Before going into all the minute details of this article, Prep My Career wants to congratulate all the eligible candidates who have made it to the final round. A personal interview is the last step in a recruitment process, and after giving an exceptional performance in this round, you are most certainly eligible to be selected for your dream job. Thus, work hard and prepare seriously for this final round.
How Is A Personal Interview Conducted?
A personal interview is conducted in a closed room with little outside noise and disturbance. It can vary in duration from 5 minutes to 15 minutes to maybe 40 minutes, and this length entirely depends upon the nature of the job profile, your own performance, and interaction level. Usually, a personal interview is of two types, which are:
- One to One Personal Interview: In this type of interview process, there will be a single person, a subject matter expert, who will examine you by way of several interactive and thoughtful interview questions.
- Panel Based Personal Interview: In this type, instead of a single interviewer, there would be a panel of 3 to 5 industry veterans who will assess your personality and approach. In this type of interview process, usually, you are the main driver of the interview process and decide what will be the next question. Whatever you say, will be used as the basis to ask several types of interview questions. For example, If you say, “Basketball is your hobby”, then be ready to tell the diameter of a basketball in the next question.
21 Best Personal Interview Questions To Study
The best way to prepare for a personal interview is by studying the frequently asked interview questions. Prepmycareer has devised a set of 21 best and most asked personal interview questions, that must be read and studied sincerely. These questions are:
1. Tell Me About Yourself.
Usually, a personal interview starts with this question. Through this first question, an interviewer wants you to be more comfortable with him or her and put an end to the estranged relationship. Be confident, and just share:
- Your Full Name
- Your City
- Your Educational Qualifications
- Your Hobbies and
- Your Current Occupation (what you are currently doing, you might be pursuing any profesional course or may be working somewhere with an organization)
2. Describe A Time When You Took Initiative At Your Workplace.
Working at any business organization is tricky and it poses a new set of challenges every day. You might have faced several opportunities at your workplace when you were the first one to start off with any particular task or project. For example, nobody was willing to do a physical market survey, but you did it voluntarily. This shows your level of commitment and seriousness, which are some of the most preferred traits.
3. Where Do You See Yourself In FIve Years?
This is a common interview question and you will always be asked about your future plans. Make sure that you deliver answers that are not absurd, rather they must be relevant, and have a good likelihood of occurrence. Never reply in the following manner:
- I hope to replace you in this company.
- I see myself as the best competitor of the company.
- I will create a start-up that will do a similar business.
4. We Believe In Delivering A Quality Performance To Our Clients. How Do You Interpret The Term “Quality”?
This is a word-based interview question wherein you will be required to interpret the term “quality”. Every business organization wants its employees to work by maintaining the highest level of seriousness and following the best business standards and ethics. In a corporate-friendly world, quality can be anything from client satisfaction to following the manuals or established benchmarks. Try giving a perfect reply to this interview question.
5. Employees Only Work For Money. Comment On This Statement.
This is a behavior-based interview question, in which you are given a controversial statement, which you need to reject or ratify using logic and rationale. This is a negative statement and must be rejected. It is true that money is the primary motivational factor for all the employees, but make sure that you list some other benefits also, like, interaction, personal development, guidance, knowledge enhancement, etc.
6. Share A Time When You Did A Task At Your Workplace, You Knew Nothing About.
Through this interview question, an interviewer wants you to share any real event that you might have faced at your workplace. Sometimes, we have to work upon some tasks at which we are not that proficient or simply have no knowledge about them. But still, employees prefer to work, for the sake of their business organization. A perfect answer to this question would put on display commitment and loyalty, which are necessary employee attributes.
7. We Will Require You To Work On Multiple Tasks. How Do You Prioritize?
It is common for business organizations to require their employees to work on multiple tasks. In order to complete these multiple tasks in a time-bound manner, it is necessary that the employees are able to arrange these tasks on the basis of any prioritization technique. You might order the tasks on the basis of their difficulty level or simply arrange them on the basis of their time consumption. Whatever it is, just share an appropriate strategy with your interviewer.
8. Describe Yourself In A Single Word.
This is a personality evaluating interview question, through which you are required to summarize your whole personality using a single word. Always remember to use corporate-friendly words, such as hardworking, persevering, detail-oriented, honest, etc. Moreover, you are also required to explain your selection on the basis of justified reasons and logic.
9. What Is Your Ideal Team Culture?
Nowadays, almost all business organizations prefer to work in a team environment. Through this question, an interviewer wants to know, what are the various qualities or attributes that you would like to see in your team members. These may be anything from being supportive, dedicated, intelligent, loyal, etc. Whatever it is, just share an honest opinion.
10. Our Work Schedule Is Usually Hectic and Cumbersome. How Do You Manage Stress Levels?
Business organizations work in an environment that is quite dynamic and is affected by a variety of factors. This pressure is ultimately transferred onto the employees of the company and they have to work in a hectic and fast-moving work environment. Thus, stress management is a common expectation of business organizations and every company expects its employees to have a few strategies to cope with their stress levels. As an ideal response, just share two to three such strategies.
11. Work Related Failures Are A Part Of Life. Have You Faced Any? If Yes, Please Share Your Experience.
Success is not a guarantee, and as per a recent study, there is always a greater chance of failure than success in any event. However, still, many of us are not able to cope with failure, which affects our performance adversely. Hence, efforts must be laid to deliver a performance that is stress-free and is not influenced by the fear of failure. Through this question, an interviewer wants to know about your strategies, which you prefer to follow while dealing with failures at your workplace.
12. We Would Like To Know Some Of Your Weaknesses.
It is a common interview question and through this question, an interviewer wants to know about some of your weaknesses. It is true that this question is a negative one, but this surely helps an interviewer to assess your personality and attitude. The best way to answer this question is by analyzing yourself and then writing down a few weaknesses on a piece of paper. Prepare at least three closest weaknesses and you are good to go.
13. What Are Your Salary Expectations?
This is a common interview question using which an interviewer wants you to share a quote of your salary expectations. There is nothing technical in this question but when answered in an inappropriate manner, can severely impact your selection chances. Whatever salary you quote, must be:
- In a salary bracket, for example, $45,000 to $52,000 per annum.
- Based on industry research
It is pertinent to note that you do not give any salary figure that is random, as there are high chances that this salary might be too high or too low than the median salary. In both cases, your selection chances would reduce drastically, as you would be seen as a person who is either not serious or too greedy.
14. What Motivates You To Work?
Everyone is motivated by a few motivational factors that prompt him or her to work hard at the workplace. An interviewer is always interested in knowing these factors as these help him in conducting thorough research of your personality and approcach. Be genuine and try to avoid all the generic answers.
15. If You Were An Animal, What Would You Like To Be?
This question is a master personality evaluator and needs some extra preparation and effort. As an ideal response to this question, you are expected to choose any corporate-friendly animal, such as an elephant, dog, dolphin, honey bee, bald eagle, etc. Post this, justify your selection by sharing some of the best qualities of the chosen animal, that might be helpful in executing the job’s tasks and duties.
16. Share Some Of Your Major Strengths.
This is a common interview question and marks its appearance in almost all the interview sessions held across the world. Try to be genuine and prefer avoiding all the generic answers. You are always expected to share at least two of your major strengths as an ideal response to this question.
17. We All Have Our Preferences. How Do You Prefer To Work – Individually or Independently?
This question requires you to choose between two options, whether you prefer to work individually or you are a team player and prefer to work with team members. The latter is always a preferred selection, however, you can choose the former also. Whatever you choose, make sure that you are just justifying it with relevant reasons and logic.
18. How Comfortable Are You With Rotating Shifts?
Established business organizations have to handle a heavy workload and prefer working 24 hours. To give effect to it, they hire employees in several different shifts, that keeps on changing as per the requirements of the company. Always answer this question positively, as this is a common expectation.
19. Why Do You Want To Work With Us?
This question checks your level of commitment, seriousness, and loyalty towards the business organization. Browse the official website of the company and note down a few relevant facts from it. Post this, compile all those facts with your personal interests in the company. This would lead to the creation of a relevant, crisp, and impressive answer.
20. When Can You Begin Working?
This question requires you to share the date on or after which you can start working with the company. This question in no way guarantees your selection. Hence, you are requested to never get too excited and lose focus. Further, it is true that immediate starters are always preferred but despite this, always say a “no” if you are already working somewhere and you are confident that you will not be able to start immediately.
21. Do You Have Any Questions For Us?
A personal interview is always concluded through this question. If you ever encounter this question during your interview session, be assured that your opportunity has been concluded and there will be no more questions after this. You can certainly go home, but before that, you need to answer this question in a perfect manner. As an ideal response just ask about the organization, its ethics, work culture, rules, guidelines, etc. Below is a list of model questions for your kind reference:
- What are the different work timings in various shifts that are offered by the company?
- What are the various allowances and incentives that are offered by the company to its regular employees?
- Please share a list of all the paid leaves that are offered by the company to its employees.
References
- https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/wk/acm/2020/00000096/00000008/art00042
- https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1362361320981319
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Sandeep Bhandari is the founder of PrepMyCareer.com website.
I am a full-time professional blogger, a digital marketer, and a trainer. I love anything related to the Web, and I try to learn new technologies every day.
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