Pretty much all jobs require some sort of teamwork. Employers are looking for people who can work well with others, identify with their team and contribute to the success of the team even if that means putting aside their individual interests. Team players are reliable and responsible, keep their co-workers informed, support and respect others and are always ready to help out.
These questions are great way to prepare for interviews because they use a very common model of interview questioning called the competency model.
Teamwork interview questions
Download this list in Word, Excel and PDF- Tell me about a time when you had difficulty getting others to establish a common approach to a problem. How did you handle it? What was the outcome?
- How have you resolved conflict or criticism within a team in which you have been a member?
- How have you resolved conflict or criticism within a team that you have managed?
- What things created excitement and motivation in your current team?
- Tell me about the last time that you had a conflict with your manager. What was the conflict and how did you resolve it?
- Give me an example of when you put the goals of the team before your own?
- Give me an example of a time when you had high morale on the job. What caused it? What did you learn?
- Give me an example of a time when you have low morale on the job what caused it? What did you learn?
- What experience have you had in building a team? How did you go about it?
- What challenges have you faced in developing your team into an effective team?
- Describe an experience when you saw the working environment or management style weaken team effectiveness. What did you do?
- Tell me what you understand to be the important steps in building a team. Give me an example when you used the steps.
- How would your co-workers describe you as a team player?
- Tell me about a situation in which you pulled back on your personal goals for the sake of the team.
- Describe your experience working on project teams, task forces or as a member of a work group? What was it like for you? What role did you primarily play?
- In terms of preference, where would you place yourself on a continuum from individual performer to team player?
- For you, what's the most difficult aspect of working with other people?
- How would your peers in your last job describe your working relationship with them?
- Describe a team or group that was extremely easy for you to work with and tell me why they were easy for you.
- What sort of people do you find it difficult to work with? What do you do when you have to work with these people?
- Have you ever had to refuse to work with someone? If so, why? What did you do about it?
- What do you do when you have to work with someone you don't like?
Competency based interview questions
Competency focused questions are designed to help draw out a person's experience by asking for examples of when they have performed a function or have shown that they have a skill/competency. This style of questioning is popular because it is more likely to draw out whether a person has the competencies to perform a role.Models that used closed questions like 'tell me what x means' tend to exclude younger or less experienced candidates and won't necessarily identify a person who has the right competence - experience of x doesn't mean you were good at x.