“But, I really want to know where they see themselves in five years,” Raymond continued.

“Why?” I asked. “What’s the purpose? Every interview question needs to have a purpose. What’s the purpose?”

“I want to see if they have plans. I want to know if they have initiative. I want to know if they have the drive to learn,” he replied.

“Those are all noble purposes, just a lousy question,” I smiled. “Let take each noble purpose and reorient the question so the candidate doesn’t make up a bunch of stuff they think you want to hear.”

Purpose – does the candidate engage in planning for the future?

• Tell me about a time when you worked on a project that required planning?
• What was the project?
• What was the purpose of the project?
• Were you a member of a project team?
• What was your role on the project team?
• Step me through the planning process?
• Who led the process?
• Was the plan formal or informal, verbal or written?
• At the start, what was the vision of the project on completion?
• What were the specific goals or milestones inside the project?
• What guidelines or constraints existed on the project?
• Step me through the project timeline?

Purpose – does the candidate have initiative to self start on a project?

• Tell me about a time when you worked on a project that required you to step up, take initiative, that without you, the project might have failed?
• What was the project?
• What was the purpose of the project?
• Were you a member of a project team?
• What was your role on the project team?
• Tell me about the circumstances around the project that left it up to you?
• What did you do first to take charge of the project?
• What did you do to get other team members engaged in the project?
• What made the project difficult to get other team members engaged?
• What was the outcome of the project?

Purpose – does the candidate have the drive to learn new skills?

• Tell me about a time when you worked on a project that required you to learn a significant new skill or learn new technical knowledge around a process?
• What was the project?
• What was the purpose of the project?
• Were you a member of a project team?
• What was your role on the project team?
• What did you have to learn?
• How did you identify the specific skill or specific technical knowledge that had to be learned?
• Step me through the learning process for you?
• Were there any books, manuals, journal articles about the subject?
• Was there any formal training available to learn this new skill?
• Did you have access to other people to discuss what had to be learned?
• Did you have a designated coach to assist you in the learning?
• As you acquired the skill, what practice was required to become more competent?
• What was your frequency of practice, depth of practice, duration of practice, accuracy in practice?
• How long before you became proficient?

“These questions will give you real data about the candidates experience in those noble purposes. The responses will be real, based on things that actually happened, not some guess about five years in the future.”