Career Services Office

Students and Alumni - Career Guides

Career Resources - Interviewing - Interview Questions According to Categories

Most interview questions will fall under the following categories: your background, work experience, work environment preference, career goals, college experience, company research, and personal characteristics. Knowing how you feel about each of these areas, is a starting point in answering most interview questions. Interviewers appreciate sincere, specific, well thought out answers. You can ensure that you provide quality responses to the interviewers questions by
thinking about the identified categories prior to interviewing. In doing this, you will be ready to answer variations of the most frequently asked questions.

SAMPLE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS GROUPED BY CATEGORY

BACKGROUND

Tell me about yourself. What do you consider your outstanding achievements?
Give me an example of a time when you dealt with pressure? Describe a time when you used your leadership skills?

WORK EXPERIENCE

Explain a project you completed or tell me what you have learned from previous jobs?
Do you prefer working independently or on a team? How do you organize and plan for major projects?
What kind of people do you like to work with?
What kind of people do you find difficult to work with?
What would your past supervisors say about you?

CAREER GOALS

What do you want out of your career?
What would you like to be doing five/ten years from now?
What are your short-term career goals? What motivates you to build a career in this field?

COLLEGE EXPERIENCE

Describe your most rewarding college experience and tell me why it was so rewarding?
Why did you choose your particular major?
Why did you choose to attend UM-D? Tell me about some things you learned in school that could be used on the job? Provide examples of how college has prepared you to take on greater responsibility? Is your GPA indicative of your ability? Why/Why not?

COMPANY RESEARCH

Why are you interested in working for this company?
What do you know about my organization? How do you feel you'll contribute to our company?
As described to you, what about this position appeals to you?

PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS

Tell of a time when you where faced with a stressful professional situation and how you managed it?
Explain a situation when you received criticism and how you handled it?
What is your greatest weakness/ strength? How will you contribute to our company?