7 Best Behavioural Interview Questions for Managers

Management is as much as science as it is an art. You can train to be a great leader, but there are those to whom things come natural, and those that are simply made for management.
We see this problem in manager recruitment. You can find someone that looks amazing on paper – and indeed, they are probably a good manager. But ideally, you don’t want just “good.” You want someone that is going to genuinely excel. For that, you may need to identify who has the “art” of management. You’ll want to find the person with the natural talent to truly thrive at the position.

How to Identify the Best Managers

The quality of the person’s background can tell you a lot about how well they’ll succeed in the role. But when you narrow your list of candidates down to the last few, you’ll then need to identify which one has the problem solving ability and critical thinking skills that you want most for the role.
For that, you’ll need to find the right questions to ask the manager candidate at the interview. In management, where the ability to solve problems and show leadership is critical, you may want consider more behavioural interview questions.
These questions give you far more insight into the way the person will treat the role compared to basic background questions, because anyone can “tell you their leadership style” or answer questions about who they worked for, but only select people can answer detailed questions about their behaviours in managerial situations. Consider the following questions:

• What have you done in the past to alleviate stress from your team members?
• Tell me about a project where you’ve had to use your analytical skills. How did you demonstrate your skills and what was the outcome of the project?
• How have you handled difficult situations where you were confused about a customer’s request?
• Describe a time when someone you supervised gave you a new idea that was odd or different. How did you respond?
• Tell me about a time when you did not reach a project or business goal. What was your role and what did you learn?
• Give a specific example of a procedure that you created to simplify a process or workflow.
• Describe the steps you’ve taken in the past to settle a dispute or problem between your team members.

These questions all help illustrate the types of questions you can ask to managerial candidates to learn more about their character, and to start really understanding the type of manager that they’ll be.
But before you can get to this part of the interview, you first have to get to the candidates. For those in Australia that need help with their recruitment, contact Recruit Shop today.