There's one test I recommend to my semi-technical fellows: Give a small practical problem to solve and see what the other person comes up with. For instance yo

There's one test I recommend to my semi-technical fellows: Give a small practical problem to solve and see what the other person comes up with. For instance you could ask prospective employee to hack together a small app or a script to do something or anything you can understand and think is solvable with technology. The great part of this test is that most of the time slackers just don't even attempt it. For those who give a shot, you can look at certain behavioral patterns using your softskills. For a non-techie judge, you won't be able to analyze the quality of design but the end result also says a lot.