In this episode of Relationships at Work, communications and leadership nerd (and host) Russel Lolacher shares more effective job interview questions to understand leadership.
Interview questions are extremely formulaic, regardless of industry. Almost all are focused on productivity, with very few determining the applicants leadership experience and quality.
Russel shares why organizations stick to the formula, and various questions (provided by the Relationships at Work community) that applicants would prefer were asked to better understand leadership levels.
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Welcome back to Relationships At Work – Your guide to building workplace connections and avoiding leadership blindspots.. I’m your host Russel Lolacher
I’m a communications and leadership nerd with a couple of decades of experience and a heap of curiosity on how we can make the workplace better. If you’re a leader trying to understand and improve your impact on work culture and the employee experience, you’re in the right place.
This mini-episode is a quick and valuable bit of information on top of our regular show.
Inspired by our R@W Note Newsletter, I’m passing on to you…
Interview Questions We Really Wished Were Asked
Job interviews are interesting. And super weird. It’s just not a normal situation of an environment that we know isn’t structured to really get to know someone but rather for them to follow some formula.
Of course it’s a formula. They ask the same questions no matter what industry you’re in.
- "Tell me about yourself."
- "What are your strengths and weaknesses?"
- "Why do you want to work for our company?"
- "Where do you see yourself in five years?"
- "Can you describe a challenge or conflict you've faced at work, and how you dealt with it?"
Why do company’s do this? Truthfully, it’s about the organization, not about the candidate. It saves time. It’s a process that is easier to mark and score. It’s about establishing a benchmark and a filter.
I'll be honest, I'm always kinda disappointed by the questions I'm asked. Because it doesn’t feel it’s about me.
I know those organizations are following a standardization but in doing so, they remove the humanity of the situation. We want to hire humans that will be good cultural fits. But we also want interviewers who aren't just reading a script and show that they are people we would want to work for and with.
One area for questions that could use some work is around leadership. Most questions seem far more focused on problem solving. Not so much around actual leadership or measuring the possible impact they could have to organizational culture. I asked our community, what questions they would like to be asked.
Provide a short presentation on your primary leadership style, top values, feedback/difficult conversation style, how a difficult team member taught you leadership and your development plan.
Tell us about a time you inherited a "problem" employee, what did you do?
Tell us about a time you "managed up"?
Do you mind if we contact your previous team members to solicit their opinion on the type of leader you were with them?
What is the most important reason why you want to be a leader?
(Thanks to Steve, Bill, Krysta and Liz for their contributions)
I LOVE these.
One of mine: How has your leadership helped some of your team members on their employee journey? Give examples.
We talk about leadership so much in our organizations but we do little to explore it in our job interviews. They seem so focused on delivering results and how we overcame obstacles to deliver those results. Yes, that’s important to. But it’s not everything. It’s also HOW you get those results.
Interviews are such a great opportunity to set up our organization for success by bringing in people who will improve on or work to fix the current culture/subcultures.
But if we don't take it seriously at this point, at the beginning of the journey for so many in our organizations, we're setting ourselves up for failure in trying to address it later.
