Create and structure a template

A template describes what you want to find in every set of interview notes. It’s organized into sections that hold questions, each with instructions that guide the writing. Everything happens on the Notes templates page, which you open from the sidebar.

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Three ways to create a template

On Notes templates, click the + button at the top of the list. The right-hand pane shows New template, and only one thing is required: the Template name. You then start from one of these three bases:

• Start from a document: upload a file or paste text.
• Describe your own: explain the interview and the information to extract from it.
• Start from scratch: build the outline section by section.

In the first two cases, you get a complete outline that you then adjust in the editor.

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Start from a document

A job description, a brief, an interview guide, or a plain list of questions all work.

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Describe the template you want

Click Describe your own, then explain the interview and the information to extract from it. Be specific about what you want to read in the interview notes, not just about the job. Then click Generate template. The Generate with AI block also offers five ready-made starting points. Each one fills in the description and starts generation in a single click:

• Phone screen
• Job brief with a client
• Reference check
• Interview debrief
• Internship / apprenticeship interview

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Start from scratch

Below the Or start from scratch divider, two buttons open the editor directly on an empty section: New section, or Repeatable section if this first block should repeat.

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Organize your sections

In the editor, each section is a heading followed by its questions. Click the title to rename it. The ⋯ menu to the right of the title gives you Repeatable section, Duplicate section, and Delete section. To reorder, grab the handle on the left of a section and drag it. Questions move the same way, within their section. The New section and Repeatable section buttons at the bottom of the editor add more sections.

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Write your questions

Click Add a question, type its wording, and confirm. Hirify then suggests an answer type and a first instruction, which you keep or change. Each question is a card with its wording at the top, its instruction in the middle, and its settings at the bottom. The trash icon deletes the question.

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Choose the answer type

At the bottom of a question’s card, Answer offers three values:

• Text: a written answer, as a paragraph.
• List: an answer as a bulleted list.
• Choice: one or more answers among the ones you define.

With Choice, the Possible answers appear. Press Enter to move on to the next answer, or paste several at once, one per line. Turn on Several answers so the notes can keep more than one. The Yes / No button turns the question into a yes-or-no answer. The length of an answer goes in the question’s instructions, such as “in one sentence” or “three points at most”. When the instructions start with “List” and the answer is Text, the editor offers Switch to a list.

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Add an instruction to a question

The Instructions for the AI field says what to look for and how to phrase it. It’s the setting that weighs most on the quality of the interview notes. An instruction such as “tell apart the motivations tied to the job from those tied to leaving” changes the result far more than a better-worded question title. The Improve button, at the top right of the field, rephrases what you just wrote. It stays disabled while the field is empty.

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Set the rules for the interview notes

The Rules for the interview notes block, at the top of the editor below the template name, sets what applies to the whole write-up. All three settings are optional:

• General instructions: the tone, the formatting and the rules shared by every question. For example: “short, factual sentences, in the third person”. A question’s own instructions come first.
• When information is missing, write: the text shown for a question the interview didn’t cover, such as “not provided”. Left empty, the notes show “Information not available from the interview”. Choice questions keep “Not discussed in the interview”.
• Add useful facts beyond the template: a useful fact that no question covers (an achievement, a signal, a context) is added at the end of the notes, under “Other points worth keeping”. Nothing is added when there is none. This setting is off by default.

General instructions shape how the notes are written. They add no information: the content always comes from the interview.

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Repeatable sections

A repeatable section produces one block per occurrence found in the interview, for example one per work experience mentioned. Turn on Repeatable section in the section’s ⋯ menu. The Repeatable badge appears next to the title. An instructions field then appears, where you say what triggers a repeat. Example: “one per work experience mentioned”.

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Edit an existing template

Click its name in the list on the left and it opens for reading, with each question on one line and its full instructions. Click a question to edit it in place, then Collapse or Escape to close it. The Rules for the interview notes block and the template name work the same way, with one click. As soon as something changes, a bar appears at the bottom with Cancel and Save, and the Unsaved changes label. After saving, the template stays open. On a template you’re creating, the button reads Create template. If you leave the template or open another one without saving, a window offers Keep editing or Discard changes. A draft is kept in your browser. When you come back, a Draft available message offers Restore or Dismiss. The ⋯ menu, at the top right, holds the visibility, Duplicate, and Delete. Deleting asks for confirmation.

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Good to know

• The description you type and the text you paste are limited to 10,000 characters. Beyond that, generation doesn’t start. Hirify shows the length reached and asks you to shorten it.
• A template without a name can’t be saved. Remaining errors are listed at the top of the editor, and each line takes you to the field in question.
• Templates curated by Hirify can’t be edited directly. Open one, then click Customize to get an editable copy.
• A template describes what to look for in the interview. It doesn’t score the candidate and doesn’t decide any next step for you.
• Editing a template doesn’t change the interview notes already written with it. To update them, regenerate them.