PART IV

How to Answer the Top 10 Hardest Questions You Will Be Asked

Check your local bookstore or Goggle and you will find plenty of books on how to answer tough questions at interviews. I offer you here, the best ways to answer the 10 hardest (nontechnical) questions. I base this on my many years of experience as a person who interviewed, and then offered jobs to many candidates. That said, let’s take a look at the top 10.

The Top 10 Most Difficult Interview Questions

1. What Is Your Greatest Weakness?

We all have weaknesses. I don’t attend to detail. I’m impulsive. I don’t pay enough attention to budgets. I also don’t speak Lithuanian. Do I work too hard? Most of the time. But, I’m not going to admit any of these as a weakness. If I am applying for a job in marketing management, I don’t want to reveal the weaknesses I mentioned because they become true liabilities, deal breakers. I want to find a weakness that will do two things: (1) It will satisfy the questions and (2) It will be something that can be improved upon. Also, I don’t want to use the trite “I work too hard.”

So, what weaknesses are available? For my non-native students, I suggest they say, “I need to continue to improve my English language skills.” For many students, I suggest they focus on a soft skill and say, perhaps, “I need to improve my communication skills (obviously this wouldn’t work in a communication job).” If you’re applying for a job in information technology (IT), maybe in coding, you don’t want to say that a weakness is Python. However, we all know (stereotype coming) that IT people need to improve their soft skills.

HAVING A WEAKNESS IS OK, AS LONG AS YOU ARE WORKING TO IMPROVE IT

I put that in all-caps so that you will see it and remember it. If you say that your English language skills are suspect, you must tell the interviewer what you are doing to improve them. “I speak English with my American friends. I watch TV and listen to the ways they talk. I learn a new word every day.” Remember, everyone has shortcomings, but not everyone works to improve them.

The Internet is teeming with advice on how to answer this question. Indeed.com tells you, “The key to preparing for this question is to identify weaknesses that still communicate strength. This will show the interviewer you’re introspective enough to know your areas of opportunity”¹. I think this is OK, but doesn’t sound genuine. A Hub Spot message gives you these responses: “Patience when working with a team, Organization skills, Delegating responsibility, Can be too timid with my feedback, Can be too blunt with my feedback, Public speaking, and Analyzing data.”² These sound like great liabilities in several jobs. But, again, your answer is not as important as the process you are using to improve. Whatever weakness you plan to acknowledge, show exactly the process you are using to improve.

2. Why Should We Hire You?

Remember this important advice, THE INTERVIEW IS NOT ABOUT YOU; IT’S ABOUT THEM.

I know, that sounds counterintuitive. But, really, they don’t care so much about you as they do about WHAT YOU CAN DO FOR THEM. In answering any interview questions, talk about the benefits to them. Cite their objectives as a business and show them how you can help them achieve those objectives. Speak knowledgeably about them. For instance, when I hired marketing people, I wanted to hear them talk about how they would help us create innovative products, services, and solutions. I wanted them to speak with authority about our customers. I wanted them to give me ideas of how they would promote our products and services. They could connect that to work they had already done. But, tread cautiously in focusing on your previous efforts; the more they talked about themselves, the faster I become bored. Don’t tell me what you did for someone else, tell me what you will do for me. This obviously requires more than a passing knowledge about the company you are interviewing with. Remember WIIFM!

3. Why Do You Want This Job?

This presents you with the perfect opportunity to tell them how great they are. It’s that simple. “All of my colleagues would die to work here. You are the leader. Your reputation is second to none.” Believe me, you can’t say enough great things about them. We’re all this way. We want to be loved. We want to be told how great we are. “I know that I will learn more here than I did in college. You have the best learning and development program. You are ranked third in the list of the best companies to work for” and on and on.

4. Tell Me What You Didn’t Like About Your Last Job

People leave jobs mostly because they have bad managers. You don’t want to say outright, “I hated my manager,” but you can list a situation or two where better management would have led to better outcomes because, of course, you take great pride in your work. You might say, “I worked on a number of projects with different people and I benefited from their guidance and feedback. However, my manager didn’t supervise most of those projects. When I worked on projects supervised by my boss, he failed to give feedback on areas of possible improvement. I appreciate and seek feedback because I want to improve and grow.”

5. Tell Me About a Time Your Work Was Criticized.

No one does perfect work all the time. We all make mistakes, so this question isn’t about the mistake, it’s about how you handled and processed the criticism. You can admit to being pained when your work was criticized. But, it’s not OK to become paralyzed. I was once asked to write an introduction for an annual report for a publicly traded company. When I took the draft to the chief financial officer, he told me it wasn’t good, that it sounded too much like “PR talk, too fluffy.” I knew immediately that he was correct, and I told him I would redraft it. I went to a quiet place and put myself in the mind of a finance person. I wrote the message as un-fluffy as I could, paying attention to language that spoke to finance people. I took the second draft to him, he made a few corrections, and he said, “This works.” I felt great. I had learned and succeeded. I knew I wouldn’t make that mistake again. When you are asked about being criticized, use the STAR method—explain the Situation, the Task, the Action, and the Result. Show how you learned and benefitted—how you maturely handled the situation.

6. What Has Been Your Greatest Accomplishment?

Here is your chance to tell a story, your greatest ally in communication. Your story can be about any accomplishment from any time in your life, but you must make it relate to the job at hand. I had a student tell me that she placed third in an international piano competition when she was interviewing for a job in finance. She told me that she practiced six hours a day until her fingers hurt. She told me that she was studying for her college exams at the same time and trying to stay on the honor roll. She told me that it was often cold in her apartment and in the practice suite. She painted a word picture for me that allowed me to feel the way she felt. Then she spoke about the competition itself, how nervous she was, how talented and accomplished the other competitors were. She put me on the piano bench alongside her. Then, to top it off, she told me how the experience prepared her for a life in finance with its many pressures and uncertainties. I was ready to hire her on the spot. You, too, can use any accomplishment, as long as you relate it to the position you are interviewing for. Tell a story!

7. Tell Me About a Time You Disagreed With Your Boss

Bosses aren’t perfect, far from it. We all have times when we think he might be on the wrong track. The important thing about this question is what process you used to resolve the situation. I tell my students to focus first on the communication aspects of this situation. For example, a student might answer this way, “My boss wanted to use television to reach our audience and I knew that social media would work better. So, I asked if I could meet with him. I asked him why he thought television was the best approach. I listened. I asked further questions. I told him why I thought social media was a better medium to use and showed him some data. I suggested that television would be a good adjunct to social media. He agreed and we compromised.” This question is really about protocol, respect, process, listening, communicating, and conflict resolution.

8. Why Have You Been Out of Work?

Everyone has moments of unemployment, gaps on their resume. I have had mine. In fact, an interviewer once told me that my resume looked “like a rollercoaster” because I had changed jobs so many times in a short span. There are periods in your life when you are finding what your dream job looks like or you are transitioning to another career. If you have moments of unemployment, or several job transitions in a short amount of time, answer honestly and explain that you are not willing to take any job just to have a job. Say that you are willing to wait for the right job and not to deprive someone else of a job that best suits them. You might even say that the job you are now interviewing for is your dream job, and that you were willing to wait for this interview, that you had planned your life with enough savings and some freelance work to wait for this one perfect opportunity to become available.

9. What Is Your Salary Expectation?

Answer this question by asking the salary range. Then, say that because of your education, skills, and experience (if you have them) suggest that you should be brought in above the midpoint. That means, if the salary range is $50K to $100K, you’d like to be brought in above $75K. Always remember that people take jobs for money, but they stay in jobs for non-financial reasons. Also, remember that you can negotiate nonsalary items that bring you additional income. You can ask for a signing bonus; you can ask for a six-month review; you can ask for a different title, tuition support, housing expenses, travel, parking, and any number of other things that the company may be willing to offer to get around the salary range or scales.

10. What Would You Do if You Knew You Only Had One Year to Live?

Now, you must talk about what truly matters in your life. You need to say that work is important to you, but your family is more important. Say that you’d want to spend more time with your family. Be honest, no matter how much you love a job, most people do not want to spend their final days focused on work.

A List of Behavioral Questions

(With a Few Trick Questions Thrown in)

I routinely mock interview students. When I do, I keep a list handy that includes questions beyond the common ones we have just discussed. It has many questions, some of them weird, some of them probing, many of them behavioral. Below you will find my list. Remember that you can find many sources on the Internet, with questions and suggested answers. I have found that the key is to answer in such a way that you show a benefit to the company you are interviewing with or show your ability to tell stories. Here’s my list:

¹ https://indeed.com/career-advice/interviewing/list-of-example-weaknesses-for-interviewing

² https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/what-is-your-greatest-weakness