Mdthbs

In the next couple of months, I am planning to have to conduct several interviews with candidates for full-time and intern/co-op positions. I work at a very large company that is well known in the industry.

The problem is that sometimes we don't have enough conference rooms in the facility, so we wind up conducting interviews in "hangout" rooms around the campus. These rooms don't necessarily have desks in them, and generally feature lounge chairs or couches. While this is fine for coworkers who know each other or when the door to the room is open, this often feels like a hotel room interview I had years ago when the door is closed and relative strangers are interacting (see the AEA and AHA ending hotel room interviews for context).

As a mid-20s white male, I think I would be absolutely fine sitting in a lounge chair or sofa while being interviewed, but I could very easily see how others would be far less comfortable (I work in "industry" so most management are men as well, this could be very weird where two or three men 25-50 are interviewing a single college-age person, gender identity/assigned sex regardless).

I could see keeping the door to these rooms open being a possible mitigating factor, but I don't think that goes far enough, and interviews are generally preferred to be private. Additionally there are relatively few women or non-cis-presenting or identifying males that can be present for these interviews.I have thought of asking people who may not have any direct contact with a potential hire to be in the room, but this takes away from work that could be done otherwise, and would require a justification to management.

I have thought of bringing these interview practices up to management as potential reasons that our recruitment rate is so low, but my sense is that our facilities staff is stretched too thin as it is, and I don't know that my observations would be acted on.

TL;DR: how can I make potential new hires feel more comfortable during interviews in an extremely relaxed/comfort-oriented and potentially private environment?

I would ensure that a meeting room is available for these interviews. Perhaps bump people out of meeting rooms as they could rearrange/or use the lounge.

I would do this also because an interviewee is also deciding if they want to work for you. It looks very unprofessional to have a meeting in essentially a break room.

facilities staff is stretched too thin

Does your company not have a room booking solution? If so, just print out a piece of paper with text Room blocked from time X to Y on date Z for interviews. And paste it outside a decent meeting room in advance. When you need the room, just ask the people to vacate.

I work at a very large company that is well known in the industry.

Flag it to the HR that by not providing proper meeting rooms for the interview, you are giving a bad candidate experience.

Interviews are 2 way street, and its not just you judging the candidate, but also the candidate assessing whether this is a workplace they would like to work at.

If I was one of the candidates interviewing at a larger employer, and if I got a small overcrowded room, I would definitely pass. Because what large corp/ HR can not find a room when the interviews are scheduled at least days, if not weeks in advance?

There is a difference between intimate and casual. It sounds like what you have are too many casual spaces.

My current employer has combinations of "huddle" and "team" rooms. I would never conduct an interview in a "huddle" room, which is often some chairs and maybe a table, and none of the furniture is "office furniture". The "team" rooms are small conference rooms, typically seating 4 to 8 people, but with normal "office furniture". Those spaces aren't particularly intimate because intimate is more than "doesn't seat a lot of people". Intimate spaces tend to have nothing which creates space between the interviewer and interviewee, and are more for 1-on-1 meetings between people, or where a small number of people might be using a speakerphone.

All that said, and the real reason I'm answering, is your question sounds as though you have little or no experience conducting interviews or setting up spaces to conduct interviews. The best way to ruin an interview is to not know how to conduct an interview. I've interviewed at "hipster" companies and their HR staff had the good sense to schedule the interviews in proper meeting rooms with tables for me to put my notepad or iPad so I could take notes, and the interviewer could have my resume and other materials handy. None of the interviews were conducted anywhere near a Foosball or ping-pong table, a smoothie bar, espresso machine, or anything else which created an overly casual atmosphere.