Do interviews make you feel stressed? Do you worry about expressing yourself clearly or meeting the expectations of the interview panel?
These are common concerns for many professionals. However, remember—you were invited to the interview because you meet the role’s requirements. While other candidates may have similar qualifications, being unprepared can put you at a disadvantage. Spontaneity alone won’t secure your success. Instead, approach the interview with a solid understanding of the process, anticipate potential questions, and practice your responses. With the right preparation, you’ll be well-equipped to make a strong impression and increase your chances of success.
The Interview Life Cycle
The interview process begins the moment you submit your job application. From that point on, preparation is key. The stages of the interview life cycle typically include a pre-interview screening, an initial interview with the recruiter, followed by interviews with the company’s human resources team and senior management. Assessments may also be part of the process, leading up to a potential job offer.
Even if you don’t advance beyond the first interview, you may still be considered for future opportunities within the organization. That’s why it’s essential to make every interview count—leave a lasting impression.
Getting Ready for Your Interview
In today’s competitive job market, standing out is key to advancing your career. As you prepare for your interview, consider both what the employer is looking for in a candidate and what you seek in your next role.
Remember, the interview is a two-way process—you’re also evaluating the company. While the hiring team assesses how your skills and personality fit their culture and strategy, you should do the same. Pay attention to aspects that excite and motivate you, and be mindful of any red flags that may conflict with your values.
To ensure a successful interview, create a preparation checklist:
- Research the company and your potential managers.
- Seek insider insights.
- Review the job description thoroughly.
- Identify your strengths and potential challenges—develop strategies to address any gaps.
- Practice common interview questions.
- Prepare thoughtful questions for the interview panel.
- Have a list of references ready.
- Conduct a mock interview with a friend, mentor, or expert.
- Confirm the interview location and time, and plan your outfit in advance.
- Send a thank-you email and follow up after the interview.
- If unsuccessful, request feedback from the recruiter to improve for future opportunities.
By taking these steps, you’ll boost your confidence and increase your chances of success.
Common Interview Questions and How to Answer Them
Tell me about yourself.
This is usually the first question asked after introductions in an interview. It’s important to remember that interviewers are looking to understand your skills, how you can add value to the organization, and how well you would fit into the company culture.
Top Tip: Prepare your answer ahead of time. Write it out and rehearse, ensuring it’s concise and relevant. Tailor your response to each specific position you’re applying for.
Start by briefly mentioning your interests, then transition into your current role, focusing on its purpose and your contributions to your team’s success. Discuss how your career has evolved, highlighting your studies, the reasons you chose your career path, and what has motivated you to succeed. Finally, mention your career goals or objectives.
Hint: Align your short-term goals with the position you’re interviewing for.
Avoid oversharing personal details; keep the focus on your professional experience and how it relates to the role.
If asked about family or hobbies, steer clear of topics that could raise concerns about your commitment to the job.
Let’s go over your CV—could you walk us through your career progression?
This question helps the interviewer understand how you set and pursue goals, as well as the thought process behind your career decisions.
It’s your chance to highlight key aspects of your experience that demonstrate your abilities and decision-making skills in a positive light.
Focus on achievements and skills that align with the position you’re applying for. For example, describe how your contributions led to increased sales, improved operational efficiency, or solved problems that had a positive impact on the business.
Top tip: Structure your answer so that each role connects to the next, explaining the skills you gained, what motivated your career moves, and how each step has contributed to your growth. Keep your response concise, upbeat, and professional.
Avoid speaking negatively about past employers or colleagues. If you left a job under challenging circumstances, frame it as a learning experience and emphasize how you prioritized addressing issues rather than avoiding them.
Tell us something we wouldn’t know from your CV.
It’s nearly impossible to capture all of your experiences and accomplishments on a CV. A CV highlights the key facts and achievements tied to your role and career outcomes.
This question allows the interviewer to explore what you can bring beyond the listed qualifications. It’s an opportunity for you to showcase additional skills or contributions that go beyond what’s expected.
Tip: When answering, consider mentioning things like personal achievements, extra efforts you’ve made for your company outside your formal responsibilities, or any volunteer work. This helps illustrate your dedication and passion for various causes and projects.
What do you believe makes you an exceptional business leader?
Great leaders are focused on motivating and guiding their teams to achieve both individual and organizational goals. They excel at identifying team members who may be underperforming and taking steps to either address these issues or create opportunities for improvement.
Tip: Share concrete examples with your interviewers, highlighting how you’ve successfully led teams to meet organizational or operational objectives. Include instances where you’ve worked with a team member who was struggling and how you helped them improve their performance. It’s also acceptable to discuss any situations where you managed restructuring or terminations, outlining the steps you took to ensure a positive outcome for the business.
Potential employers want leaders who can inspire and develop teams while also handling challenging situations when necessary. Be sure to highlight both of these qualities during your interview.
Can you share an example of a time when you had to make a difficult business decision?
Effective leaders possess the ability to make tough, yet well-reasoned decisions, while remaining committed to their choices. As a current manager, you’ve likely faced situations where your decisions could have both positive or negative effects on the business. Frame your response by reflecting on a specific instance where you had to make a challenging decision, considering whether to stay aligned with the company’s long-term objectives or prioritize short-term gains.
Tip: When answering, highlight your ability to problem-solve and develop innovative solutions to business challenges, leading to positive changes for the company and its stakeholders. Share your thought process and how you implemented and rolled out your decisions. Employers will want to see if you are open to taking calculated risks and how you justify those risks for the company’s benefit.
Make sure to highlight aspects of your experience that align with the job’s requirements.
As a leader, how would you encourage others to embrace your plan, and how would you handle those who disagree with you?
A leader must be able to inspire teams to adopt new strategies, processes, or ideas. There will be times when a leader needs to influence stakeholders, staff, or clients without triggering alarm, concern, or conflict.
Tip: Your response should highlight how you consider the objections of others and offer effective solutions to address them. Reflect on your previous roles and think of an instance where you had to be persuasive—how did you get stakeholders to support new ideas, and what impact did it have on them?
In your experience what has been the most challenging team you have ever managed?
Anyone who has lead or leads a team knows that, is no easy feat managing people. As a senior manager or executive you are going to be dealing with difficult teams and individuals who challenge authority. It would be unbelievable if you said you have never faced this challenge.
Top tip: Put together various examples of where you have had to step in to solve conflicts, performance issues or project failures. You want to demonstrate that you’re able to squash problems before they become big issues.
Avoid giving negative feedback about your executives or team members. Focus on the positive results by showing what processes you followed to resolve negative situations.
What are your greatest strengths and how do you think they will help you succeed?
What attributes do you have that are ensuring you achieve set objectives in your current position? If you are succeeding in your current role what are doing to meet business goals.
It would be important to focus on the significant strengths that would highlight why you could add value to your potential employer.
Top tip: Establish the requirements on the job description that align to your qualifications.
Give examples of why you feel that is strength. Validate why it is a strength by displaying real working examples. Always be prepared to discuss more than one strength, keeping them related to the job you are interviewing for.
What is your greatest weakness?
This can be a tough one to answer, for some. After the below tips, this should no longer be a daunting question to answer. I have seen when conducting interview training or mock interviews, many interviewees are concerned their weaknesses may deter potential employees from hiring them. They would respond with, “I am not sure of my weaknesses” or “that’s a tough one, I would have to think about it”.
Top Tip: The panel are looking for problem solvers and achievers. You want to show them how you can make the improvements that make a positive impact to you or the team. Create solution on how you are improving or fixing your weakness. Provide an example of how you are or would be fixing the problem to better your skills in that area.
Avoid telling the interview panel that you do not have any weaknesses, this would be unbelievable and set alarm bells off for them. Remember they are establishing how you solve a problem or come up with solutions to business issues. If you are not able to identify or improve your weaknesses, how will you be able to do this for the organisation?
Example: In the past I was a challenged with maximising or managing my time effectively. I found it difficult to manage interruptions. I decided to structure my day in way that I had time slots where I would check my emails or meet with the team to discuss important tasks and respond to important correspondence. I also, advised my team and stakeholders that should it be a task that needs to be attended to straight away that they call me. By implementing this structure both, the business unit and I were able to maximise outputs and achieve daily targets.
Why should we hire you?
This is a chance for you to highlight why you are good match for the position. You response should sell your experience focused on what you can strategically offer the business and explaining why you should be an employee.
Top tip: Establish the important requirements of the job, and identify the parts of your current job, education that would demonstrate how you could add value in this role and achieve the outputs required.
Do not restrain your response, but careful of being arrogant.
Be concise and confident in your response.
Why are you considering a new position, or why have you left your current role?
Be honest and truthful, reference checks will be completed and your referees are going to be honest.
Consider your career objectives, making sure you are communicating a clear and consistent message of your career goals throughout the interview stage. Relate your response to the job profile and what can offer the business, as well as what you aim to learn and achieve while working with the business.
Top tip: If you have left or are leaving a company under negative circumstances, structure your response with a positive approach. Avoid communicating negative information about your previous employer, its business, and or management teams.
You want to portray an image that indicates your plan making the best of a challenging situation. A potential employer is not likely to want to hire an individual who may create a negative atmosphere for its employees and business.
Why do you want this job?
Remember that research you did on the company. If you haven’t yet, take the time to identify what products and services they offer, get an understanding of the company culture and establish their vision and mission. You can find this information in online search, company LinkedIn pages, and communicating with trusted individuals that have or may within the company.
The job profile offers you some key information of what he company expects of the professional applying for and eventually taking over this role. It is an introduction of what is required of you. Take some time to go over the profile and establish what excites you about the opportunity and how you can contribute to achieving the objectives indicated in the description of the role.
Consolidating the job profile and company information to formulate a response aligned to the aspects of the profile and business that interest you and how you would be a great match for the position and the organisation.
Top tip: Develop responses utilising experiences and qualifications. Demonstrate how you have driven organisational values and led teams to achieve operational objectives.
Avoid mentioning what you do not like about the organisational structure, culture or job profile. If there are aspects you do not align with your values and goals, this is likely not the right company or job for you.
What question should you ask to establish if the business is a right fit for you?
This is dependent on who is interviewing you. If you were interviewing with a talent specialist or human resources professional, your questions should be geared towards the interview process.
Your questions to the management team would differ and could include:
Is this a new position and what did the previous person in the position accomplish in their role?
This question gives you the opportunity to see what the previous employer accomplished in the role as well as what skills or experience the individual brought to the table. On the other side, it could allow you to assess whether people are promoted within the business or if the organisation has a high staff turnover.
Are their opportunities to attend professional development courses, if not is there a possibility of integrating learning opportunities?
The response will offer insight as to how the organisation views staff learning and development. As a leader you want to show the executive team that motivating your team to achieve professional milestones is as important as developing their skills as well as your own. If this is something, the organisation will not consider you would need to establish if there is no interest at all or just lack of funding to offer their employees this benefit.
Additional question to consider include:
Will there be team management and what would the size of the team be?
What functions would I need to be managing to ensure that I meet organisational targets?
What would you like a potential employer to accomplish within the first 3 months of working with the organisation?
Avoid asking the interviewer questions about:
Salary or employee benefits, unless it brought up by the interviewer.
Work hours or leave days.
What the company does, you should have an idea based on the research you would have conducted.
When you can expect an offer.
Various studies have shown that many interviewers make a decision on whether a candidate really wants the job or not, by the questions they ask. An interviewer will be strategic in the questions that they pose to you and so should you. Preparing and asking questions shows you have interest and that you are enthusiastic about the position.
As the interview comes to a close, make a point to thank the interviewer in person or by e-mail. It is a common courtesy to thank everyone involved in the interview process. Thanking the interview panel in the interview room as well as in a follow up mail the hiring manager, should you have their details.
This would not guarantee you the job, but puts at an advantage over those that would not consider sending an e-mail.
Follow up afteryour interview. This assists in ensuring the team remembers who you are. It could earn you a second or third interview.
Finally, if you do not get a call back, take the opportunity to find out why.
What to take out of this article is to remember to prioritise your interview preparation. No interview or role is the same, so you must make sure to review every job profile and align your responses to your experience and that of the positions requirements. Always keep abreast of industry trends, so that you are able to structure responses based on current information and market trends.
