Interview Notes Template for Hiring Teams

Good interview notes record evidence, not impressions. The gap shows a week later, when someone asks why a candidate advanced and the file says only "strong communicator". Here is a template you can copy in one selection, and the habits that make it worth filling in.

Why we keep this page: we build Talent Summoner, an AI agent that turns a role brief into a ranked, evidence-backed shortlist from 200M+ profiles — $39 a role, or $79/month if you hire every month, free to start with no credit card. It is our product; every claim below is sourced and stands on its own.

Scope, plainly: Talent Summoner does not record, transcribe or score interviews today. We are building that — a notetaker that joins the call, transcribes Cantonese and English, and scores answers against your role brief — and it is in build, not live. Join the waitlist. Everything below is manual.

Prepare the template before the interview

Do not wait until the call starts to decide what counts as evidence. Copy the approved must-haves into the requirement review, give each interviewer a few to own, and write one primary question for each — so two interviewers do not both test the same must-have and leave another untouched.

If the brief itself is vague, fix that first. Ask plainly which language, framework or scale the role requires — our software engineer hiring guide lists the questions worth settling before anyone books a call. Anything no interview can assess gets marked not assessed, not left blank.

The interview notes template

Copy the whole block below in one selection. It is plain markdown, so it pastes into Notion, Google Docs or an ATS free-text field. There is no separate file — the block is the template.

## Interview details

- Candidate:
- Role:
- Interviewer:
- Date:
- Interview stage:
- Interview focus:

## Evidence notes

| Question or topic | Candidate's answer or example | Evidence observed | Follow-up needed |
|---|---|---|---|
|  |  |  |  |
|  |  |  |  |
|  |  |  |  |

## Requirement review

| Requirement | Evidence for | Evidence against or missing | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Must-have 1 |  |  | Low / medium / high |
| Must-have 2 |  |  | Low / medium / high |
| Nice-to-have 1 |  |  | Low / medium / high |

## Recommendation

- Strongest evidence:
- Biggest uncertainty:
- What the next interview should verify:
- Recommendation: advance / hold / decline
- Recommendation rationale:

## Handoff checklist

- [ ] Concrete examples, not general impressions
- [ ] Missing evidence marked separately from negative evidence
- [ ] Requirements actually tested are listed
- [ ] One useful follow-up question identified
- [ ] Recommendation readable by someone who was not in the room

Three rules for filling it in:

Example before interpretation — write what the candidate said or did before what you think it means. Labels such as "strong" or "weak" earn their place only next to a specific answer or result.
Missing is not negative — a requirement nobody asked about is unassessed, not failed; a blank field is never evidence against the candidate.
Recommendation apart from evidence — separating the two lets another interviewer challenge your conclusion without discarding notes worth keeping.

The checklist is the last gate: if another interviewer cannot follow your recommendation without having attended, the notes are not finished.

Run the debrief and leave a decision record

Five steps, in order:

Notes first, discussion second — every interviewer submits a completed evidence table before the group talks; that is what stops the loudest first opinion from shaping everybody else's memory.
Compare against the approved brief — requirement by requirement, state what was tested and what was demonstrated.
Silence is not a no — an untested requirement is a gap, not a failure. Give every material gap a named owner and one specific follow-up question.
Resolve conflicting readings out loud — when two interviewers read the same example oppositely, keep both readings and name the point the next stage must settle.
Record the decision — the final reason for advancing, holding or declining, plus the evidence that still needs checking.

The purpose is not longer notes. It is a concise record of which requirements were tested, what the candidate demonstrated and how the team decided.

Keep access to the people in the decision, and keep the notes to job-relevant evidence: no protected characteristics, no medical details, nothing personal the role does not touch. What you may record and keep is jurisdictional. New York City's Local Law 144 bars an employer from using an automated employment decision tool without a bias audit in the year before that use, public information about the audit, and notice to candidates — enforced by the New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection. A hand-written note is not such a tool, so that rule misses this template; the same jurisdictional questions still decide what you may capture and when you must delete it. Not legal advice.

Connect sourcing evidence to interview evidence

A public profile can suggest that a candidate shipped a relevant product or held a title. It cannot prove depth, motivation or current interest. The interview earns its hour by testing the biggest uncertainties sourcing left open.

That pre-interview half is the part we do build. Talent Summoner turns a role brief into a ranked shortlist with the reasoning for each match written out — how the ranking works, and what to demand from any ranking. Already have the CVs? The free ranking tool scores up to 50 against a job description with no account, and that reasoning hands you your first interview questions. Sourcing new candidates is $39 a role, free to start with no credit card.

Trade-offs, stated plainly: no interview recording, transcription or scoring today — the notetaker is in build, not live; no ATS integration; no contact-credit database, so you reach candidates through your own email or LinkedIn.

When a dedicated interview-intelligence product is the right call

You need recording, transcription and scoring in production this week → buy a dedicated interview-intelligence tool; a waitlist is not a deployment date.
Regulated hiring that needs a consent and retention trail → you need a system that logs consent, access and deletion per candidate; a markdown file records none of that.
High-volume interviewing → at dozens a week hand-written notes fall behind on day two; put enforced scorecards inside the system that already holds the applications.

FAQ

What should interview notes include?

Include the question, the candidate's example, the requirement it relates to, evidence for or against that requirement, uncertainty and a recommended follow-up. Keep observations separate from conclusions.

Should every interviewer use the same template?

Use the same structure, but assign different requirements. Consistent fields make evidence comparable without forcing every interview to ask identical questions.

Does Talent Summoner record or transcribe interviews?

Not today. Talent Summoner supports candidate sourcing and evidence-backed shortlist review; this is an educational template for interviews your team runs. A notetaker that transcribes Cantonese and English and scores answers against your brief is in build — join the waitlist to try it early.

How long should interview notes be retained?

Retention depends on your organization, jurisdiction and hiring policy. Limit the notes to job-relevant evidence and follow applicable privacy and employment requirements.

Better interview notes start with a better shortlist. Start free, no credit card, and bring the sourcing evidence into the interview.

Talent Summoner prices and product scope read from our own published pricing page, /candidate-ranking and /screening, verified August 2026; Local Law 144 requirements from the New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection. We re-verify this page quarterly — tell us if something changed.