are usually the ones who were never going to qualify. Keep the list short, put the knockouts first, and leave the essay questions out of it.
Can I ask different questions on different jobs?
Yes. Every job has its own questionnaire, and you can save the sets you use often so a new posting starts with the right questions instead of a blank list.
Is it legal to screen people out this way?
Screening on the requirements of the job, like a license, a certification or the ability to work the shift, is standard practice. Keep questions tied to the work itself and away from protected characteristics. Every answer is recorded, so you have a consistent record of how each applicant was screened. AvaHR is hiring software rather than a law firm, so check anything unusual with your own counsel.
Where do the answers show up?
On the candidate profile beside the résumé, and on the candidate list where you can sort and filter by them. You can pull up everyone who answered 6+ years without reopening a single application.