THE INTERVIEW: Interview Questions You Should Expect

THE INTERVIEW
Interview Questions You Should Expect
Question Areas
About Your Qualifications
About Your Ability To Be Effective In The Work Environment
About Your Career Goals
Welcome To The Real World (for recent graduates)
Difficult Questions
The Stress Interview
For Career Changers
Tell Us About Yourself
Do You Have Any Questions For Us?
Advancement
Responsibilities
Being New On A Job
More About The Company
About Your Qualifications
-Tell me about yourself.
-How do you think someone who knows -
-Nyou well would describe you?
-What is your greatest weakness?
-Tell me the contribution you can make to the organization.
-Tell me about a professional assignment you've handled.
-Tell me about your school experiences.
-What was your most rewarding college experience?
-Describe your most meaningful work experience.
-How do you think someone you have worked with would describe you?
-Why are you the most qualified for this position?
-Do you have supervisory experience?
About Your Ability To Be Effective In The Work Environment
Why do you want this job?
What do you know about this company?
What kind of work environment makes you feel the most comfortable?
How do you determine whether or not you want to work for a particular company?
How are you a team player?
Do you work well under pressure?
How do you handle conflict?
Name a major problem you encountered and describe how you dealt with it.
How competitive are you?
What do you expect from your supervisor?
What qualities should a successful manager demonstrate?

About Your Career Goals
What are your long term career goals? How are you preparing to achieve them?
What career rewards are most important to you?
How do you spend your spare time?
What are your salary requirements?
Are you willing to relocate?
return to question areas
Welcome To The Real World!
Here are some tough questions employers ask that are specifically designed to determine your career potential:
Why did you choose (name of school)?
Why did you want to major in (name of major)?
What course did you like to most? The least?
What things did you learn in school that you could use on the job?
Do you think your grades adequately represent your abilities?
We have hired people from your school before, but they have not worked out. What makes you different?
What problems did you see in your school? How would you go about changing it?
Tell me about your accomplishments that show you have initiative and a willingness to work.
Difficult Questions
Have you ever had a boss you disliked? Why did you dislike him/her?
How would someone that dislikes you describe you?
Tell me about a group you participated in that was having problems:
What was your role?
How did you handle it?
What was the outcome?
What would you have done differently?
How could the group have improved its performance?
Tell me about a time when you experienced a failure and how you reacted to it.
Tell me about a time when you were under considerable pressure to meet one or more goals.
Describe a problematic situation at work and how you resolved it.
Give me an example of how you are a risk taker.
If you could have any job in the world, what would it be?
How are you  motivated?
Why do you want to work for us?
Why should we hire you?
Give a one sentence positioning statement of yourself.
How do you decide what to do first on a new project?
How did you handle a situation where you did not agree with something your boss asked you to do?
What did you like about your last job? Dislike?
What would you like to be doing five years from now?
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The Stress Interview
Would you like to have your boss's job?
Sell me this computer you see on my desk.
Why should I hire you when I could fill this job within the company?
Why weren't you working for so long?
Describe a situation where your work was criticized.
Your resume shows that you were with your last company for a number of years with limited increase in rank or salary. What can you tell me about this?

For Career Changers
Why do you think you would like this kind of work?
How do you expect to become proficient in those areas you are unfamiliar with?
return to question areas
Tell Us About Yourself
This is one of the most difficult questions to answer, but yields you the greatest opportunity. Do not give a long autobiographical lecture; rather, just organize your thoughts around why you are interested in and qualified for the job.
return to question areas
Do You Have Any Questions For Us?
Always answer yes and be prepared to have some. Otherwise, you'll appear to be disinterested. It is important to ask questions that show a response to what you have learned from the employer. Avoid trying to sound scripted. Here are some examples:
Advancement
-Can you tell me how success in this position is measured?
-How do you encourage your employees to keep current with professional ---developments in the field?
-Can you describe your training program for me?
-What is a typical career path for someone who has been in this position?
-What is the time frame for advancement?
-What is the retention rate for people in this position?
-Does the company tend to promote from within?
Responsibilities
-Tell me about a typical day on this job.
-What is the most challenging aspect of this job?
-Who would I work with most closely?
-How often can I expect to relocate?
-return to question areas
-Being On A New Job
-What is the most challenging aspect to this job for someone who is new to
Nthe company?
-What will the new (job title) have to accomplish in the next six months?
-What are your expectations for newly hired employees?
-What qualities do newly hired employees possess?
-How would you describe a typical first assignment?

More About The Company
-Why is the position open?
-What are your major projects for the coming year?
-What is the structure of the department where the position is located?
-What is the work environment like?
-What are the company's strengths and weaknesses?

Be prepared by practicing your answers to these common interview questions.
One of the most valuable things you can do pre-interview is to go over all of the questions that could be asked and how to answer them. In fact, it is beneficial to say these answers out loud. This will help during the actual interview, making you sound more confident and knowledgeable. It also helps to eliminate any stuttering or filler words.
You’ve gotten the interview. Now which questions should you be taking a long, hard look at?
Question: What you do you know about the company?
Answer: This may seem like an innocent question, but it is loaded. This is the interviewer testing you to see if you’ve done
your research . This is where you should talk about the company’s goals, something you can easily get from their website or Facebook page. Then it’s time to make it personal. Talk about why you are personally drawn to these goals and how they resonate with you.
Question: What do you consider to be your
weaknesses ?
Answer: This is not the time to mask actual strengths as weaknesses, such as “I am too organized.” This is a time when the interview wants to gauge your self-awareness and honesty. However, you also don’t want to showcase any major red flags that will immediately get your resume thrown out. Talk about something that you are currently struggling with. Then, follow up that struggle with how you are currently working to improve.
Question: Why did you leave (or are leaving) your last job?
Answer: Badmouthing a previous employer at an interview is a big no-no. The interviewer will frown upon this and may just see you as a gossiper or trouble-maker. If you are currently employed, talk about the things you are searching for that you aren’t currently getting from your new job, such as a more team-oriented environment. If you are currently unemployed, talk about your unemployment in a more positive context. For example, the company went under, but I managed to hang on until the last round of lay-offs.
Question: Why should we hire you?
Answer: This is your time to show the interviewer that you are suited to this position. It is always a good idea to research the position before the interview. Why are they hiring someone? What do they need from the person they are hiring? Be that person. Talk about your strengths in a way that will help the company. Show you have researched the company by talking about their general practices and how you will be able to fit in easily.
Question: What is your greatest accomplishment?
Answer: You don’t have to talk about an
accomplishment that is job-related, but it doesn’t hurt. Showcase an accomplishment that will highlight how you’d be a great fit for the company and position you’re interviewing for. Don’t forget to bring the passion. Interviewers want to see that this is something you’re actually excited about and love to share.

Question: Tell me about a challenge you’ve faced at work and how you dealt with it.
Answer: This is always a tricky question to answer. Basically, the interviewer wants to get a sense of how you deal with conflict when it arises. You can mention any challenges that you faced in a previous position. Then talk about how you handled those challenges in a polite and professional manner. They also want to see that you were productive with the challenge—that there was an actual solution and not a sweeping under the rug.
Question: What’s a time that you disagreed with a decision made at work?
Answer: There is always going to be at least one time where you’ve disagreed with your bosses decisions or actions. This is okay. However, hiring managers want to see that you handled this disagreement politely and productively. In this case, explain how you talked to your boss, why you had disagreements, and how you offered alternatives to the situation. You should bring up a situation in where you actions had a positive outcome, such as a better relationship with your boss or an increase in work productivity.
Question: How would your boss (or co-workers) describe you?
Answer: This is a case where honesty is the best policy. The interviewer will have the opportunity to call a former boss and ask this question themselves. You still want to remain positive. Try to talk about strengths that you haven’t been able to showcase elsewhere in the interview. You may be able to talk about your ability to meet tight deadlines, or your willingness to pitch in on a project that wasn’t your responsibility.
Question: Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
Answer: This is a time to demonstrate your commitment to the position you are currently interviewing. An interviewer is not looking for someone who will jump at bigger/better positions at other companies if given the opportunity. Stress that you have an interest in a long-term career with the company you are interviewing for. However, you can outline a realistic growth strategy for within the company.
Question: What are your salary requirements?
Answer: Make sure you do your research pre-interview so you know what you should be getting paid. You do not want to undersell yourself. There are many online resources that can help with this, such as our salaries section. With this research, you should be able to come up with a range of pay, with the lowest value you won’t go under. When
negotiating salary , start at the top of this range. Make sure the interviewer knows that you are flexible and up for negotiation .