§ Give me a brief about your experience so far and also about the initiatives you took to enhance your department and some key contribution in your working tenure?.
The purpose of asking this question is to gain an insight about his or her experience and how follow up questions can be framed.
§ What are your strength and weaknesses ?.
Talking about their strength gives them a great opportunity to showcase what they can do and also for me to gauge if their strengths can be leveraged and aligned with the vision of the hotel. For example, if they say that creativity is their strength, they also should talk about a time when they used their creativity to solve a problem or address a challenge. Weakness: Not easy to answer ! The question is asked to gauge if first do they really know what is the area of improvement and another if their weakness will stop them from doing the job they have applied for or be a hindrance towards their optimum performance.
§ What attracted / motivated you to be a part of our company?.
Answer to this question gives an insight in case the candidate has done their research about the company, hotel or not. They are able to ace the answer, In case if they are able to talk about what stands out about the company’s mission and values, and how that resonates with their own career path. If candidates find the purpose of the company intriguing and they want to align themselves with the company’s purpose it automatically becomes an added advantage
§ Tell me about a time you encountered a business challenge & How did you overcome it?.
This kind of question is asked to understand if the candidate proactively reacts to the situation or acts promptly in the situation, what was the task they had to undergo, what was their plan of action, how did they mobilize the team to solve the situation in hand along with themselves and what was the result because of the course of action undertaken by them.
§ Tell me as a leader what has been your contribution towards Training your employees and mentoring your subordinates?.
It is responsibility of every leader to create better leaders and managers than himself for the organisation. If any proactive step was taken in developing talent and is able to justify it with giving examples.
§ Tell me about a time you have disagreed about any idea or decision with your head of department or your fellow managers.
The key here is to gauge one’s ability to handle conflict in a mature way and come up with a compromise that is mutually beneficial to all the parties involved.
§ How do you address any behavioral issue or any performance issue with any colleague?
This is a definite question of anyone being interviewed for the leadership role to gauge his or her people management skills. Every situation and colleague is unique and requires personalized attention.
§ Tell me what have been your coping mechanism during COVID -19 ?
Through this I am able to gauge that does the candidate has out of the box thinking and survival spirit within himself. We live in a VUCA world now, this question helps me to understand if a candidate can adapt, improvise and overcome in any problem he or she is subjected to.
