Decision-making interview questions help you determine your candidates’ experience and competency in making decisions at work.
We talk about why you should test a candidate’s ability to make decisions and give you a list of the best decision-making interview questions.
Making sound decisions is a critical skill for any role. During interviews, hiring managers often ask behavioral questions about how you have made decisions in the past to assess your judgment and critical thinking. Being able to give compelling examples of your decision making process and outcomes can set you apart from other candidates. In this article, we will look at common decision making interview questions, how to prepare winning answers, and examples to guide you.
Why Do Interviewers Ask About Decision Making?
Interviewers ask decision making questions for several reasons
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To understand your decision making process. They want to know how you gather information, weigh options, analyze data, and ultimately land on a choice. This provides insight into how you would make decisions on the job.
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To assess judgment and critical thinking skills. Your examples will demonstrate how you analyze options and use logic to select optimal solutions. Strong decisions take into account various stakeholders, objectives and potential roadblocks.
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To evaluate past outcomes. Interviewers want to hear examples of key decisions you have made and what the results were. Good choices lead to positive outcomes that you can take credit for. If there were poor results, they want to hear how you learned from the experience.
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To see how you operate under pressure. Many key business decisions need to be made quickly with limited information. Your examples will showcase how you remain focused and think on your feet when the pressure is high.
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To determine values and ethics. The choices you make reflect your integrity and values. Interviewers want to make sure your decision making aligns with the company’s principles.
Common Decision Making Interview Questions
Here are some of the most common decision making questions you may be asked:
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Tell me about a time when you had to make a difficult decision. This open-ended question allows you to choose an example that showcases your judgment. Focus on a key business decision rather than a personal one.
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Describe a time when you made a decision that was unpopular. How did you handle implementing the choice despite opposition? What was the outcome? Highlight your ability to make tough calls.
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Walk me through a time when you had to solve a problem. Outline the situation, your process for analyzing options, how you selected the best solution, and the results. Showcase analytical abilities.
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Tell me about a time you made a bad decision. What was the situation? How did you realize the choice was not working? Then explain how you addressed the misstep and what you learned. Show you can acknowledge and fix mistakes.
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Describe a time you had to make a quick decision under pressure. How did you ensure you had enough key information? What techniques did you use to think clearly despite the urgent timeline? Demonstrate decisiveness.
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How did you weigh pros and cons before making a major decision? Pick an example where you had to consider multiple angles. Walk through your cost-benefit analysis process. Showcase analytical thinking.
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Tell me about a time you had to defend a key decision. Why did people disagree with your choice? How did you persuade them? Share an example that shows you can back up decisions strategically.
How to Prepare Winning Answers
With some prep work, you can develop and practice responses to demonstrate your stellar decision making skills. Follow these tips:
Choose relevant examples. Pick key decisions from your work history that apply to the role you are interviewing for. If possible, highlight examples that show leadership ability, analytical thinking, problem solving, and sound judgment.
Be specific. Vague, general examples won’t make much impact. Provide details like the key players involved, financials if applicable, options you considered, data points that factored in, and why your choice was optimal. Timelines and numbers help tell a vivid story.
Explain your process. Walk through how you made the decision, not just the outcome. What methodology do you use to make sound choices? Do you gather input from others? How do you analyze options? Share your step-by-step approach.
Be honest about mistakes. Everyone makes poor calls sometimes so don’t try to pretend you always make perfect decisions. Talk through how you learned important lessons from less optimal choices. Show maturity.
Highlight positive outcomes. What results did your decisions lead to? Quantify the impact if possible. Share key numbers and data that exhibit the success of your choice. Make sure credit falls to you.
Connect to core competencies. Tie your examples back to key skills needed for the target role like leadership, collaboration, analysis, problem solving, or communication. Help the interviewer see how your past decisions illustrate skills that will benefit their company.
Practice aloud. Actually vocalizing your stories out loud will help you refine your answers. Practice in front of a mirror or with a friend to polish your delivery.
Sample Response Stories
To make these concepts more concrete, here are some examples of strong answers to decision making interview questions:
Question: Tell me about a time you had to make a difficult business decision.
“In my last role, our team was deciding whether to invest in an expensive AI customer service chatbot. There were pros and cons to consider. On one hand, it could improve customer satisfaction metrics and free up human agents. But on the other, it was unproven technology with a hefty price tag. I gathered input from key stakeholders across IT, operations, finance, and marketing to understand different perspectives. After comprehensive analysis of costs, risks, and potential benefits, I decided not to move forward. While promising, the technology was too new and costs were too high for the potential reward. By declining this investment, I avoided excess spending that wouldn’t align to our core budget priorities. In the end it was the right call – customer satisfaction improved by 10% that quarter from our other initiatives. This showcases my ability to make tough choices, weigh pros and cons, and stand by data-driven decisions even if they are unpopular.”
Question: Tell me about a time you had to solve a problem quickly.
“Just before a major product launch our primary website server crashed. Taking the site offline right before our launch could have been a disaster and led to significant revenue losses. As soon as the issue arose, I sprang into action. I huddled with our IT lead and security experts to rapidly assess options. We determined the fastest resolution was to divert traffic to our backup server while keeping engineers focused on restoring the main server. I had the call center notify customers of potential slowness but keep taking orders. Within four hours we had the main server back online and traffic flowing smoothly. Due to quick problem solving, the launch proceeded successfully and we met our sales targets. This example demonstrates my ability to react quickly under pressure and make rapid decisions by pulling the right experts together to assess options.”
Question: Tell me about a time you made the wrong decision.
“Early in my career, I was tasked with managing a brand redesign. In an effort to finish quickly, I did not gather enough input from key stakeholders about requirements and preferences. I made the mistake of forging ahead with minimal collaboration from sales, marketing and our users. When I presented the new branding internally, it fell flat. People were confused by the new direction and felt they should have been consulted. I realized I should have taken more time upfront to do my due diligence and gather perspectives. I learned the importance of cross-functional collaboration, especially on big initiatives. Moving forward, I applied this lesson by improving how I seek diverse input to make informed strategic decisions.”
Preparing stories like these can help you confidently tackle any decision making interview questions that come your way. Use these tips to showcase your judgment and impress interviewers. With the right preparation, you can leverage your past decisions to land the job.
Business Acumen and Resource Allocation
These questions assess a candidate’s ability to make informed business decisions and allocate resources effectively.
- No matter which choice you make, it won’t help you reach your goal. How would you decide which option to pick?.
- Explain how you would choose between a new hire, a project leader, a candidate for a promotion, and someone who wants to move up in the company.
- How do you decide how to prioritize allocating resources when you have a lot of projects with tight deadlines and not enough resources?
- If you had to choose between the quality and cost of a product or service, what would you do? How did you ensure the business’s interests were met?.
- How do you choose which areas or projects get funded and which ones don’t when you’re on a tight budget? Can you give an example of a tough choice you had to make in this area?
- Would you mind telling me about a time when you had to make a business-changing strategic decision? How did you go about it? What happened?
- Can you talk about a time when you had to weigh the risk and reward of a business decision? What were the pros and cons, and how did you lower the risks?
- How do you keep up with changes in the market and trends in your industry? How have you used this information to make business decisions?
- Tell me about a time when you saw a chance to make things run more smoothly in your department or the company as a whole. What steps did you take, and what was the outcome?.
- Can you think of a time when you made a business decision based on what the customer wanted? How did you make sure that the company’s needs were met while also making the customer happy?
The best decision-making interview questions you should be asking every candidate
Here are the questions to ask your candidates to assess their decision-making skills:
These questions evaluate a candidate’s general approach to making decisions and forming action plans.
- To solve a problem, you can pick from a number of different choices. It’s important to make decisions that will lead to good things. What steps would you take?
- Describe the steps or methods you usually use to decide what to do and how you plan to do it.
- There are two or three paths that would all work to reach a goal. What steps would you take to choose which path to take?
- Have you ever put off making a decision? If so, how did that delay affect you and your customers?
- When did you have to make a quick choice under a lot of stress? How did you know the choice you made was the right one? What was the situation?
- Have you ever had to make a choice when you didn’t have all the facts? How did you deal with the uncertainty? What did you decide?
- Tell me about a choice you made that didn’t turn out the way you wanted it to. How did you reflect on and learn from the experience?.
- Describe a time when you had to make a choice that was morally difficult. How did you solve the problem, and what rules did you use to make your choice?
- Give an example of a time when you had to think about how your choice would affect things in the future. How did you make sure that your choice would help you reach your future goals and objectives?
- Describe a time when someone told you something that made you question your choice. What did you say in response? Did you change anything because of the feedback?
