The Top Interview Questions To Ask Any Candidate

Most hiring pros are familiar with phone interviews, often called a phone screen. Phone interviews are the initial recruiting point-of-contact with a company. It occurs after a candidate applies for a position.

The best questions to use in phone interviews are off-the-cuff, factual questions.

The awkwardness of dead phone time can put gentle pressure on a candidate to answer quicker. Then, candidates answer with what first comes to their mind, which may be the most frank and honest displays of the interview process. For this reason, personality and skill set questions are good to ask during a phone screen.

Some good phone screen interview questions are:

• What are you ideally looking for in your next position?
• Why are you in the market for new opportunities?
• What questions do you have about the interview/hiring process?

These phone interview questions help you and the candidate gather some background information.

Since the phone interview should be used to screen candidates, it is also a good time to ask specific questions about the candidate’s skill set and previous experience. If their qualifications aren’t a good fit for the job, it’s best not to move forward with them in your hiring process.

Video interviews, Spark Hire’s specialty, are more insightful than a phone screen. This type of interview creates the opportunity to pick up on a candidate’s nonverbal cues. These cues give a better sense of how a candidate presents themselves. Phone screens miss these details.

There are two main types of video interviews:

Behavioral, cultural fit, technical, and business skill questions are best for one-way video interviews. These ‘higher-level’ questions take more thought than phone screen questions. Thus, candidates can be more articulate and use think time to compose their answer.

Good questions to ask in a one-way video interview include:

• Tell us about a project/accomplishment you’re most proud of and why.
• What is your ideal work environment?
• What personality trait do you believe will help you most in this position?
• Tell us about something you’re really good at and how you developed this skill set.

As live video interviews can serve as a replacement to an in-person interview, please refer to the next section for the best questions to ask.

In-person interviews are the most crucial and illustrative type of interview. Questions where the process to an answer is as important as the answer itself are best asked with a candidate in front of you. The best questions for in-person interviews are situational and critical thinking.

Any questions asked in a video interview would also work well in an in-person interview. Again, it is important to pay attention to more than the words a candidate says. Their nonverbal cues and mannerisms will show their confidence and feelings.

The best interview questions to ask in an in-person interview depend on which direction you choose to go with your interview. One can pick between situational, behavioral, or soft skill-focused questions.

A situational interview is one that focuses on situational interview questions. As discussed before, situational interview questions are hypothetical situations pitched to a candidate. How the candidate reacts, solves, and arrives at a solution are significant to the interviewer.

Questions to consider asking are:

• How would you resolve a conflict between employees within your team? (Source: Robert Half)
• A customer is walking in, the phone is ringing, and a co-worker needs help making a copy. Walk me through how you’d handle these competing needs for your attention.” (Source: Rikka Brandon)
• If you know your boss is 100% wrong about something how would you handle it? (Source: Alison Doyle)
• Team members you’ve been assigned to lead during a new project object to your vision and ideas for implementation. What specifically would you do to address their objections? (Source: CareerProfiles.info)
• When a subordinate is performing below average, what specific steps do you take to correct the problem? (Source: CareerProfiles.info)

Behavioral interviews are like situational interviews, but focus more on a candidate’s’ past experiences. For some, these interviews are the best way to tell how a candidate will react in the new work environment.

• Tell me about a time you failed. (Source: BigInterview)
• How would you prioritize multiple projects at a time? (Source: The Balance)
• Describe a situation where you needed to persuade someone to accept your point of view or convince them to change something. (Source: Chuck Leddy)
• Tell me about a time you were under a lot of pressure. What was going on, and how did you get through it? (Source: The Muse)
• Describe a time when you were the resident technical expert. What did you do to make sure everyone was able to understand you? (Source: The Muse)
• Tell me about a successful presentation you gave and why you think it was a hit. (Source: The Muse)
• Give an example of a situation when you had to turn down a customer request for a good reason. How did you handle the case? (Source: Job-Interview-Site.com)
• Ebook Teaser: Describe a situation in which you aspired to reach a goal. What obstacles did you confront along the way? What did you do to overcome them?

A soft skills interview focuses on intangible and difficult-to-measure aspects of a candidate. These attributes include personality, work ethic, and outlook. This interview pairs well with a hard skills test to ensure a candidate will fit both company culture, and have success in the position.

• How would you rank these qualities in order of importance: communication, collaboration, delegation, critical thinking, and organization? (Source: Donn LeVie Jr.)
• Ebook Teaser: Have you ever seen anyone mistreated in the workplace? How did you handle the situation?
• Describe a time when it was especially important to make a good impression on a client. How did you go about doing so? (Source: The Muse)
• Give me an example of a time when you did not meet a client’s expectation. What happened, and how did you attempt to rectify the situation? (Source: The Muse)
• Give me an example of a time when you had to explain something fairly complex to a frustrated client. How did you handle this delicate situation? (Source: The Muse)
  • Bonus Follow-up Ebook Teaser Question: Explain a new idea to me. For example, take a complex process, product, or service in your current job and explain it to me so well that I could teach a class on it tomorrow.
• Can you tell me about a time when you had to ask for help? (Source: The Muse)

Elements to prepare before doing an interview include:

• Give feedback
• Create a standard question list
• Make a scorecard

When a position opens up, the hiring manager and recruiter must discuss its required skills and qualities. Identifying which characteristics are most important and which are optional help to create an accurate job post.

The accuracy of the job post will improve self-selection. This is when potential applicants ask themselves, “Is this something I can actually do?” before they apply. Self-selection improves the quality of an applicant pool even before screening.

Once a human resources professional and hiring manager agree on the skillset, they must determine the interview process. It must point to the applicants who will succeed with the metrics and culture of the open position. The process can include intelligence tests and job samples to provide more points of reference for the hiring decision.

Each job should have a unique set of questions to determine if an applicant is right for the position. These questions should align according to the interviewing method and type of question. This creates a standard interviewing experience on which to assess all applicants.

Evaluating applicants with a scorecard quantifies a candidate’s answers to the job’s questions. Their scores should reveal each candidate’s capacity in the job’s required skills. By ranking each candidate’s skills, hiring can become more objective.

Understanding which required qualities, making standard question lists, and having a scorecard for each position are the best ways to prepare for an interview.

Better preparation for an interview will bring better candidates for interviews. But all would be lost with a poor interviewing experience. Conducting an interview can also impact the accuracy of a hiring decision. So, it’s also important use interviewing best practices.

During the interview, it is important to:

• Put candidates at ease
• Document the interview
• Give feedback

For an organization, an interview’s purpose is to learn how well-equipped a candidate is to succeed in a position. Candidates use interviews to learn an organization’s culture, and if the opportunity meets their expectations.

Despite this dual purpose, candidates feel interviewers have control over the interview. Being powerful comes with great responsibility, including one to put candidates at ease. To get the most accurate and genuine answers from a candidate, create a conversation. Asking question after question can stress candidates, making their responses more terse or flippant. This does not create a positive interviewing environment for a candidate.

Candidates will relax knowing they are being heard. Acknowledging their answers with more than a nod shows the interviewer is listening. By speaking to signal you were listening, a candidate may expand their answer. This allows the interviewer to learn more about a candidate’s skills.

Another way to put candidates at ease is to “flip the script”. Consider allowing a candidate to bookend your questions with their own. By giving candidates time to ask questions at the beginning of the interview, an interviewer shows their interest in a candidate’s thoughts as well as their own.

During an interview, candidates may make memorable statements. An interviewer should not trust themselves to remember these statements. After a day full of interviewing and many memorable statements, some may have slipped away. To keep track of notable interactions from every interview, document them. Ideally, an interviewer should record every interview. Failing that, interviewers should take notes during and after each interview. Notes should denote impressions and thoughts of each candidate, as well as the conversation.

Paper notes are preferable to notes taken on a laptop or smartphone. These tools can put a physical and metaphorical barrier between interviewer and interviewee. If privacy of the notes is a concern, build time in the interviewing schedule for reflection and notes before the next interview.

Last, interviewers should give candidates feedback and a prompt follow up. At the end of an interview, outline the next steps a candidate can expect. They will appreciate the evidence of a company’s organization and clear deadlines. A clear schedule helps prevent candidates from inquiring about their application. This also prevents a rushed hiring decision.

While rejection is not pleasant, letting candidates know they will not be moving on is imperative. Rejection is another interaction with an organization’s brand. Any interaction is an opportunity to create a positive brand impression.

Interview feedback should be:

• Tactful and constructive
• Truthful and specific
• Balanced

By giving constructive feedback to candidates, rejection helps a candidate in interviews with other organizations in the future.

Presenting practical feedback prevents the souring of an organization’s recruiting image. It is a common belief that those looking for positions know other people looking for a new job. Job seekers also tend to network together and share experiences. This means word of a poor interview experience will spread. This experience may dissuade future applicants, shrinking an organization’s future candidate pool.

Another position may open up at a later date which plays more to an applicant’s strengths. By providing feedback and a rejection letter, hiring professionals can leave the door open for an applicant to apply later.

By creating a calm interviewing environment, ensuring thorough documentation and providing feedback, candidates can leave an interview feeling positive about an organization, regardless of their future employment.