nick18_in
Nikhil Gadodia
Assessing "soft skills" in candidates
Questions to reveal integrity/ honesty/ trustworthiness:
- Discuss a time when your integrity was challenged. How did you handle it?
- What would you do if someone asked you to do something unethical?
- Have you ever experienced a loss for doing what is right?
- Have you ever asked for forgiveness for doing something wrong?
- In what business situations do you feel honesty would be inappropriate?
- If you saw a co-worker doing something dishonest, would you tell your boss? What would you do about it?
- What brings you joy?
- If you took out a full-page ad in the newspaper and had to describe yourself in only three words, what would those words be?
- How would you describe your personality?
- If I call your references, what will they say about you?
- Do you consider yourself a risk taker? Describe a situation in which you had to take a risk.
- What kind of environment would you like to work in?
- What kinds of people would you rather not work with?
- What kinds of responsibilities would you like to avoid in your next job?
- What are two or three examples of tasks that you do not particularly enjoy doing? Indicate how you remain motivated to complete those tasks.
- What kinds of people bug you?
- Tell me about a work situation that irritated you.
- Have you ever had to resolve a conflict with a coworker or client? How did you resolve it?
- Describe the appropriate relationship between a supervisor and subordinates.
- What sort of relationships do you have with your associates, both at the same level and above and below you?
- How have you worked as a member of teams in the past?
- Tell me about some of the groups you've had to get cooperation from. What did you do?
- What is your management style? How do you think subordinates perceive you?
- As a manager, have you ever had to fire anyone? If so, what were the circumstances, and how did you handle it?
- Have you ever been in a situation where a project was returned for errors? What effect did this have on you?
- What previous job was the most satisfying and why?
- What job was the most frustrating and why?
- Tell me about the best boss you ever had. Now tell me about the worst boss. What made it tough to work for him or her?
- What do you think you owe to your employer?
- What does your employer owe to you?
- Tell me about an objective in your last job that you failed to meet and why.
- When is the last time you were criticised? How did you deal with it?
- What have you learned from your mistakes?
- Tell me about a situation where you "blew it." How did you resolve or correct it to save face?
- Tell me about a situation where you abruptly had to change what you were doing.
- If you could change one (managerial) decision you made during the past two years, what would -that be?
- If you had the opportunity to change anything in your career, what would you have done differently?
- When was the last time you "broke the rules" (thought outside the box) and how did you do it?
- What have you done that was innovative?
- What was the wildest idea you had in the past year? What did you do about it?
- Give me an example of when someone brought you a new idea, particularly one that was odd or unusual. What did you do?
- If you could do anything in the world, what would you do?
- Describe a situation in which you had a difficult (management) problem. How did you solve it?
- What is the most difficult decision you've had to make? How did you arrive at your decision?
- Describe some situations in which you worked under pressure or met deadlines.
- Were you ever in a situation in which you had to meet two different deadlines given to you by two different people and you couldn't do both? What did you do?
- What type of approach to solving work problems seems to work best for you? Give me an example of when you solved a tough problem.
- When taking on a new task, do you like to have a great deal of feedback and responsibility at the outset, or do you like to try your own approach?
- You're on the phone with another department resolving a problem. The intercom pages you for a customer on hold. Your manager returns your monthly report with red pen markings and demands corrections within the hour. What do you do?
- Describe a sales presentation when you had the right product/service, and the customer wanted it but wouldn't buy it. What did you do next?
- How do you measure your own success?
- What is the most interesting thing you've done in the past three years?
- What are your short-term and long-term career goals?
- Why should we hire you?
- What responsibilities do you want, and what kinds of results do you expect to achieve in your next job?
- What do you think it takes to be successful in a company like ours?
- How did the best manager you ever had motivate you to perform well? Why did that method work?
- What is the best thing a previous employer did that you wish everyone did?
- What are you most proud of?
- What is important to you in a job?
- What do you expect to find in our company that you don't have now?
- Is there anything you wanted me to know about you that we haven't discussed?
- Do you have any questions for me?
