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SittingXlegged

Corporate recruitment: what works and what doesn't plus other musings.

The Very Best Interview Question follow this blog post

posted by on May 6, 2007

If you work in the staffing industry you most likely interview people for a living. I had planned to blog about what I think The Very Best Interview Question is and then I got to musing. I wondered if I threw out the challenge and actually asked you, the reader, to respond with The Very Best Interview Question that you use, if we all may learn something. Think about it, with the countless number of interviews that happen every day, some of the questions asked must be very good. Of course, the opposite is true also. Some of the questions asked must be very bad. And then there is the position that any interview that is based on asking questions that are not tied to some structured, objective analysis is worthless or close to worthless. That may or may not be true but the fact remains that many of us will keep on asking questions each and every day. Wouldn't it be nice if we could investigate this together and develop The Very Best Interview Question?

So, assuming that you want to play, think about the questions you ask and choose just one that you rate as your best. If it is your best then my guess is that you use it every time you interview someone. Respond to this blog with a comment with your question. If you blog yourself you may want to trackback to this blog. Explain briefly why you ask it, what results it produces, and why you think it's the very best. It might also be fun to respond with The Very Worst Interview Question. We've all heard and probably used some really bad ones.

You are, of course, welcome to write any question but I encourage you to keep your question simple. While it may be clever to ask a question that is really 4 questions, it isn't true to the spirit of the game.

So how will we determine the best question? I promise that absolutely no scientific method will be used. If people really get into this game, The Very Best Interview Question may just fall out of the discussion. If not, I promise to read all the comments and will digest them and choose The Very Best Interview Question myself. I'll blog about my choice which will give everyone a chance to comment on that! If we get some interesting worst questions, I'll do the same with them.

So tell me, do you want to play?

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14 comments

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  • 1 point 2 years ago

    For nearly 20 years I've been asking the question "What makes you good at what you do?"

    Of course such a question lends itself to directing the coversation, through additional prompts, to explore every aspect of persons professional experiance, educational background background, and personal issues relative to a given job.

    It's the same approach as Adler's "One Question Interview".

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    Hi Everyone!

    Thanks for all the great comments! Normally I?d respond to everyone here but this time I?ll respond as a follow-up blog.

    Thanks again,

    Simon

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    "On a scale of 1-10 how geeky would you rate yourself"

    I ask this question of all my candidates as a way to catch them off guard and bring some levity to the process. I either get very passionate answers about how truly geeky a person is; or confusion as to what "geeky" is. Very rarely do I get anger and when I do...hey I know they wouldn't fit in the company's environment.

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    I like to ask: "How are M&Ms made? This lets me see how in tune they are with a business. Naturally, there are a number of assumptions that can be made about any business (development, quality assurance, marketing, etc...)

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    Following a string of fluffy information usually provided by a candidate, my favourite is: "Can you give me an example?"

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    Most of the ones I think of are employment question no-nos. Like, Do you own a house, are you married, etc.....but I think "What is your weaknesses?" is annoying. I really tire of the stock answers "turning weaknesses into strengths" blah blah blah. Oh good, at least it shows the candidate knows how to search interviewing help sites. Whoopie!

    I prefer to ask "What is one thing that you have had difficulty over coming in your career, and how did you do that?" Here, I get a chance to let the candidate talk about their progression, and maturity in their career. That can tell you a lot about a person.

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    "How does this position fit in with the career path that you are taking, or desire to take?"

    This is a question I ask candidates whether I found them or they found me through a posted job description. (I ask it after we go over the job description and the company.) In many cases it has helped me figure out which candidates are actual goal oriented, and which are just money or "the grass is greener on the other side" motivated. (Granted, money is not a bad goal at all - but I have found in my expeirence if the candidate is only concerned about money, they don't stick around long.)

    Even if a candidate has all the qualifications for a position, if they have other long term goals in mind, like eventually leaving the industry, I need to know.

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    I like to ask people "if there was one thing about your current position that you could change that would make your job more satisfying to you, what would you change?" Of course that leads to the follow up "why haven't you been able to change it?"

    I think this question gets to the heart of if they are a change agent, or willing to try new things and be a risk taker.

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    My favorite Motivation Question is:

    "How would you define 'success' for your career? At the end of your work life, what must have been present for you to feel as if you had a successful career?"

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    "Imagine you are driving and come up to a yellow light. What do you do?"

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    "What haven't I asked I should have asked?"

    Works with my kids...

    ;)

    ?Whoever is asking questions is in control of the conversation.? ~ Greg Bradley, Team Manager for Wholesale Mortgage Recruiting, Wachovia

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    I like to ask, "If you were king (or queen) for a day, and could literally design your next position, what would that be?" (probing on this I continue to ask, "what would you spend the majority of your day doing", etc).

    This helps determine motivation, fit for job, work styles, etc.

    I also vary the question sometimes by asking, "If we all worked for nothing except the very satisfaction of working (no $$), what would you choose to do?"

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    After asking all the competency and behavioural based planned questions, I recently tried this question at the end which gave some revealing indications. One candidate whose motivation and passion was in question throughout, suddenly came alive and told us all the things she was truly dreaming of. None included working in her chosen field.

    "If this weekend you won the life-changing $billion lottery what would you do?"

  • 1 point 2 years ago

    "I'd like you to paint me a word picture of a typical workweek in this role- include all the detail you need to convince me that you understand our company, the job itself, and the skills and KPI's that are needed for success in the job"