In over 20 years as a consultant, business owner and Recruiter, I have been involved in thousands of interviews. In all these there is a common group of questions that if you are prepared for, will get you through 80% of the interviews. I cannot prepare you for the 'random' questions, like "If you were a Dog, what type would you be?" but it will help for most situations.
Here you go:
I include 99 of the most common job interview questions as follows:
1. Common starter or general questions
How did you find out about us?
Tell me a little about yourself.
Why should I hire you?
Why do you want to work for our company?
Why are you here today?
How do you define success?
Where would you like to be in five years? Ten years?
Describe your personality.
What past accomplishments have given you satisfaction? Why?
What made you choose to apply to this position?
Why are you leaving your current job?
Did you visit our website? What did you find most useful?
When can you get started? Can you start immediately?
2. Common last job questions
Why did you leave your last job?
Tell me about your last position and what you did?
If you don’t leave your current job, what will happen there? How far can you advance?
What did/do you enjoy most/least about your last/p resent job?
What past accomplishments have given you satisfaction? Why?
What’s the most exciting project you worked on at your last position? Why?
Quantify the most significant result you had at your last position?
3. Common new job questions
What are you looking for in a job?
What kind of people do you like to work with?
What type of work environment do you prefer? Relaxed, formal, fast, slow, etc..
Do you have any questions for me?
What do you know about this position?
What do you know about this company?
Explain why you are qualified for this job.
Are you looking for a permanent or temporary job? Why?
What do you look for in a boss?
What will make you successful here?
We have x% of travel requirements, how much travel can you do?
4. Common experience questions
How would you define a great work environment?
Have you ever worked for a difficult person?
Have you mostly worked alone or in groups?
How many projects can you handle at one time?
What was your workload in your current/last position?
What are some things you find difficult to do on the job? Why?
Take me through how you managed your last project?
5. Common education questions
What non-specific job qualifications have you attained?
What if (if any) self improvement courses have you attended?
What certificates have you attained?
What is the most recent skill you have learned?
What have you learned from your past jobs?
If you could go back to school, what degree would you choose today?
Tell me about your alma mater.
While in college, were you involved in extracurricular activities such as clubs, sports, etc..
How did your extra-curricular activities help you in the work world?
6. Common competencies questions
What are your strengths?
What is your weakness?
What would you consider to be your greatest set of skills that make you successful?
What type of people would you surround yourself with to be even more successful?
7. Common behavioral questions
How do you work with new people?
We have a problem with “______”. How would you handle this problem?
Are you a persistent person? Give me an example of this, if so.
Where do you stand with your former employer?
Explain a difficult situation in which you were involved and how you handled it.
If an employee told you something in secrecy, but it would hurt the company, what would you do?
If you knew an employee you were friendly with was doing something illegal, immoral or unethical, what would you do first?
If you were given responsibility over your co-workers, how would you handle that situation?
If you were in a room with your competitors for this job, what would you do?
8. Common direct/stress questions
How long have you been looking for a new job? Why?
How long would you stay with us?
Have you ever had problems getting along with others?
What can I tell you about my organization?
What can you tell me about our organization?
What can you bring to the table that someone else could not?
Why should I hire you?
What outside interests do you pursue?
Do you have any reservations about the job of the company?
9. Common goal setting questions
How do you set goals?
What (exactly) do you want to achieve?
What career oriented goals have you set for yourself?
Why invest time and energy into this goal?
Why would this goal relate to purpose, vision, or organizational values?
Who possesses the skills and talent necessary to meet the goal or do we need to train?
What is more important to you. Promotion, Money or being happy where you work?
10. Common management skills questions
How do you handle a subordinate whose work is not up to expectations?
How do you coach a subordinate to develop a new skill?
What have you done to develop the skills of your staff?
When do you give positive feedback to people? Tell me about the last time you did?
Give an example of how you handle the need for constructive criticism with a subordinate or peer?
How do you commonly work with your boss?
How do you come up with ideas? Group, by yourself and sell, collaboration?
Tell me the worst employee you ever had. How did you deal with him/her?
11. Common conflict resolution questions
How are you with conflict?
How do you usually handle a situation where you and another employee don’t get along?
How do you handle a situation where two people in your department don’t get along and it affects your work?
Tell me about a situation when you were given job instructions and you were unable to comprehend the instructions. How did you go about completing the task?
What types of disputes can be addressed through conflict resolution?
12. Resume Questions
Tell me about this break in your resume?
You state in your objective “______”. Please define that for me.
Tell me about this project you state in your resume.
Tell me why you did this item you state here, how you did it and what was the outcome?
You state here you like to do “___”. Tell me about that.
13. Wage negotiation
What was your last W-2 earnings?
What is the wage you need?
This is very helpful.
Thank you so much for compiling this for us!
Respectfully
Paul Castain
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What a great list of questions. Spending a little time preparing for these is time well spent. If you can think of a brief story to demonstrate the answer to the key ones that can make you a standout memorable candidate.