Question

Of the roles you undertook, which was your favourite?

Answer 1

Answer:

You’ve landed a job interview. Congratulations!

And now you’re reading this guide, which means you recognise preparing interview answers is key to securing the job.

You’re already ahead of some of your competition.

Prepared candidates give detailed, concise and relevant answers. Which is exactly what employers want to hear.

Preparation means you’ll be more confident, less fearful of the unknown and much less likely to suffer from interview nerves.

If you’re preparing for interview, we have some good news:

“Surprise questions aren’t as common as you’d think; 85% of questions are entirely predictable,” says John Lees, interview coach and author of Knockout Interview and The Interview Expert: How to Get the Job You Want.

To help you nail your interview, we’ve spoken to a wide range of interview experts and determined the 20 most common interview questions. For each common interview question, those experts also tell us:

What the employer really wants to know. By employer, we mean the interviewer(s) and hiring manager(s).

How to answer the question.

How not to answer the question.

The typical ways interviewers phrase questions. We find the most common interview questions are often asked in slightly different ways.

Before getting into the specifics of the 20 questions, it’s worth drawing your attention to two killer pieces of interview advice that our experts agree apply to all interview questions:

First, match your skills, competencies and experiences with those the employer requested in their job advert.

Second, come up with your own answers to these common questions. Don’t give stock replies. You won’t find ready made answers here. Instead, we’ll help you give your very best answer.

See also our handy guides on preparing for competency-based interview questions:

How to handle competency based interview questions

The most common competency-based interview questions (and how to answer them)