I ask potential candidates what the best project they ever worked on was. I explain that I'm going to use it as a way of gauging technical aptitude so please an

I ask potential candidates what the best project they ever worked on was. I explain that I'm going to use it as a way of gauging technical aptitude so please answer appropriately. Once they get started, I ask questions that make sense based on what the candidate says. In most cases you can glean enough of what a candidate can do by the depth and breadth of their answers. You can get a sense of how passionate they are, how detail oriented. You can ask about the problems they encountered, how they handled them, what they would do differently. What kind of notes did you take? What kind of documentation did you leave, etc.