Killer Interview Question: How Can I Tell If You’re Having A Bad Day?

We’ve seen our fair share of strange interview questions, but this week’s KIQ is one of the more unusual ones we’ve come across. It is a question that global telecommunications network equipment provider CEO Gary Smith likes to ask.

No matter how qualified a job candidate looks on paper, it’s often difficult to gauge their working style and how well they would fit into a company. You can dig a little deeper with the stock standard questions of “What’s it like to work with you”, “How do you interact with your peers” and “What skills would you bring to this job”, but there’s always a chance that the prospective employee is ready to provide well-rehearse answers for them.

That is why Smith prefers to throw candidates a curve ball by asking “How can I tell if you’re having a bad day and how does that manifest itself?” Smith said that candidates often pause to think before answering.

“If they say they become quiet, then I’ll ask, ‘Tell me what comes next? How do you deal with it? Do you walk away from the issue?’ And I’ll drill down on that, because it leads to a lot of good discussions around what motivates them, and what they enjoy about their work and what they don’t like about it,” he said.
How would you answer this question? Let us know in the comments.

[Via Business Insider Australia]

This article has been updated since its original publication.


The Cheapest NBN 50 Plans

Here are the cheapest plans available for Australia’s most popular NBN speed tier.

At Lifehacker, we independently select and write about stuff we love and think you'll like too. We have affiliate and advertising partnerships, which means we may collect a share of sales or other compensation from the links on this page. BTW – prices are accurate and items in stock at the time of posting.

Comments