Hiring
Apr 14, 2026 · 6 min read
Unstructured interviews predict job performance at around r = .19. Structured interviews — same questions, same rubric, independent scoring — reach roughly r = .42, the strongest single selection method in the revised meta-analytic estimates of Sackett, Zhang, Berry and Lievens (2022).
Those figures are lower than the ones the field cited for two decades. Schmidt and Hunter's 1998 analysis put structured interviews above r = .50; the 2022 re-analysis found that range-restriction corrections had been applied in ways that inflated most of the estimates. The ordering of methods survived. The magnitudes did not.
The change is procedural, not technical, which is why it remains the highest-ROI thing most hiring teams can do. TalentSpark generates a structured guide for every shortlisted candidate, anchored to their psychometric profile so probes target the actual risk areas rather than a generic question bank.