Core Competency Interview Questions
Contents
1.0 Core Competencies
1.1 Adhering to Principles & Values
1.2 Customer Focus
1.3 Teamwork
1.4 Creating & Innovating
1.5 Results Orientation
1.6 Deciding & Initiating Action
1.7 Adapting & Responding to Change
Core Competencies
1.1 Adhering to Principles and Values
Give an example of a time your principles or values were challenged at
work.
What action did you take?
What did you do to support your position?
Tell me about a time when someone has made unreasonable demands on
you.
Why was this unreasonable?
How did you deal with the individual to tackle this?
What sort of ethics or values do you need to uphold in your work?
Why are these important?
What do you do to uphold these?
How would you deal with company ethics or values which were different from your own?
1.2 Customer Focus
Who are your key customers?
How do you understand and meet the needs of these customers?
Give an example of a difficult customer relationship (internal/external)
that you have had to manage & improve over time.
What were the issues at the beginning?
How did you decide how to handle it?
What was the result?
Tell me about how have you managed conflicting priorities in the past,
whilst maintaining a good level of service to your customers?
To what extent were you able to balance the internal business requirements with the needs of the
customer?
How did you measure the success?
What lessons did you learn from this incident?
Give me an example of a time when you had to satisfy a particular
customer or client need (this could be an internal or external
'customer').
How did you make sure that the client/customer was fully satisfied with your work?
How did you ensure that you set and delivered to agreed timescales and delivery standards with
the customer?
How effectively do you think you satisfied the client's expectations?
Tell me about a time when you have failed to deliver a promise to a
customer and the action you took.
Why were you unable to deliver?
How did you communicate this?
What was the result?
1.3 Teamwork
Tell us about a time when you have been working in a team that did not
work well together.
How did it impact you & the wider team?
What were you able to do to improve the situation?
Give us an example of a time when you needed to be particularly
supportive to other members within your team.
Why was this required?
How did you decide the extent of the support that was required?
Give an example of a time that you have successfully created a virtual
team in order to deliver a significant project or objective.
How did you identify the right people?
What challenges did you face throughout the project? (geography, communication, culture)
Tell us about a time when you have had to build a working relationship
outside of your team
Why was this needed?
Were there any barriers to overcome?
What is the benefit of this for you or the team?
1.4 Creating & Innovating
Give us an example of an improvement that you have made to working
practices or processes within your role.
Why was an improvement required?
What did you do and what was the impact?
Give me an example of a time when you developed a new or different
solution to a problem.
Why did you think the problem needed a new solution?
How did you develop the new solution?
What feedback did you receive on how it was working?
Give an example of a time when you found it necessary to take a short
cut in a process.
Why did you do it?
What was the impact?
Would you do this again?
1.5 Results Orientation
Tell us about a time when you have had to work under pressure to
achieve stretching work/project objectives/deliverables.
What was tough about it?
What sacrifice did you have to make to achieve the objective?
Give me an example of when you have had to deliver to a business
critical deadline (e.g. corporate objective)
What was the situation?
What was pressurised about the situation?
Did you have to compromise anything to achieve the deadline?
To what extent were you successful?
What would you do differently?
Talk me through a time when you had to take responsibility for a project
deliverable or specific task.
What was it?
What was your role?
How did you approach the task?
How did you ensure you delivered within time, cost and scope constraints?
Talk through a time when you were not able to meet a customer
deadline or expectation.
What was the situation?
What did you do to try and resolve it?
Why was it not successful?
Give us an example of a challenging project that you have been
responsible for.
How did you pull the team together?
How did you ensure that you delivered within the time/cost/scope constraints?
To what extent were you successful?
What would you do differently?
1.6 Deciding & Initiating Action
Give an example of a time when you have had to make difficult decisions
with limited information or time.
How did you come to the decision that you took?
To what extent did you have to involve others in the decision making?
What was difficult about the process?
Give me an example of a situation where you had to take the initiative.
Why was this necessary?
How effective did you feel you were?
What would you differently next time?
Tell us about a time when you have had a controversial decision to make
and communicate.
What was the impact on others?
To what extent did you have to consider this impact in your decision?
What were the alternatives and why were they discounted?
Give an example of when you had to make a decision based on minimal
information available.
How did you evaluate your options?
Did you consult anyone?
In hindsight, would you have made the same decision?
Give an example of when you been able advise on or initiate a new procedure or
change an existing procedure
Tell us about the last time one of your projects went off track.
How did you identify it went off track.
What did you do to get it back on course?
Tell us about a time you had to make a difficult or controversial decision that had
an effect on others or you.
What was the decision?
How did it affect others?
How did you communicate this decision?
1.7 Adapting & Responding to Change
Give an example of a time that you have had to adapt quickly to
changing circumstances/priorities?
How did the change impact you?
What were the difficulties in managing the change?
Give an example of when you have had to adapt your style or approach
to resolve a situation.
What was the situation?
What did you have to change to overcome the situation?
Give an example of a time that you had to adapt quickly to changing priorities /
circumstances
How did the change impact you?
Give an example of when you had to implement a change that you did not agree
with
What was the change?
Why did you not agree with it?
What was the outcome?
