When you are interviewing for a new manager, you need to learn not as much about a candidate’s technical skills as you do about their people skills. However, their ability to understand, support, communicate with, and manage people is not clear or obvious from a typical listing of what roles they played when and where.
Here are 3 questions that can help you dig beneath the facts of a resume to unearth answers that will give solid clues as to how your candidate might behave as a new manager on the job.
- To determine if they know how to give feedback and handle difficult situations, ask them to describe a time when an employee’s performance was below par and how they responded. Follow up to ask if they would handle the problem differently in retrospect and how long the performance was below par and why.
- To determine if they truly care about an employee’s development, ask if they would share a few examples of how they supported former team members in achieving career goals. Then follow up to ask if they would refer you to one of these employees so you could learn first-hand about their experience.
- To determine if they know how to show their appreciation for a job well done, ask about how they have rewarded employees in the past. You want to learn not only that they value individual contributions but also that they know their team members well enough to give rewards that are personally meaningful. Then follow up to ask if they would refer you to one of these employees so you could learn first-hand about their experience.
