Leadership Excellence demands that every leader within your organization… including you… must attract, interview, select and retain the very best talent available, consistent with the mission and values of your organization. Nothing is more crucial to leadership excellence and accomplishing the mission and specific goals of your organization.
Many leaders reading this article have been interviewed (probably many times), have conducted interviews (no doubt numerous times), and will do much more of both in the future. Since interviews (whether interviewer or interviewee) are crucial to your leadership success, it makes sense to invest time to be sure you are well prepared and that you maximize value from those interviews. In fact, it makes perfect sense that you would create an electronic or paper file and accumulate excellent questions that you might ask or that might be asked of you in the future. The return on investment of this simple strategy will pay huge personal and professional dividends in the future!
The March 17, 2010 Dallas Morning News ran an article entitled Hirers: Try these creative questions. The article was written by Diane Stafford from The Kansas City Star.
Diane writes,
“Beyond the open-ended ‘Tell me about yourself,’ here are a few good questions suggested by The HR Specialist newsletter:
- What makes you proud? (A good one because it can reveal whether the applicant thinks in terms of me-me-me or involves others in the answer.)
- What would your fans say about you? And your critics?
- What is the most useful criticism you’ve received?
- What processes did you improve at your last job?
- Who was your favorite boss and why? Least favorite?
- What frustrates you at work, and what do you do about it?
- What one area of your performance do you struggle with?
- Tell me about a time when you had to adapt quickly to change.
- Describe a time you had to sacrifice quality to meet a deadline.
- How do you stay current on industry trends and standards?
- What do you think are key qualities for this position?
- How has your current position prepared you for this job?
- Have you ever been fired? Why?
- What are your three most effective business accomplishments?
- Tell me about a time when your communication skills had an impact.
- Tell me about a time when you missed a deadline.”
Excellent questions that will reveal highly relevant information, frame of mind and ways of thinking, confidence levels and honesty.
Two very important, even crucial suggestions…
- Save these excellent questions and use them in future applicant interviews. You will be amazed what these questions will reveal… the good, the bad and the ugly.
- Save these questions and invest the time now, to be sure your answers to these excellent questions reveal the highly relevant information, frame of mind and ways of thinking, confidence levels and honesty you wish to convey in future interviews you face as you continue to create and build the leadership excellence career of your choice.
And now it’s up to you!
