Screening questions IT staffing recruiters should ask before they submit

The expensive failure is not a candidate who fails a client interview. It is a candidate you should never have submitted: wrong visa, last used the stack in 2019, or unavailable for the onsite days. A short screen exists to find that out while it is still cheap.

Four buckets, not a 40-question form

• Technical — one or two probes on the must-have stack, in their own words.
• Experience — which role did they actually do the work in, and how recently.
• Verification — legal name, dates, current employer, and whether they can start.
• Availability — notice period, timezone, onsite days, and competing offers.

Do not run a full loop. You are not the hiring manager. You are checking that the packet you send will not embarrass the desk.

Write questions from this JD and this resume

Generic “tell me about yourself” wastes the call. Screening Questions builds technical, experience, verification, and availability questions from the JD plus the resume. Ask the ones that map to gates. Put the answers in the recruiter summary so the account manager does not have to guess.

If they cannot walk through a recent project on the must-have skill, do not submit and “hope the HM likes them.” That is how you lose the req.