Shortlisting candidates isn’t just about narrowing down a pile of resumes. Done well, it’s where you win or lose the hiring game. The quality of your shortlist shapes your interviews, influences your final decision, and ultimately determines whether your new hire succeeds or becomes a costly misfire.
But the traditional shortlisting process is flawed. It leans heavily on gut instinct, favors good formatting over real fit, and often amplifies bias rather than reducing it. So how do we fix it?
Here’s a step-by-step framework based on behavioral science and people analytics to help you shortlist candidates more accurately and inclusively.
Step 1: Start with your business, not the candidate
Most shortlisting processes start by scanning resumes. But that skips a critical question: What does your business actually need?
Instead, begin by profiling your business and team:
- What are the core values, communication styles, and decision-making norms?
- Is your culture more risk-averse or innovative? Collaborative or individualist?
- What work styles complement the team’s current dynamics?
This cultural self-awareness helps you benchmark what a strong match looks like not just on paper, but in context. Compono calls this your "business personality." When you know how your team works, you can filter candidates based on real alignment, not resume proxies.
That’s why Truffle builds a short intake into every role. It’s not busywork, it’s the foundation for better shortlists. Without it, we’re matching candidates to generic job descriptions or outdated templates. With it, we’re anchoring the process to real team dynamics and role expectations.
The result: fewer false positives, fewer bad interviews, and shortlists that reflect who’s actually going to succeed; not just who looks right on paper.
Step 2: Use a structured way to assess your team’s gaps
Before you open a single resume, audit your team’s needs using what we call the 8 work types that drive high-performing teams. Are you over-indexed on process people but lacking communicators? Do you have great strategists but no finishers?
This team audit gives you an additional lens beyond qualifications or experience. It allows you to shortlist for complementary thinking and behavior, and not just technical ability.
Step 3: Make your shortlist longer (on purpose)
In informal hiring situations, we default to candidates who “come to mind.” The problem? Those defaults are biased. In male-dominated roles, for example, hiring managers are less likely to recall qualified women. Not because they aren’t fit, but because they don’t fit the mental prototype.
Brian Lucas’s team at Cornell ran studies across industries (from tech to Hollywood) showing that simply asking hiring managers to double their shortlists led to a 33–44% increase in gender diversity.
Why? Just like with idea generation, people tend to start with conventional choices. As they push further, their selections become more novel and inclusive.
So: triple-check your instincts. Then write down three more names.
Step 4: Ditch the resume as the primary filter
Even with extended shortlists, resumes are still a flawed signal. They're subjective, inconsistent, and increasingly AI-generated. Worse, studies show that experience (one of the main signals we use) has a weak correlation with actual job performance.
Instead, shift your screening criteria to include:
- Work motivations: What drives a candidate day-to-day?
- Attributes: Are they reflective, proactive, coachable?
- Organizational fit: Will they thrive in your way of working?
This doesn’t mean throwing out resumes entirely. But resumes should supplement—not dominate—the shortlist.
Step 5: Add behavioral assessments early in the process
Traditional psychometric testing is expensive and time-consuming. But many platforms now offer scalable assessments that evaluate soft skills, values, and culture fit at the top of the funnel before a human reads a resume.
This approach creates a four-quadrant model for shortlisting:
- Looks right, is right: Great on paper and a great fit. Move quickly.
- Looks right, is wrong: Strong resume, poor fit. High risk of mis-hire.
- Looks wrong, is right: Unimpressive resume, high potential. Hidden gems.
- Looks wrong, is wrong: Easy cut. Avoid wasting interview slots.
Most teams only ever find the first category. But the best hiring teams build a process that surfaces category three: candidates who’d normally get ignored but are actually perfect for the role.
Step 6: Use one-way interviews to add context early
One of the fastest ways to enrich your shortlisting process is to add one-way interviews—short, pre-recorded video or audio responses that candidates complete on their own time.
These async interviews give you richer signals than a resume ever could:
- Hear how candidates communicate—tone, clarity, confidence
- Understand their motivation—why this role, why now
- Spot alignment early—values, mindset, and attitude
Unlike live interviews, one-way interviews are scalable. Every candidate gets the same questions, delivered the same way. That means you can assess everyone fairly without spending hours on scheduling or initial calls.
They also help reduce bias when paired with structured scoring. Instead of evaluating a candidate on “gut feel,” you’re rating their response to a consistent set of questions designed to reveal job-relevant traits.
Pro tip: Use 2–3 knockout questions aligned to the role’s real success factors (e.g., “Tell us about a time you solved a problem independently”). Then review responses with a structured rubric to make comparison easier.
Step 7: Build a repeatable scoring system
Once you’ve got cultural benchmarks and behavioral data, use a standardized rubric to rank your candidates. At minimum, your shortlist scoring criteria should include:
- Skills/qualifications (baseline only)
- Motivations and values alignment
- Team fit or behavioral complementarity
- Predicted on-the-job success (based on psychometric models)
Weight the criteria based on what matters most for the role. For example, if you're hiring for a fast-paced customer support role, responsiveness and empathy may matter more than industry experience.
Step 8: Re-audit your advancement pathways
Even after shortlisting, bias can creep back in. That’s why we recommend conducting an "advancement pathway audit." This is a self-assessment for hiring managers to map where and how they influence someone’s progression.
Ask yourself:
- Who do I tend to recommend for interviews, promotions, or special projects?
- Are assumptions about gender, personality, or availability affecting those choices?
- Am I assuming someone won’t want a role because of life circumstances I haven’t confirmed?
Use the audit to check your own thinking before final decisions are made.
Step 9: Communicate the why behind your new shortlist process
Finally, if you’re leading a team or rolling this out in your organization, don’t just change the process. You need to explain it.
Hiring managers need to understand that this isn’t about being “politically correct.” It’s about:
- Making better predictions about job success
- Reducing the chance of costly mis-hires
- Expanding your talent pool with people who would otherwise be overlooked
Whether you frame it in terms of performance, diversity, or fairness, tailoring the pitch to your audience is key. Some will respond to the data. Others to the principle. Either way, back it up with research and not just policy.
Why improving your candidate shortlisting process matters
Shortlisting candidates isn't just a time-saving step—it's one of the highest-leverage points in your entire hiring funnel. The right shortlisting strategy helps you:
- Reduce bias and increase fairness in early-stage decisions
- Surface high-potential candidates who often get overlooked
- Align new hires with your team’s working style and company culture
- Avoid costly mis-hires caused by resume-first decision-making
- Save time by prioritizing candidates who are more likely to succeed
By extending your shortlist, incorporating behavioral insights, and starting with your business needs—not just the candidate’s experience—you can consistently build better, more diverse, and more effective teams.
Whether you’re hiring for a high-volume frontline role or a hard-to-fill leadership position, a structured and research-backed shortlisting process sets the foundation for better hires and stronger outcomes.
Let me know if you’d like this adapted for a landing page, email follow-up, or internal playbook.
