10 must ask Interview Questions for Managers

As an interviewer, you have to shoulder the responsibility of making skillful evaluations and assessments to find the best employee for the organization from a pool of candidates. However, when interviewing for a managerial position your job becomes all the more difficult.  How should you make the most of the limited time you have to get to know and evaluate a near stranger? More so, hiring effectively has become increasingly difficult with the job opportunities reviving and companies competing for the top talent. We’ve detailed the finest techniques to enable you to discover a candidate’s true character and teamwork style, helping you to look beyond stellar resumes, prescreened references, and rehearsed answers. We have covered a comprehensive guide on interview questions and answers for managers.

Defining Job Requirements and Desired Skills

You must determine precisely what you want in a managerial candidate before meeting applicants face-to-face. Compile a list of attributes that the candidate must possess in the form of educational background, past job experiences, technical know-how, and other leadership abilities. Here you should also consider any behavioral competencies or soft skills crucial for managerial success specific to your organization. These could include interpersonal skills like adaptability, analytical thinking, teamwork, problem-solving abilities, and effective communication. Clearly, behavioral skills are closely related to one’s core values and inherent working style. By taking cognizance of the same, you can aptly determine the personality of a person weeding out the perfect candidate who is best suited for the company. Lastly, to guide you in your endeavors to outline the required skills and competencies you can also consider the top performers in your company and identify any commonalities or characteristics underlining their success.

Creating a Structured Interview Process

Creating a structured interview process is essential to evaluate the candidates objectively. More often than not, when assessing a person’s eligibility interviewers can unknowingly run into predetermined biases. Instead of relying on candidate-specific questions, one approach to mitigate this issue is to combine a list of predetermined questions. Candidates’ responses are then noted and evaluated using a standardized scoring system. The fixed set of questions are asked of other candidates in the same chronology to enable the recruiter to gather similar information from them in a consistent setting to score them in an unbiased manner. A study from the International Journal of Selection and Assessment suggests that structured interviews can reduce intentional distortion of responses by job applicants to show themselves in a more favorable light, thereby enhancing the validity and reliability of such interviews. Similarly, in another research published in the Journal of Applied Psychology cited that three or four unstructured interviews can predict candidates’ job performance with the same degree of validity as a structured interview conducted by a single interviewer. Even though formulating questions for a structured interview may require meticulous planning, the research findings show that the effort is ultimately worthwhile, eventually saving time and enhancing the probability of finding the ideal applicant.

Behavioral and Situational Interview Questions

Managers have a significant influence on the morale of the employees, their productivity, and on the resultant working culture overall. By incorporating behavioral and situational questions you can get a significant insight into their leadership abilities, management style, and their potential with regards to the organization. Behavioral questions focus on past experiences to get an understanding of how they have dealt with situations in the past. These questions basically provide concrete examples of their skills being put to action. Situational questions in contrast look at hypothetical scenarios with the intention to gauge how they are likely to behave in a given context.

We have formulated a list of ten high-impact situational and behavioral interview questions for managers. We suggest you customize these questions linking them to the specific demands of managerial roles.

1. Give an example of a time when you had a disagreement with a colleague. How did you handle the situation?
2. Give me an instance from your career where you were successful in convincing someone to see things your way.
3. Describe a situation when you had to deal with a client who was not satisfied with the results delivered. Were you able to rectify the problem and retain the client?
4. Tell me about a time when you wish you had handled a problem with an employee differently.
5. Describe a time when you had to deal with a crisis at work. How did you manage to get the company out of it?
6. What is your highest professional achievement to date?
7. Tell me about a time when your efforts didn’t yield results as expected. How did you deal with the setback?
8. What’s the best way to motivate your team?
9. How do you delegate responsibilities between employees who don’t necessarily get along?
10. Describe a time when you single-handedly managed multiple tasks.

References and Background checks

Once you have shortlisted the candidates, begin the verification process to confirm their employment history by conducting rigorous background checks. Background check is essentially a way of evaluation to ascertain the veracity of the information job candidates submit as part of their application to highlight any potential reflags prior to extending the job offer. Before you initiate the verification process, it’s imperative to seek approval from the concerned individual/s as to remain in compliance with the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) in the United States or refer to similar laws in your jurisdiction. Begin with carrying out a credit check, which serves multiple purposes – along with assessing a person’s financial responsibility you can also corroborate important information like their name, address and contact details. Thereafter, verify the employment dates, job role, responsibilities, and other pertinent information with the applicant’s previously listed employers. Their bandwidth, work ethic, and integrity can be further inferred from the professional references they may have provided. You can contact their educational institutions directly via email to verify their qualifications, degrees, and certifications. It’s imperative to ensure they haven’t engaged in fraudulent activities in the past, so look up any evidence of a criminal record by contacting relevant accredited organizations. Lastly remember that regardless of how thorough your background check may be, you have to safeguard the applicant’s privacy at all costs to avoid any possible legal implications. We advise you to use the utmost caution when handling and storing any information received throughout the verification and background check procedure.

Evaluating and Selecting the Right Managerial Candidate

Once you have all the necessary information in place it’s time to make the final decision, assessing each candidate’s eligibility for the position. One thing to keep in mind is to lean towards applicants who have backed up their qualifications and experience with quantified and measurable success. Your short-listed applicants will definitely have diverse job experiences and roles under their belts, but the top applicants will be those who can explain how they were successful in completing those responsibilities. Take a pragmatic approach considering their qualifications, prior job experiences, interview performance, and feedback from their past employers and references. Finally, choose the applicant who most closely fits the job’s requirements and exhibits the highest potential of succeeding in the managerial role. Once you’re able to zero in on a candidate, roll out their job offer. To further ensure that your new recruit quickly reaches optimum productivity, invest your time in efficient onboarding and training sessions.

Final words

In the quest of finding a driven and skilled manager, who can positively impact a company’s trajectory, follow the techniques we have suggested to bolster the chances of discovering the ideal candidate. We know effectively interviewing and hiring requires much planning, consideration, and skillful evaluation. By defining job requirements, conducting structured interviews, and incorporating the right behavioral and situational questions to ask when hiring managers, recruiters can uncover a candidate’s true potential and make the most apt choice. Undoubtedly, the role of a manager is pivotal, and with careful hiring, organizations can set themselves up for success.

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