Interview questions
Grouped by what each question is testing, not by job title. The same six things get tested in almost every interview, and the wording is the only part anyone rewrites.
The bank
36 questions across six groups
- Motivation
Why this role?
Listening for · Whether you read past the title — a specific line from the posting, not enthusiasm.
- Motivation
Why us, and not a competitor?
Listening for · One concrete thing about the company. Anything that would be true of five companies is a non-answer.
- Motivation
Tell me about yourself.
Listening for · A route from where you started to why you are in this room. Three stops, not thirty.
- Motivation
Where do you want to be in three years?
Listening for · Whether this job is on the way there. They are checking retention, not ambition.
- Motivation
What made you start looking?
Listening for · That you can leave without disparaging anyone. The reason matters less than the tone.
- Motivation
What would make you turn this down?
Listening for · That you have criteria at all. "Nothing" reads as no options rather than strong interest.
- Behaviour
Tell me about a time you failed.
Listening for · A real failure with your name on it, and what changed afterwards. The change is the whole answer.
- Behaviour
Describe a time you disagreed with a decision.
Listening for · Whether you disagreed and then committed, or disagreed and then sulked.
- Behaviour
When did you last miss a deadline?
Listening for · Who you told, and when. Missing is normal; discovering it late is the problem.
- Behaviour
Tell me about a time you had to say no.
Listening for · That you can decline work without escalating it into a conflict.
- Behaviour
Give an example of feedback you found hard.
Listening for · Whether you can repeat the feedback accurately. People who dismissed it usually cannot.
- Behaviour
Describe something you shipped that you would build differently.
Listening for · Technical honesty with no self-flagellation. One concrete change is enough.
- Judgement
How do you decide what to work on first?
Listening for · A rule you actually apply, not a framework you can name.
- Judgement
When do you stop investigating and act?
Listening for · That a threshold exists. Anyone who says "when I am certain" has never shipped under pressure.
- Judgement
Tell me about a decision you made with incomplete information.
Listening for · What you did to make the decision reversible.
- Judgement
How would you handle two urgent things at once?
Listening for · Whether you ask who is waiting on each. The answer is a question.
- Judgement
What is a risk you took that did not pay off?
Listening for · That you priced the downside before taking it.
- Judgement
How do you know when something is good enough?
Listening for · A definition owned by someone — you, a spec, a user — rather than a feeling.
- Craft
Walk me through something you built.
Listening for · Whether you can pitch the level of detail at your listener. They will adjust once and watch whether you notice.
- Craft
What is the hardest problem you have solved?
Listening for · Hard for a reason you can name. Difficulty without a cause reads as scale, not skill.
- Craft
How do you keep your work maintainable?
Listening for · One habit with a cost attached. Habits with no cost are aspirations.
- Craft
What would you improve about your last project?
Listening for · That you have looked at it since. A project nobody revisits teaches nothing.
- Craft
How do you test what you build?
Listening for · Where you stop, and why there. Coverage numbers are not an answer.
- Craft
Explain something technical to a non-specialist.
Listening for · Whether you drop the jargon or just define it. Defining it is still using it.
- People
How do you handle a colleague who is not delivering?
Listening for · That you spoke to them before you spoke about them.
- People
Tell me about someone you helped get better.
Listening for · Specificity. A named person and a named thing they can now do.
- People
How do you work with someone you disagree with often?
Listening for · That disagreement is about the work and stays there.
- People
Describe a time you had to deliver bad news.
Listening for · Whether you led with the news or buried it in context.
- People
What do you do when you are blocked?
Listening for · How long you wait before asking. Both extremes are answers, and both are wrong.
- People
How do you prefer to be managed?
Listening for · Self-knowledge, and whether it is compatible with how this team runs.
- Closing
What questions do you have for us?
Listening for · That you have some. Two specific questions beat six generic ones.
- Closing
Is there anything we have not asked that we should have?
Listening for · A gap you want to close, said plainly. It is a genuine offer, not a formality.
- Closing
What are your salary expectations?
Listening for · A range with a reason. A single number is a negotiating position by accident.
- Closing
When could you start?
Listening for · That you know your notice period. Guessing here is the one avoidable stumble.
- Closing
How did you find this process?
Listening for · Honest, useful feedback. They are asking about their own process, not about you.
- Closing
Anything you want to add?
Listening for · One sentence you prepared. Not a summary of the last hour.
What a question is actually asking
- The question
- What gets said out loud. It varies by company, by interviewer, and by how much of the day they have had.
- Listening for
- What they are checking. This barely varies at all, which is why preparing the group beats memorising the wording.
Six groups, because six is what an interview has time for. A seventh group would be a longer interview, not a better one.
Your set
Questions you keep are collected here, and the mock run starts from this set when it has one. Signed out, the set lives on this device only; signing in moves it to your account.
Nothing kept yet. Use Keep on any question.
How to use it without memorising anything
Step one
Pick a group, not a question
Read the six “listening for” lines in one group. They are the same six things, worded six ways.
Step two
Find one real example per group
One example can answer four questions in a group. Six examples cover an interview.
Step three
Say it out loud once
The mock run exists for this. Reading an answer and saying it are different skills, and only one of them is tested.
What this is not
- Not model answers. A model answer is somebody else’s evidence, and an interviewer can hear the difference.
- Not the questions you will be asked. Some of them, worded differently. That is what the grouping is for.
- Not a score. Nothing on this page judges an answer, and nothing you write here is sent anywhere.
- Not company-specific. A company’s own questions come from its own process. These are the ones every process shares.
Questions about the questions
Are these the questions I will be asked?
Some of them, worded differently. The grouping is by what a question tests, so preparing the group is worth more than memorising the wording.
Why is there no model answer?
A model answer is somebody else’s evidence. What is here instead is the thing the interviewer is listening for, so you can check your own against it.
Does ClearHire score my answers?
No. Nothing here judges an answer. The mock interview reports which beats you left out, which is structure, not quality.
Can I add my own questions?
Yes, in the mock run. A question you were actually asked is worth more than one from a bank, and the run keeps it with the rest of your set.