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Screening Interview: 25 Questions, a 20-Minute Call Structure and a Free Scorecard

2026-10-16 21:46
SHORT ANSWER

A screening interview is a short call — usually 15 to 30 minutes — that a recruiter runs before the main interview. It checks the must-haves agreed with the hiring manager (experience, salary range, availability, work format), gets a first read on motivation and communication, and ends with one decision: invite to the interview, hold, or decline. Score every candidate against the same criteria.

Course on this topic: Recruiter Course: Recruitment Training from Scratch

A screening interview decides who the hiring manager will spend an hour with. Done well, it saves the manager's time and gives every candidate the same fair chance. Done badly, it is a friendly chat that lets the wrong people through and screens out good ones on gut feeling. Below: a 20-minute call structure, 25 questions by block, how to decide after the call, and a free screening scorecard that suggests the next step.

What is a screening interview?

A screening interview is a short call — 15 to 30 minutes, by phone or video — between a recruiter and a candidate before the main interview. It has three jobs:
  1. Check the must-haves. The one or two things the role cannot do without, the salary range, availability and work format.
  2. Get a first read on motivation and communication. Why this job, and can the person answer a question clearly.
  3. Make one decision. Invite to the interview, hold, or decline.
It is not the same as pre-screening — the review of CVs and profiles before anyone is called — and it is not the main interview. Deep competency questions belong in the main interview; the screening call only decides whether that interview is worth everyone's time. How candidates move through all the stages is covered in Employee Selection Process: 7 Steps from Application to Offer.

Before the call: agree the must-haves with the hiring manager

Most screening mistakes happen before the first call. If the recruiter and the hiring manager have not agreed what a “yes” looks like, every recruiter screens by their own feeling. Agree and write down:
  • Two or three must-haves — without them the person cannot do the job. Everything else is a nice-to-have and should not decide the screening.
  • The salary range you can actually offer.
  • Start date and work format — office, hybrid or remote, and time zone if it matters.
  • What happens next — the stages after screening and how fast you will come back to the candidate.
These become the knock-out questions on your scorecard. Everyone who passes them gets rated on the same four criteria.

A 20-minute screening call structure

  1. Opening — 2 minutes. Introduce yourself, the purpose and length of the call, and ask if now is still a good time.
  2. The role in brief — 3 minutes. What the team does, what the job is for, what the first months look like. Keep it short: the goal is to check interest, not to sell everything at once.
  3. Must-haves — 5 minutes. Experience with the key requirement, salary expectations, availability and notice, work format. If one is clearly not met, you can close the call politely here.
  4. Experience — 5 minutes. One or two questions about recent work, asking for specific examples.
  5. Motivation — 3 minutes. Why they are looking and why this role.
  6. Candidate's questions and next steps — 2 minutes. Answer their questions and say exactly when and how they will hear back.
Putting must-haves early is deliberate: it respects the candidate's time as much as yours.
FREE TOOL · SCREENING SCORECARD

Screening call scorecard

Fill it in during or right after the call. Must-haves first, then four ratings. The scorecard suggests the next step and gives you a note to paste into your ATS or send to the hiring manager.

Must-haves agreed with the hiring manager
Ratings (1 = weak, 5 = strong)

The full assessment toolkit — the Scorecard method, competency-based interviews, questions on salary expectations and counter-offers — is in the Recruiter course.

25 screening interview questions

Opening and current situation
  1. What are you doing now, and what does a typical week look like?
  2. Why are you looking for a new role at the moment?
  3. What made you respond to this vacancy?
  4. Are you in other hiring processes right now? At what stage?
Must-haves
  1. Tell me about your experience with [the key requirement]. Where did you use it last?
  2. What salary range are you looking for?
  3. What is your notice period, and when could you start?
  4. The role is [office / hybrid / remote]. How does that work for you?
  5. Is there anything that would stop you from accepting an offer if we made one?
Experience
  1. What was the most important result in your last role? How did you achieve it?
  2. Which part of your current job do you do best?
  3. What is a task you would rather not do in your next job?
  4. Describe a recent problem you solved. What exactly did you do?
  5. Who did you work with most closely, and how did you split the work?
  6. What tools or systems do you use every day?
Motivation
  1. What do you want your next role to give you that the current one does not?
  2. What would make you stay in a company for several years?
  3. What kind of manager do you work best with?
  4. What do you already know about our company?
  5. Where do you want to be in two to three years?
Closing
  1. What questions do you have about the role or the team?
  2. What is most important for you in deciding between offers?
  3. How do you prefer we contact you about next steps?
  4. Is there anything about your experience we have not covered that matters for this role?
  5. If we invite you to the next stage, when are you available?
You do not need all 25 in one call. Pick the must-have questions for your role, add two or three from the other blocks, and ask every candidate for that role the same ones.
FROM MY PRACTICE · WHAT A SCREENING CALL SHOWS

Recently someone tried to ask me something at the start of a call. He said: “Hello, can I consult you?” I said: “Ask your question.” And he started telling me his story for several minutes.

I said: “Sorry, could you just ask? I don't understand why you are telling me all this — maybe I can't help you at all.” Some people simply cannot think and express themselves in a structured way.

That is exactly what I assess in screening when I look at communication: is the person's speech coherent, can they express a thought, or does it not work well.

Structured thinking shows in the first minutes of a call. It is one of the few soft skills you can actually check in a screening interview — so put it on the scorecard.

— Mike Pritula

How to decide after the call

Decide within the day, while the call is fresh, and use the same rule for every candidate:
  • Decline if a must-have is clearly not met. Tell the candidate soon and politely — a fast, clear no is better than silence.
  • Hold if something is unclear (for example, the salary expectation is just above the range) or the ratings are mixed. Clarify or compare with the other candidates before deciding.
  • Invite if all must-haves are met and the ratings are solid. Send the hiring manager a short note: why this person, what to check in the main interview.
The scorecard above uses exactly this logic: any “No” on a must-have means decline, any “Unsure” means hold, and an invite needs an average rating of 3.5 or more with no rating of 1 or 2. For the main interview, use a structured scorecard — see Interview Scorecard: How to Turn Hiring into Science, Not Roulette.
FROM MY PRACTICE · BIG NAMES ON THE CV

In 2009, after the crisis, I was hiring for a company without a famous name. I had a pile of CVs from people at top companies — Procter & Gamble, Kraft Foods, Mars — and I thought: great, now we will hire top people.

When they came to the interview, I realised something was wrong. They answered my questions worse than people from less famous companies.

So use a test task during the interview and collect references: we had several cases where a candidate looked fine, and the references showed a serious problem.

A strong brand on the CV is not a competency. Screen on your must-haves and answers, not on logos — and verify the rest later with a test task and references.

— Mike Pritula

Red flags in a screening interview

  • No specific examples. Only general words — “I managed processes”, “I improved results” — after you asked for a concrete case twice.
  • Not answering the question asked. Long stories instead of an answer, as in the call above.
  • No idea why this job. “I am open to anything” is not motivation for this role.
  • Big gap between the CV and the call. Skills listed on the CV that the person cannot describe using.
  • Salary far outside the range. Not a red flag about the person, but a reason not to move forward.
One red flag is a question to clarify, not an automatic no. Two or three together usually mean hold or decline.

Six common screening mistakes

  1. No agreed must-haves. Each recruiter screens by their own feeling, and the funnel fills with the wrong people.
  2. Salary left for later. A mismatch found after three rounds wastes the candidate's and the manager's time.
  3. Too long a call. A 60-minute screening is a main interview without preparation.
  4. Different questions for different candidates. Then you cannot compare them fairly.
  5. Judging by the brand on the CV. Screen on the must-haves and the answers.
  6. No feedback to the candidate. Every candidate should hear back, quickly, whatever the decision.
If you are choosing between several strong candidates after screening, the matrix in Shortlisting Candidates: The All-In-One Guide helps rank them.
Assessing candidates — the Scorecard method, competency-based interviews, questions about salary expectations and the likelihood of a counter-offer — is part of the Recruiter course, together with sourcing, outreach, interviews, offers and onboarding.
FAQ

Frequently asked questions

What is the purpose of a screening interview?

To decide quickly and fairly who goes on to the main interview. It checks the must-have criteria, salary range and availability, and gives a first impression of motivation and communication — so the hiring manager only meets candidates who could realistically get the offer.

How long should a screening interview be?

15 to 30 minutes. Twenty minutes is enough for most roles if you prepare the questions in advance and keep the must-haves at the start.

What questions are asked in a screening interview?

Why the candidate is looking, what they did in their last role, their experience with the key requirement of the job, salary expectations, notice period and availability, preferred work format, and what questions they have about the role.

Should you ask about salary in a screening call?

Yes. Agree the range with the hiring manager before you start and check the candidate's expectations in the first call. Finding a mismatch after three interview rounds wastes everyone's time.

Who should do the screening interview?

Usually the recruiter, using criteria agreed with the hiring manager in advance. For senior or highly technical roles the hiring manager or a team member may join or run a short technical screen.