6 Creative Interview Questions to Ask Job Candidates

The interview process plays a critical role in helping you find employees who are a good fit for your organization. It can even make a lasting impression on your potential hires. A 2019 report by PwC found that 49% of job candidates have turned down a job offer due to a bad experience during the hiring process.

One way to keep candidate attention — and make better hires for your company — is to ask unique interview questions. The best interview questions stand out to candidates, prompt critical thinking, and tell your company more about the talent you’re considering and whether the candidate would fit in well.

As you conduct job interviews today, think about these 6 strong questions to ask in an interview. Each one can help your business discover deeper insights about potential employees.

49% of job candidates have turned down a job offer due to a bad experience during the hiring process.

What are some unique interview questions?

The following creative interview questions are timely and relevant to today’s job candidates. See what types of responses you get to see if these questions are worth keeping in your interviews.

1. How has the pandemic affected you as a professional?

The COVID-19 pandemic has illuminated the need for workers to feel like their employers care about them as people. A 2021 study by Microsoft found that 40% of professionals feel more comfortable being their “full selves” at work post-pandemic, while 1 in 6 has cried with a colleague in the past year.

Asking this question to job candidates shows you acknowledge the challenges the pandemic has brought upon workers and that you recognize the human side of the crisis. You might also learn insights like a candidate’s comfort with virtual collaboration tools, remote work arrangements, and other work preferences via the answer to this question.

2. What’s your ideal workday?

Beyond an employee’s qualifications and how they fit with the job description, it’s important to know what an employee wants to do at work. When you learn all of an employee’s strengths, you can help them maximize their contributions to your business. According to Gallup research, employees who use their strengths at work:

• Are more engaged
• Produce higher-quality results
• Increase profits for a company
• Are less likely to leave a company

A question about an employee’s ideal workday helps your company understand where the best fit for a candidate is and the tasks at which they’ll excel. The answer to this question may even cause you to offer a completely different role to a candidate. As you interview people, seek to learn about how the individual can contribute to your company, not just in the role for which they’re interviewing.

3. What’s your favorite product or service of ours, and why?

Like the above question about strengths and an ideal workday, this type of question shows you:

• Why a candidate would be a fit for working on your product or service
• What a candidate knows about your company

The answer to this question could reveal employee strengths related to how you create your product or service, or how it serves your company. By asking this question, you can learn about how a candidate envisions bringing value to your company and why they’ll be passionate about working for you.

4. How would your former coworkers describe you?

Many interview questions tend to be about how the candidate views themselves from their own point of view. This question forces candidates to take a step back and observe themselves from a different angle.

When you get a glimpse of how others describe the candidate, it can provide social proof that the candidate would excel in the position. The answer can also reveal insights about the type of management style the candidate prefers, how they’d fit in with various teams, and whether they’re more suited for autonomous tasks or leadership-based work.

5. What’s something you learned recently?

A 2021 report by Harvard Business Review called lifelong learning “the only sustainable competitive advantage.” As technology rapidly develops and professionals must upskill or get left behind, a passion for learning can set your workforce apart from competitors.

Some companies ask candidates, “What’s the last great book you’ve read?” Today’s professionals, particularly younger generations like Millennials and Gen Z, may be learning more from TikTok videos or podcasts than books. This general question shows you what candidates want to learn about. It also confirms the people you’re interviewing are self-starters and learners who will continuously innovate for your company.

6. How would you pitch us as an employer to someone you care about?

This goes beyond the, “Why do you want to work for us?” question and forces the candidate to do a deeper dive on your company.

This goes beyond the, “Why do you want to work for us?” question and forces the candidate to do a deeper dive on your company. In their answer, you might learn things like how:

• A candidate views your company culture, and possibly why they’re a fit for it
• The candidate views the value of your product or service
• The candidate’s passions align with what you offer

This question also puts the candidate’s communication skills into practice. You’ll learn how a candidate talks with a friend, which could reveal insights about how they’d fit in with your culture. You’ll also get a sense of how engaged a candidate would be while working for your business.

Think outside the box for creative interview questions

As you collect good questions to ask in an interview, get your current employees involved in the process. Maybe there was something you asked that resonated with them. Or they might have ideas for unique interview questions.

These questions may catch candidates off-guard. Be sure to give them time to explain their answers and let them know there aren’t any incorrect responses. You might be surprised by what you learn and what it reveals about the candidate fit for your company.