Work Out What Level a Candidate Actually Is

When to use it

The prompt

Help me calibrate what level this candidate actually operates at. OUR LEVELS AND WHAT SEPARATES THEM: {{paste the rubric, or describe the two levels you're deciding between}} THE CANDIDATE: {{current title, company type and size, years of experience, and their own description of what they own}} WHAT THEY SAID IN THE SCREEN: {{quote them as closely as you can, particularly on scope, autonomy and influence}} THE ROLE'S LEVEL: {{what we're hiring at}} Tell me: 1. Which of our levels their evidence actually supports, and which specific statements point that way. 2. Where their title is likely inflated or deflated by their company's context, and in which direction. 3. The difference between what they did and what they merely sat near — the "we migrated the platform" problem, where a whole team's work arrives in the first person. 4. Two questions that would settle the level quickly, and what the answer at each level sounds like. 5. What would make them a stretch hire rather than a level mismatch, and what the team would need to provide for that to work. 6. How to raise a level discrepancy with the candidate without it reading as a downgrade. Work only from what I've given you. Don't infer level from company prestige.

Tip

Listen for scope of decision, not scope of project. Someone who chose the approach and defended it operates a level above someone who executed the same project competently, and both describe it identically on a resume.

How to use it

Paste the prompt into ChatGPT, Claude or whichever assistant you use, then replace every {{bracketed}} part with your own detail. The more specific and messier your input, the better the output — a model given raw notes has more to work with than one given a tidy summary you wrote first.

More Screening prompts

Open the full tool for all 87 prompts, the glossary, and the JD decoder.