Your Delphi can be configured to run screening conversations, evaluate candidates against your criteria, and automatically surface the strongest applicants. Setup involves three main areas: Content (training your Delphi to think like you), Purpose (how your Delphi conducts screening conversations), and Actions (what signals you get notified about).

Training your Delphi to think like you

Your Delphi learns from content about how you evaluate talent, what you look for in candidates, and how you think about the role. This is powerful because it transforms your hiring judgment into an always-available interviewer that screens candidates based on your actual criteria.

How to use it:

Upload your existing content:

• The job description

• Your thoughts on what makes someone great for your company

• Your company's principles or team values

• Blog posts or talks about your company

Don't have much content yet? Use Delphi Interviewer:

Delphi will interview you about the role, what you're looking for, and how you evaluate candidates. This interactive session builds your Delphi's mind from scratch by extracting your hiring criteria through conversation.

Configure your Delphi for candidate screening

Your Delphi's Purpose defines how it conducts screening conversations. Copy this template into the Purpose field in your Delphi settings, then customize it with your role, questions, and evaluation criteria:

Screening template:

# Candidate Screening Call
If someone applied for [ROLE NAME] at [COMPANY NAME], follow these steps.

---

## Step 1: Introduction
- Welcome them and ask if you can ask some questions about their background
- If yes, continue. If no, end the conversation.

---

## Step 2: Core Questions
Ask these questions one at a time, reacting naturally to what you learn:

- "Walk me through a recent project you owned end to end. What was the goal, key constraints, and how did you measure success?"
  - Look for: clear problem framing, constraints, metrics, ownership through delivery

- "Tell me about a time you made a trade-off between speed and reliability. What did you ship, how did you de-risk it, and what broke?"
  - Look for: pragmatic risk management, learning mindset, no blame

- "How have you increased your team's velocity without just working more hours?"
  - Look for: leverage moves like better tooling, reduced handoffs, or process improvements

- "Describe a production incident you handled. How did you triage, communicate, and prevent recurrence?"
  - Look for: calm triage, clear communication, root-cause thinking

---

## Step 3: Decision
- Privately evaluate: Do this person's answers demonstrate the skills and thinking you need?
- **If yes:** Thank them, say you enjoyed the conversation, and that the team will reach out about next steps. Invite questions about the company.
- **If no:** Thank them for their time, but explain you're moving forward with other candidates. Encourage them to stay in touch.

How to customize this template:

1. Add your role and company:

Replace [ROLE NAME] with the position you're hiring for (e.g., "Senior Software Engineer") and [COMPANY NAME] with your company name.

2. Write your screening questions:

In Step 2, replace the example questions with the ones that matter for your role. For each question, add what you're looking for in the answer. Format:

• "Your question here?"

  • Look for: what signals matter to you

3. Define how decisions are handled:

In Step 3, update what happens after evaluation:

• If yes: Explain what strong candidates should do next (reach out to an email, wait for team contact, etc.)

• If no: Explain how to politely close the conversation

Handling next steps

After your Delphi evaluates candidates, you need to decide how to route strong applicants to your hiring process.

Free option:

Configure your Delphi's Purpose so that when it determines a candidate is a strong fit, it tells them to email a specific address (e.g., "Please email hiring@yourcompany.com with the subject 'Engineering - [Your Name]' and we'll schedule next steps within 48 hours").

Paid option - Actions:

Actions (available on paid plans) let you automatically identify strong candidates and route them into your process without manual review.

Write alerts in natural language, and Delphi will analyze the full conversation to determine when to notify you.

Example alert:

"If the user completes an interview and the Delphi is excited about them and it tells the user that the team will follow up with next steps."

This context-based alert analyzes the entire conversation - your Delphi's questions, the candidate's answers, and your evaluation criteria - to determine if you'd be genuinely excited to move forward.

What happens when an alert fires:

• Notify me - Get an email when conversations match your criteria

• Auto-advance - Integrate with your ATS (Ashby, Greenhouse, Lever) to automatically move candidates to the next stage