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Interview Questions for Leadership Positions
Linked to APL Management Competencies and Behaviors
The questions below can be used to interview candidates for leadership positions. Not all of the questions
apply to every opening, and you are encouraged to select and tailor the questions so they best meet the requirements of
your position. One suggestion is to divide the questions among the interview team and have different interviewers ask
questions about different competencies.
Leadership
Think Strategically
 How have you built professional relationships with potential customers and sponsors?
 Tell me about a time when you recognized and created a new business opportunity.
 How have you established long term plans for your department/group? How did you follow-up and
work to achieve your objectives?
 What have you done as a leader to ensure that your work unit’s direction was consistent with the
greater organization’s vision?
 If you become the leader of this group/section/department, what 2-3 issues would require your
immediate attention? Why?
 How have you demonstrated being on the leading edge in your field? How have you used this
knowledge to lead projects or new initiatives?
Fostering Innovation
 Tell me how you stimulate new ideas and approaches in your current organization.
 What processes have you redesigned to better meet business requirements? How did you go about it?
Lessons learned?
Leading with Courage
 Tell me about a time when you had to tell your supervisor bad news. What did you do?
What did you learn from the experience?
 How have you stood up for co-workers and staff in a challenging situation?
 Tell me how you have had lead in a confrontational situation. What was the outcome?
 Tell me about a time when you were given a rush, high priority assignment. How did you handle it?
What was the outcome? How did you get other people on board to accomplish this task?
Developing and Motivating Staff
 When was the last time you had to integrate a new team member into your work group? How did
you do it?
 Have you had the experience where a staff member did not meet the expectations for their position?
What did you do? What were the results?
 How do you coach and provide feedback to your current team? How often?
 Give me an example of the support you provided when a staff member wanted to grow/develop new
skills.
 Give me 2 examples of how you have recognized others on your team within the past 2 months.
Interpersonal
Understanding Others
 Tell me what ideas you have heard from your staff/team members for improvement. What have you
done with those ideas?
 How do you gather information from your customers/and or sponsors on their needs? How often?
How have you used this information to plan for improvements or new products/services?
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Tell me about a time when your decision was modified or improved by the feedback and input of
others.
 If I were to ask the people in your work group about an area for development for you as a leader,
what would they say?
Promoting Team Unity
 Share with me an example of where you had to collaborate with other work units to achieve an
important organizational goal. What obstacles did you have to overcome to do this effectively and
how were the results impacted by this collaboration?
 How often and in what ways do you currently communicate with your team/section? Which
approaches are most/least effective?
 What have you done to build your work unit as an effective team?
Valuing Diversity
 What actions have you taken to ensure that diverse staff are provided opportunities for growth and
development?
 How have you handled challenging diversity related issues? As a new supervisor, what will you do
to ensure higher diversity of staff in your group/section?
 What things have you done to promote workplace diversity?
 What efforts have you made to ensure the inclusion of viewpoints of staff from different age, race,
cultural and gender backgrounds?
Administrative/Managerial
Planning/Prioritizing
 Tell me about the most recent comprehensive change you have managed in your area to date. How
did you come to understand the need for change? Who was involved in the change process? What
was your role? How was resistance handled? How did you assess the impact of the change? What
would you have done differently knowing what you know now?
 Describe a positive change that you have made as a result of input received from your supervisor.
 What steps do you take to ensure that customer/sponsor satisfaction is a top priority?
 What do you do to make sure that you are on the forefront of your technical/functional field?
 How do you set priorities for the year? How do you include staff in this process?
Making Decisions
 You were the technical lead for ….. (describe the role). What is an example of a challenge you faced
in a leadership role, and how did you handle it? What would you do differently next time?
 How do you ensure that information is shared freely on your team or within your section/group?
 What was the last significant decision you were responsible for making? How did you arrive at your
decision?
 Can you give me an example of a good decision and an example of, in retrospect, a poor decision that
you have made in the last year? What were the lessons learned from this experience?
Delegating/Managing Tasks
 Tell me about a time when you were leading an important project for a customer and did not trust that
all the team members had the capability or motivation to make it a complete success. What did you
do?
 How do you currently ensure that each person on your team knows what is expected? How are
priorities discussed?
 In your management role what are the key factors you keep in mind when deciding whether or not to
delegate a task or do it yourself? Give an example of a task you decided to delegate and explain why.
Give another example of a task you decided to do yourself and explain why.
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