Common Leadership Interview Questions & How To Answer

Leadership takes on different forms, and is required at every stage, even at junior or graduate jobs. As you move up the job levels, your responsibilities are likely to increase as well. This may involve leading a team, managing high net worth accounts or making the call on strategic decisions. 

Suppose you’re interviewing for your first leadership job or are hoping to step up to a higher leadership level. In that case, you’ll be faced with some tough interview questions to prove that you have the aptitude and skills for the job. 

We look at the top skills that employers look for in leadership candidates, common  questions you could be asked in a leadership interview, along with example answers and tips on how to prepare for a leadership interview. 

Top leadership skills employers look for

Every job requires a unique set of skills. Still, it is possible to list specific soft and hard skills that employers tend to look for in candidates interviewing for a leadership role. These include: 

3 interview questions that are frequently asked

The type of leadership interview questions you may be asked will depend on the job and the industry. Here are three frequently asked leadership interview questions: 

1. How would you describe your leadership style?

The employer wants to know how you lead and how comfortable you are doing it. Think about a past situation where you’ve had to take the lead. This could be in a previous job, at college or university or in a volunteering role. Be truthful in describing your style and emphasise the value of this. 

Example answer: “I like to lead from the front. I make sure I’m visible to my team and take action when needed. I demonstrate what needs doing, and I continually communicate to my team to ensure we’re all aware of what each other is working on.”

2. Talk about a leadership challenge you’ve faced. How did you overcome it?

The employer wants to understand how you approach a situation that involves taking decisive action or making a tough decision. Think back to when you had to use your decision-making skills and explain what options you had, why you chose the route and what the outcome was. 

Example answer: “A new staff member had not included part of an important customer’s order. This caused a delay for the customer and they weren’t happy about it. They demanded that this person never works on their account again. Looking into why this happened, it became obvious we needed to improve our training procedures for our staff. I phoned the customer and explained why it had happened and told them that our staff was going through more training. I also explained that we were introducing spot peer reviews of orders to prevent this from happening again. The customer was happy with this.”

3. Why do you want to take on a leadership role?

This question is tricky to answer as it’s not directly asking what skills or attributes make you a good leader. Instead, the employer wants to know what is motivating you to take up a leadership role. You’ll need to be clear about the reasons why you want a leadership job and be able to demonstrate to them that you have the necessary drive, energy and confidence to take this job on.

Example answer: “Over the last 10 years I’ve taken the lead on several successful projects, and I now feel ready to move up to a senior role. I’ve also worked under some fantastic project managers and I’ve learned from them that you need to have great time-management, communication and organisational skills. I would use my industry knowledge and previous leadership experience to support my team and to bring out the potential in every team member.”

Tips on how to prepare for a leadership interview  

Each employer will be looking for different leadership qualities, so don’t assume you know what they want. Instead, look back through the job description or application pack to see which skills are mentioned. For example, the job may need someone who can inspire and bring out the best in others. Or, it could require someone who is flexible in their approach to working and who can quickly and easily adapt their working style to fit different environments. 

Now that you know what skills and qualities the employer is looking for, you can apply the STAR technique to back up your claims that you possess these skills. 

The STAR technique is a highly effective method of answering behavioural or situational style interview questions. These types of interviews require you to look back at past, real-life work situations and describe how you approached and handled them and what the end result was. 

STAR stands for Situation, Task, Action and Result. In brief: