you need to engage with the person on theoretical tasks, like an audition
I agree in theory, but the real world doesn't work like this. There is a very high probability that the candidate that you want to hire is a very busy person and can devote half a day or a day to figuring out if they want to come work for you. Similarly if you have 5 people on your shortlist, you can only devote a finite amount of time to figuring out which one of them is the best fit.
I agree with you it doesn't work this way, and my wife would say "that's why you don't get good employees." And she'd be right. It doesn't take half a day to give a short 20-30 minute skill assessment. And if you're going to pay this person $50k and up a year, both of you should find the time to do it. The cost of onboarding a new employee can be tens of thousands of dollars in salary and training costs before they're an effective employee. If you have 5 people on your short list, you can spend an entire day adequately testing them and still come out ahead.
I agree in theory, but the real world doesn't work like this. There is a very high probability that the candidate that you want to hire is a very busy person and can devote half a day or a day to figuring out if they want to come work for you. Similarly if you have 5 people on your shortlist, you can only devote a finite amount of time to figuring out which one of them is the best fit.