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1. Answer the question asked.
   Listen and ask clarifying questions.
   Confirm that you are answering the question.
    
2. Describe the situation.
    
3. Describe what steps were taken.
   Be specific about your role (where you made difference).
    
4. Relate what the result was.
   When at all possible, quantify the results.

Typical Interview Questions

The Most Frequently Asked Questions:

• What are your goals (short-term and long-term)? How does our firm fit within these goals?
   
• Why did you choose to attend Michigan? What are your concentrations? Why did you choose them? What have you learned so far?
   
• Why are you interested in XXXXX? How are you currently preparing for a career in XXXXX?
   
• How do you know you will excel at it?
   
• Why are you interested in our organization? What do you know about it?
   
• What would you contribute to our organization? What unique skills and experiences can you bring to us? Why should we hire you?
   
• What personal or professional qualities are you proudest of? How have these helped you achieve your goals?
   
• Discuss your career progress to date. How do you feel about it?
   
• In your most recent position, what were your most significant accomplishments? What skills did you employ to arrive at those goals?
   
• Describe one or two of your most important personal accomplishments. Discuss the hurdles that made them challenging.
   
• How do your co-workers describe you? Members of your study groups at Michigan? Your friends?
   
• How would you add to the diversity of our organization?
   

Communication and Persuasion

• Discuss examples of situations when you had to persuade a person of a different point of view to agree with an issue.
   
• What are some of the best ideas you have ever sold to a superior or peer? What were your approaches?
   
• Describe a time when you had to use several approaches because your initial approach failed to persuade others.
   
• Describe your most satisfying experience in attempting to gain upper management support of an idea or proposal. What was the situation? How did it turn out?
   
• What oral presentations have you made? Which were the most successful and why?
   
• Have you ever done any public speaking? Tell me about those events.
   
• What are examples of the most difficult writing assignments you have ever had?

Leadership

• Describe your leadership style.
   
• Describe a situation in which you had a conflict with another person in a corporate or school setting and how you resolved it.
   
• Discuss some situations in which you successfully supervised a diverse group of people towards a difficult goal. What skills did you employ in supervising them? What did you learn?
   
• Describe a situation in which you had to lead a difficult group towards a goal despite opposition from others.
   
• Describe a situation in which you had to provide negative feedback to a co-worker or team member.
   
• All of us have been in situations where we assigned work to other people and they did not follow through. Can you tell me about some of those? Why did it happen? What did you learn from the experience?
   
• When have you inspired someone to work hard to do a better job? How did you do that?
   

Teamwork

• Are you a team leader or follower? Give me examples of your teamwork style.
   
• Discuss examples of how you effectively dealt with difficult individuals in the workplace.
   
• Describe a situation in which you were able to build team spirit in a time of low morale.
   
• When making decisions, how much consideration do you give to the needs of team members? Give examples.
   
• Give an example of a time when you intervened to get your team back on track because they could not resolve an issue.
   
• Tell me about the toughest group you ever had to work with. What made the group so tough? What did you do?
   

Decision-Making

• What’s the worst professional decision you have ever made? What were the consequences? What did you learn?
   
• What types of decisions do you find easy to make, and what types difficult?
   
• What’s the most difficult decision you have ever made? What were the consequences? What did you learn?
   
• Describe a situation in which you had to make an important decision without having all the information at hand.
   
• Give me an example of a good decision you have made recently. What alternatives did you consider? Why was it a good decision?
   

Integrity

• Describe an ethical dilemma that you have had to face during your career. How did you resolve the issue?
   
• Describe your character.
   
• Have you ever been in a situation in which a co-worker showed dishonesty on the job? If so, how did you deal with the situation?
   
• Have you ever been asked to do something that was not right? What did you do?

The Organization

• What are our products, services, etc.?
   
• What have you learned about our organization?
   
• What is the worst thing you have learned about our organization?
   
• What is the most important thing you would look for in an employer?
   
• How did you structure your research about our organization?
   
• What was your first impression about our company?
   
• What did you think of our corporate presentation?
   

Creativity

• What ideas have you developed that were creative or innovative?
   
• Sell me this pen (plant, pencil, etc.).
   
• Describe a situation in which you developed a unique solution to a problem.
   
• In your last job, what did you do differently from your predecessors and why?
   
• Did you express any new ideas to your boss in the last 6 months of work? What were the ideas, and how did your boss respond to them?
   

Analytical Thinking

• Discuss a project which best demonstrates your analytical skills.
   
• Describe a situation in which you identified key problems early on in a project and were able to avert a crisis.
   
• Walk me through a situation in which you had to research and analyze the results for one of your projects.
   
• Tell me about a time when you had to analyze or interpret numerical or financial information.
   

Marketing Questions

• What is the best commercial you’ve seen in the past few months and why? Do you believe it is effective?
   
• Briefly describe a marketing plan for yourself.
   
• Name some of the most recent new products launched by a consumer products company in the past 6 months. Which of these impressed you? Why? Do you believe it will be successful in the marketplace?
   
• How would you describe the personality of Brand X? Brand Y?
   
• If you had your choice among all brands in the U.S., which would you want to market? Why? Which would you not want to market?
   

General Questions

• What do you do in your free time?
   
• What has been the most useful criticism you have ever received?
   
• Describe the biggest crisis of your life or career.
   
• What is your biggest disappointment in life?
   
• What is your greatest weakness?
   
• What motivates you best?
   
• What kind of boss gets the best work out of you?
   
• Do you feel your grades at school accurately reflect your abilities?
   
• How well do you take criticism? What is the most painful criticism you have ever received?
   
• Tell me about your most spectacular failure.
   
• Tell me about times you were not very pleased with your performance.
   

Questions to ask when Interviewing

Everyone has different criteria by which to judge a prospective employer. Some of the issues highlighted below may not be important to you; others vital. Possible topics include:

Environment (offices, cubes, software, company facilities such as a health club, etc.)

Corporate Culture (team or individual-oriented, risk-taking, methods of communication, normal working hours, etc.)

Exposure to Upper Management (management levels, upper management support, decision makers, etc.)

Hiring / Advantages (promotions, turnover, job description, etc.)

Training Opportunities (seminars, workshops, personal development, etc.)

Miscellaneous (recent changes, personal preferences about company, etc.)


-- Adapted from the SC Johnson Wax /Michigan Marketing Club Interview Workshop “Brand Management Interview Guide,” 1997.