Core Elements for Solid Leadership Responses

For most individual contributor (IC) roles, the key to interviews is mastering case questions and fundamental behavioral questions where you actively drive solutions to the finish line. But what makes leadership interviews a little different is an emphasis on cross-functional partnerships and people management. Your interviewer is also looking for self-awareness and reflection.

The Categories of Questions:

• Strategic Influence and Conflict Resolution

• People Management

• Self-Awareness & Reflection

Below I address each category, sample questions as well as the signals your interviewer is looking for in your answers.

Strategic Influence and Conflict Resolution

Sample Questions

• How do you influence and build consensus with stakeholders?

• Tell me about a difficult cross-functional partnership?

• How do you collaborate with others?

• How do you solve conflict?

Signals

• Identify all of the stakeholders as well as their interests

• Frameworks for your consensus-building:

  • timetables, goals, work plans, and ground rules.

• Building relationships by working together on a plan or fact-finding mission

• How you owned and guided the process of deliberation among the stakeholders, ensuring feasible and politically palatable outcomes.

• How you got buy-in, even if imperfect.

• Understanding XFN priorities, transparency, and empathy

• Active listening and signaling that you understood the issues and desired outcomes.

• Hard conversations: How you tackle these convos head-on with openness and self-awareness of your own weaknesses.

• Mitigate Conflict: Ensure cross-functional teams understand the trade-offs necessary to achieve outcomes.

• Stakeholder Empathy: Help team members walk through the process from the perspective of others.

• Modify to New Realities: Revisit and revise their agreements as the reality of implementation sets in.

People Management

Sample Questions:

• What do you look for when building a team?

• How do you maintain a healthy team?

• How do you grow people’s careers and build your bench?

Signals

• Self-reflect on weaknesses.

• Add well-rounded team members who compensate for blind spots.

• Evaluate soft skills (i.e. hard conversations, building consensus)

• Seek out people who are thoughtful and curious, and who enjoy scope and complexity.

• Problem Solvers: Look for independent people who can make decisions at the site of the problem.

• Transparent communication: Show build respect by not being afraid to have hard conversations.

• Strategic decision-making: Signal you include your team in the process.

• Being open to criticism.

• Active Listening: How you treat 1:1s, including striving for 75% of talking to be your directs, not you.

• Foster development in high-performers: Letting them take the lead but being there to help catch them if need be.

• Development Plans: Work collaboratively with team members to align to their interests and experience in goals.

• Healthy Nudges: Enabling team to grow when outside of their comfort zones.

• Making sure everyone feels heard, especially during key product and technology decisions.

• Pairing team members with mentors who suit their personality and work styles.

Self-Awareness and Reflection

Sample Questions:

• What would a report/peer/manager feedback on you be?

• How do you describe your job to people outside the industry?

• How do you measure your own success?

Key Elements in Response

• Question your claim of being an empathetic listener: Does your team feels heard, empowered, respected, and included in the decision-making process?

• How do you take calculated risks?

• Focus on business outcomes, and drive through problems to ensure complete solutions.

• Identify real weakness: i.e. not following through on final details because you are more of a big-picture thinker. (Yours wlll likely be different but pick something real and significant.)

• How you enable a technical team to ship products that delight users and achieve business outcomes.

• Take responsible for the efficiency and effectiveness of your team.

• Driving fruitful conversations with stakeholders, as well as anticipating and mitigating risk.

• Creating an environment where everyone feels empowered to contribute.

Resource:

Medium Article from People Manager who interviewed extensively