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Best Interview Question Ever

Editor’s note: Jason Sanders is Vice President of Executive Search at Ivy Exec, a web-based recruiting company that combines next generation technology with human power to deliver customized hiring solutions targeting high caliber professionals to help place them in executive jobs. This article is reprinted with Ivy Exec’s permission.

As Ivy Exec’s Vice President of Executive Search I spend a lot of time interviewing high quality candidates, as you might imagine. Candidates talk with me about their executive job search, career progression, skills, experiences and personal lives. Usually, I am most interested in understanding what motivates a person. That discussion generally provides the most relevant information to screening and attracting excellent candidates for executive jobs. When you interview a candidate, you will need to balance both objectives in order to make a good hiring decision.

Normally, I spend about two hours total interviewing a candidate. Ideally, these conversations are broken down into an initial phone screen and a face-to-face interview. We cover many topics, including personal ones and a general career history. But what if you don’t have two hours to spend evaluating a candidate? Maybe you only have twenty minutes, or perhaps only five. How do you get the most information in the least amount of time? In short, what is the best interview question you can possibly ask?

You must to accomplish a number of things to make smart hiring decisions. You need to find out about the candidates’ primary skills, their general experience, their ability to synthesize information, their ability to present well and think on their feet, their people skills, their basic intelligence, and their fit into your organization. In truth, you will never fully evaluate a person until you work together. You can cover a lot of ground in a short period of time, though, using this question:

What is your most significant professional accomplishment?

This question has the advantage of leading to a very short answer, or a very long one. It may put your candidates at ease, or make them sweat. You may learn about your candidates’ values, their self-esteem and their cultural fit. You will certainly learn about their ability to communicate. If you listen well, you may be able to sort out sincerity from pretense. You may be able to tell how they view themselves in relation to a team. You may also be able to learn about the person’s drive to succeed.

You can use this interview question for any level candidate, and use it according to your own style. If you prefer, you may remain silent after asking the question, or you may use it as a basis for many follow up questions.

If you choose this question as a starting point, you create a theme for an entire interview. If there is time, you should dig more deeply by asking questions that qualify your candidates’ response. In the case of a consulting project, some of these questions might be:

What were the dimensions of the project? How was it sold? How long did it last? What was the makeup of the delivery team?

What was your role in the assignment?

What was the overall business impact of the assignment? This is a critical question to assess your candidates’ understanding of the connection between their work and the goals of their clients.

Why were you chosen for this assignment?

What challenges did you face and how did you overcome them?

Which elements of the project did you enjoy, and which didn’t you enjoy?

How did you grow as a person during the course of the assignment?

What did you learn from your client, and what did you teach your client?

When you begin with a strong open-ended question, you lead with a very powerful analytical tool. You can gather a lot of information in a short period of time. You also create an anchor, around which to base a longer interview.

This question makes it easy to structure your interview by introducing a theme for the meeting. Preparing interview questions is always a good idea, but even without an organized approach, you now have something to refer back to. If your candidate begins to wander away from the topic, you will be able to steer the conversation, and learn about the candidate’s ability to stay focused at the same time.

The questions you ask are less important than how you listen to the answers. You may find, for example, that a person needs a lot of prompting. This may mean that they have not accomplished much, or it may mean that they are introverted, or maybe they have not interviewed in years and are a bit rusty. Your evaluation must be flexible according to the circumstances, and other bits of information you gather.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, you may find that your interviewee cannot stop talking about their work. Most hiring managers respond poorly to people who talk excessively, and with good reason. While over talking may make a person sound prideful, the opposite is usually the case. It also shows an inability to rapidly synthesize information, and in the worst cases, may be rude to the interviewer.

This question provides you with a firm grounding to begin, and to guide an interview. You should challenge a person, but also make them comfortable enough to reveal themselves. Your questions, and your style give candidates an impression of what it will be like to work for you. Take advantage of every opportunity to leave a good impression.

Using this question puts you in position to gather information and to ask smart follow up questions. It serves as a kind of interviewing cheat sheet, which helps you get around some of the preparatory work, like reading a resume. Don’t misunderstand me; reading a candidate’s resume is extremely important. If you are caught off guard, however, you can refer back to this question without tipping your hand.

In order to make a good hire, you need to check many different aspects of a candidate’s background, skills, personality, cultural fit and drive. You will need to use different approaches to get all the information that you want. Somewhere in the process, though, you ought to ask this question. You may get more than you expected.

About Mark Anthony Dyson

I am the "The Voice of Job Seekers!" I offer compassionate career and job search advice as I hack and re-imagine the job search process. You need to be "the prescription to an employer's job description." You must be solution-oriented and work in positions in companies where you are the remedy. Your job search must be a lifestyle, and your career must be in front of you constantly. You can no longer shed your aspirations at the change seasons. There are strengths you have that need constant use and development. Be sure you sign up to download my E-Book, "421 Modern Job Search Tips 2021!" You can find my career advice and work in media outlets such as Forbes, Inc., Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, Glassdoor, and many other outlets.

by Mark Anthony Dyson

Time to Get Down to the Heart of Your Employment Matters

Years ago, Don Henley released a song called, “Heart of the Matter,” that describes the broken and turbulent relationship is about forgiveness,

…even if you don’t love me anymore.

Closure is important proceeded by resolution, if a lack of forgiveness is the source of anger. Relationships are crazy and complex if the heart of the matter never comes to light.

I mean, how powerful and honest are the lines,

I’m learning to live without you now…but I miss you sometimes

The more I know, the less I understand

All the things I thought I knew, I’m learning again

A job search can be as turbulent as a broken relationship. But if you can’t get down to the core of your problems, or at least define the doldrums, delayed success you can expect.

Yes we can talk about effort and exertion, but without strategy, failure begins. But there is something to be said about shortcomings, weaknesses, and character obstacles that can hold you back. I listed a few of them below:

1. Fear of returning to your career vomit

You do not want to do the last job. That is understandable as diligent professionals avoid sticking their hand in the proverbial plow and look back to do the duties of their last job. You move on but the lack of money is tearing your interests in two. Solution: Patience and diligence pay off. If you don’t want to return to old job duties, see if you can transfer those old skills into new opportunities.

2. Demons of your past errors

Errors are good. They remind us of what we shouldn’t do. Past errors are not good if they are allowed to roam free in your heart and mind. Solution: Shut down the pity party, and focus on your successes. Taking care of business may mean additional training, or a visit with a mentor.

3. Have not tapped the value of skills

People will look at their career as a moral and economic obligation, but rarely will people understand demonstrated value his or her performance results. Solution: Past performance reviews are good to read sometimes to remind us how valued our performance was to past employers. Look to see if your work was broken down by quantity and quality to showcase performance measures on your current resume. Not only numbers are eye-grabbing, but also it highlights your value. Words alone hides your worth, and your abilities.

4. Your network lacks a bold and honest person

We can win a war with many advisors, assuming the advisors are wise. Unwise advisors lack strategy and perspective, thus losing the war. Solution: Most need objective and honest people to shake us up, and motivate us to increase our expectations. Capable individuals who bring the best out of us know how to push the positive button, urging us, and spurring us in all areas of our job search.

5. Lack outstanding oral and written communication skills

The truth is that most people do not master oral and written skills. Although there are varying measures to what “master” means, but most jobseekers do not possess excellent oral and written skills. Solution: There are writing courses that can be taken online. Although it would be easier if people checked your work, it is not always possible. I wrote an article that cited some resources that help correct grammar and spelling errors.

6. Money is determining your happiness

Money is a temporary solution to a life long wound. Money is idolized if your pocket are always empty after working “just a job!” Throw the idol in the fire by unearthing a career path as you look toward the future. Solution: A frequent cliché but true is pursuing a career that you would do for free brings more happiness than a job for twice the money. Find intrinsic markers that allow you to find careers that provide some fulfillment, and allow the release of endorphins.

Job seekers need candid talks with mentors and coaches to shed light on strengths and grow in areas writing and speaking. It is essential that each job seeker understand what motivates him or her. It is not what you see that can keep you from being hired at the job you want. Everyone needs an individual who will get to the heart of the matter.

What areas do you find difficult to change? That is where the conversation should start. What do you think? Please offer your thoughts below.

About Mark Anthony Dyson

by Mark Anthony Dyson

5 Ways To Conspire Against Your Job Search

When I sit with a client a job search strategy session, we develop a career development plan. We create a contract agreeing to complete certain tasks with dates, times and how-to associated with the task. I will have a to do list, and my client, the job seeker has a list. We have each other’s list, and we work to make it happen. 9.9 out of 10 times I have to remind my client, but they pay me to do so. Without accountability it you are likely to fall behind and excuse yourself with your job search efforts. It is part of the longitudinal conspiracy against yourself.

That’s right, I said it! You are purposely derailing your own job search.

You are not helping your career by waiting for a lead to drop from the sky. Nor, are you strategically active researching and exhausting resources to gain insights about employers. You can blame laziness, passivity, and apathy for letting important career defining moments lapse. Many of these mini-moments occur in front of you, and you pass on an opportunity to display expertise. Sometimes, these are tests that an employer will employ to see if you’ll blink. I bet you blinked more than once.

Other times the volume and speed of the conversation intimidates you. They smile. You smile. The interviewer forcefully and politely ends the interview and before you know it, the meeting is over. And still you remain unemployed.

Conspirator!

Et tu, job seeker?

I can name several obvious ways that conspiracy against thyself rears its ugly head:

You lose track of the employers you approached, and networking contacts

The conspiracy: Shame on you not following up on resumes and other correspondence to employers seeking interviews, and other opportunities that could advance your career. It’s an essential part of your job search! Solution: Get organized and start using tools that provide reminders of contacts, events, and of course, follow calls.

It’s what you don’t say that speaks volumes

The conspiracy: What? No questions for the interviewer? No research done? No direct answers given? At this point, your silence says things you don’t want to say–you don’t care. You didn’t take time to prepare. Solution: Ask direct questions, and through research answer direct questions. Anticipate what will be asked, and prepare accordingly. If your experience has the depth, so will your answers.

You give too much information

The conspiracy: A bad sign–your overstated banter becomes someone else’s entertainment. You mentioned your former bosses and coworkers by name, how bad you the were to you, and nothing about what your team accomplished. Solution: Listen three times as much as you talk, and answer one question at time. Show understanding and give positive examples of how you worked with others and what you accomplished together.

Not asking the interviewer the right questions

The conspiracy: This is the part where the lack of diligence bites your butt because your preparation downloading “50 Questions to Ask in an Interview” was satisfactory to you. You didn’t prepare to interview with the specific company, and glean questions to ask about the company. Solution: One interview, one employer, one set of questions to ask the employer. There are LinkedIn groups to participate in, and the company’s 1-800 number to inquire about the company’s product and brand, and the website to capture the company’s philosophy.

Quietly passive upon receipt of the unanswered question

The conspiracy: Remaining neutral on direct questions is a common error. No one likes admitting it, but the bait and switch is a frequent strategy to avoid answering questions. Solution: An interview is a privilege, and never a right, so seeking confrontation when a question is not answered is more than a bad idea. Be tactful in asking the answer to a question. First see if you were clear, and assume that you were not. I suggest having a main question, and prepare a rephrased a and b question.