Being asked a tricky interview question that catches you
off guard, makes you stutter and try and collect your thoughts
as you scramble to give a good answer,
is probably one of the worst feelings
that you can have in an interview.
So to try and help you guys out and avoid this,
I went to the career coaches here at Indeed
and we've compiled a list of 10 interview questions
that are typically a notoriously tricky, along with answers
that you can confidently provide to try and mitigate
some of those nerve wracking feelings.
These questions are either questions
about your past performance, your self awareness
in the workplace, or your run of the mill Gotcha question.
If you're not sure what I mean by that stick around the end
I'll explain and give some examples
of what those typically are and how to look out for them.
So let's kick things off first by discussing
some questions that are really tricky that employers
like to ask about your past experience.
Now, for context, employers ask about your past experience
because they want to understand about your professional
offering, how well you know how to sell yourself,
and how your history applies to the skills and requirements
for the role at hand.
Trick question number one is, why did you
leave your last job?
This is a pretty obvious professionalism test
at the surface level.
I think a lot of people know if you
say some really negative things about your former employer
in an interview with a new potential employer, that
might make some red flags go up on their end.
However, there's a secondary motivation
that employers may have for asking this question, which
is to determine how committed you might
be to this new opportunity.
Hiring is expensive and they want
to make sure that you're a long term investment.
If you left on good terms, great.
Speak concisely and authentically
about the professional reasons that
brought you to looking for a new opportunity,
but definitely speak well about that positive working
relationship that you had.
However, if the complete story isn't something
that you can sincerely speak positively about,
do your best to say what positive things you can,
though they may be few, but really to emphasize that it
just wasn't a professional fit.
So one way you could describe that particular situation would
be, it just wasn't a professional fit
but I'm so excited to be interviewing for something
that I already know is.
An answer like that achieves two things.
One, you pass that professionalism test
with flying colors.
And then two, you're really able to demonstrate
that you're interested in being a committed long term employee.
Tricky question number two, why have you changed jobs so often?
Like I said, companies invest a lot of time and money
into training and hiring, so they want employees
that they think will stick around.
So the trick to answering this question
is, we can sometimes feel like we
need to provide a reason for each and every move
that we made professionally, but that is not the case.
You may have perfectly great reasons
as to why you left each job, but the more
you talk about it, the more space and time
this question of changing jobs a lot takes up.
Try and come up with a one or two
sentence response that generally explains
why you moved around a bit, but bring the conversation back
to the opportunity at hand and why
you see it as a long term fit.
For example, you can say right now
I'm in the process of looking for a long term
professional home.
For a while in my career I took some
gigs that I knew would be shorter term at the outset,
and there was one other opportunity I had,
which unfortunately I lost due to layoffs
that the company underwent.
However, I absolutely see this role
as a long term investment on my end.
Tricky question number three, tell me
about a time when you made a mistake at work?
Yikes, obviously this is a not so fun question
to be asked because we don't want to provide a mistake that
scares the employer away, so what level of mistake
is acceptable to disclose?
The trick to responding to this question
is that managers just want to see
that you have made a mistake, you can own it
and that you've learned and implemented
tactics to prevent that mistake from happening again.
So to answer this question, concisely
tell a story of when you made some kind of error or blunder,
what you learned from it and how you can now approach
similar situations differently.
This can be a big mistake, it can be a small one,
but the important thing is that you take it
on your own shoulders, really show that accountability.
For example, you could say in my first job,
I made the mistake of not proofreading
a piece of social copy that went out and actually appeared
on my boss's phone.
I, of course, quickly fixed the mistake and from that point on,
I learned the importance of creating a system for myself
of reading every single piece of social copy
out loud, so I didn't make that error again.
Pro tip here, whenever you hear a question that
starts with tell me about a time when,
or can you give me an example of.
These are behavioral based interview questions.
So if you want some advice on how
to answer those particular types of questions,
there's actually a whole strategy on it,
which we explain in this video right here.
So this brings us to our next type of tricky interview
questions, I'll sort of term these self awareness questions.
But before I hop into those, please
if you've watched this far, give us a like,
subscribe down below and turn on notification bell.
So the next category, like I said,
is self awareness questions.
And as a general note before we get into the specific ones,
it's important to understand that employers
care about your answers to these because if you're self-aware,
you're able to be coach-able, adaptable,
and mitigate your emotional responses.
All of these are really key things
when it comes to operating smoothly
in a professional workplace.
So tricky question number four, is
what is your greatest weakness?
This question, like the one about your greatest mistake,
can often make our stomachs sink because we want to put our best
foot forward in an interview and here we
are being asked to disclose something negative
about ourselves.
However, the real trick here, the real false answer
would be to sort of provide a humble brag.
We've all heard the, I'm a perfectionist response.
While that might be true, generally,
if you answer something a little bit more
vulnerably, candidly, and honestly
and show some mitigation strategies,
that will resonate more with employers.
The best tactic here is to share a story about a time
when a personal trait led you to make a mistake that you
won't repeat.
The best formula here is weakness, plus example,
plus improvement measures.
Really focus on that improvement measure.
An example would be if you tend to procrastinate, share
how you came to realize that.
And add, and now I set a deadline of my own
before the actual deadline, so that I have enough time
and I'm not ending up scrambling at the end.
Don't revert to sugar-coated weaknesses like,
I'm a perfectionist, or I'm a workaholic.
These don't really demonstrate your self-awareness
and openness to improvement.
Tricky question number five is, what might your current boss
say about you?
Woo, this is another tough one.
It's easy to leap into over-inflating
what your boss might say.
Actually this is really all about understanding oneself
and understanding your ability to empathize
with other people in the workplace.
They want to see that you can put yourself
in your boss's shoes, sort of think like that manager.
Just be honest about your best qualities at work,
even if your boss hasn't specifically commented on them.
You can say something like, my boss would
talk about my accountability and how seriously I
take not passing the buck to other team members
and creating more work for others.
So tricky question number six, is tell me about yourself?
Some people may say that this is sort of an icebreaker
and it definitely does take that role
when beginning an interview people often start here.
However, this definitely feels like a tricky question
to most people because it's so open ended and broad.
What is relevant to share, how do I
stand out and make a good impression on an interviewer?
The mistake here would be to come across as
rambling and unprepared.
It's really important to give a clear and concise elevator
pitch.
My suggestion is not to just summarize your resume
or daily responsibilities.
Instead, really connect with that interviewer
on an emotional level and then describe your big impacts.
One strategy to make that emotional connection
is to describe your origin story,
and make that quick connection to career goals.
Let's say you started out in print journalism,
but you've broadened your career search,
you're trying to make a transition.
You can say something along the lines of,
I have been devoted to storytelling
ever since I was a child, I loved reading fairy tales.
And in college I was obsessed with romance novels
and I've loved my time in print publishing.
I've reviewed x number of books and made a lot of impact there.
But I'm really interested in broadening my reach,
so that I can bring my passion to storytelling
on many different platforms.
If you'd like to learn more about how to answer, tell me
about yourself and create that perfect elevator pitch,
I highly recommend checking out our guide, it's right here.
Tricky question number seven, why should we hire you?
When you're asked this question, the pressure is on.
We know we're supposed to sell ourselves.
And I think the mistake a lot of people make here,
is focusing only on their big achievements
without really thinking about what's
relevant to the employer.
The important thing isn't just to say,
I have so much success and a great track
record of being successful.
It's really to hone in on, here's
how I can help you solve your business needs.
So the trick really is to get into that job description.
Figure out what issue is the employer solving
by hiring someone for this role, and look
at where your past experience and qualifications can
overlap and solve that problem for them.
You could say something like, from what I understand,
this job really demands someone who has strong business acumen
and great attention to detail.
I have a track record of success and the natural traits
do both of those tasks very well.
Tricky question number eight, is what
salary are you looking for?
This is a nerve wracking question
because we don't want to ask for too little too late,
but we also don't want to ask for too much too soon
and scare away a potential opportunity.
The important thing here is to honor that question.
We always want to be polite, professional, and obliging
in an interview, but pivot it back to the employer.
At the end of the day, they're at the advantage
when they're asking this question,
because though they're trained to put
the pressure on candidates to respond and disclose
the number first.
Ultimately, they know the salary, historical data
that they've offered to people in the past
and they know probably what their exact budget
is for your role.
You could say something like, total compensation
encompasses more than just salary for me.
I'm still learning about the roles and responsibilities,
so it's hard to say exactly what my expectations are
at the moment.
But I'd love to know, what have you budgeted for this role?
It's pretty much guaranteed that this question
will come up at some point during the hiring process.
So I'd highly recommend checking out this video right here,
where we explain how to answer all of your questions
about salary.
Now we're out the last set of questions,
which I term Gotcha questions.
These are sort of out of left field or really challenging
questions that you can't anticipate,
and the point here is to see how you perform under pressure
and whether you can handle difficult or challenging
situations with grace and professionalism.
So let's hop into the first one.
So tricky question number nine, is
to describe how you'd react in a specific scenario in this role?
So employers ask this question because they
can't see you in action.
So forcing you into these mental scenarios where
they're testing how you would behave,
is the closest they can get.
It's kind of an unfair scenario because obviously
you gain a lot more experience and knowledge,
the more you become ingrained into the role.
But the important thing here, is to really
become ingrained and understanding
the real priorities of the job.
The night before your interview, what's recommended
is to really visualize the day to day that you anticipate
this job would be, and thinking about what
those key metrics are.
What is the overall priority?
When you kind of create this mind frame
of being clearly guided by what the ultimate goal is,
you can handle this kind of question with poise
by keeping that in mind.
For example, if you're asked how you would drive sales
at a new company, and you know that giving presentations
is a big part of the role and you have familiarity with that
from your previous job, go ahead and say something
along those lines of, at my current company
I give business development pitches at least once a month,
and I'm really confident that once they understand
these product features, I can craft and deliver
compelling presentations very quickly
in order to maximize our overall revenue.
The final tricky question is, just that.
A trick question, could be challenging
trivia or a hypothetical scenario that
throws you off guard.
Something that more than likely no one on Earth
has a confident answer to on the spot.
For example, how many elevators are there in the USA?
Or, what would you bring to a desert island
if you could only pick three things.
All these questions are definitely
going out of fashion.
They still do occur typically with recent graduates or people
with not much experience.
If you're asked this question or any tricky question,
don't panic.
It's not expected that you'll be able to accurately estimate
the number of elevators in the United States,
or you have some perfect survival
kit for surviving on a desert island.
It's really all about explaining your thinking,
and showing that you can solve problems well
and communicating that.
For example, I don't know exactly how many elevators
there are in the US off the top of my head,
but in order to solve that problem,
I would start with an online search.
Reach out with friends or colleagues who might know more
about the topic than I do, and then synthesize that research.
And what I've learned and depending on how important it
is to get really accurate information,
I could go beyond that and conduct firsthand research
myself.
I'd then bring my ideas to my boss to get the best solution.
And just a quick note here.
This piece of advice can be applied,
not just to trick questions, but to any question that
is difficult or challenging for you.
Everything from a behavioral interview
question that is really specific and you
don't have a specific scenario to share that matches up.
Or it could be a question about a certification
that they wanted you to have that you have never even heard
of.
All of these things are perfectly fine.
We often feel confined to talking about experience
that we've had firsthand ourselves,
but if you can explain how you would go about solving things,
that's great and extremely useful for an employer.
If you found this video helpful, please let us
know by hitting the like button down below
and subscribing to our channel right here.
If you want more interviewing advice with a whole playlist
on interviewing that you can click right here.
And if you want some advice on what to avoid in an interview,
I highly recommend checking out this video right here.
Thank you so much and best of luck.