Culture of Experts
Module #12
Culture of Experts Interview Questions
Culture of Experts is a start-to-finish employee training and talent acquisition program that includes interview questions. These interview questions can help company leadership, hiring managers, HR professionals and corporate trainers hire people with characteristics that align with those of Unconventional Experts. Most of the modules have these questions in green boxes, at the bottom of the page. This module puts all of those boxes together, so readers have the option of seeing them all in one place.
As a company moves deeper into the interview process, there is a point where a strong candidate should have strong interest in the position at hand. Some people show interest differently than others, so allowing candidates to put effort into a related task can help determine interest without judging people by the way they express interest. Assigning a candidates a small part of the Culture of Experts program and questioning them on it at the next interview will not only reveal more about their expert-level work habits, it will help gauge their level of interest, by their level of involvement.
Task for candidates:
Direct candidates to the Culture of Experts sister website, UnconventionalEXPERTS.com. This website contains the same concepts, but is designed for experts, aspiring experts and potential experts. Assign candidates Unconventional Workshop 1 through Unconventional Workshop 5, as a reading assignment. In the following interview, ask candidates questions from Culture of Experts modules #1, #2 and #3, below, as follow up questions to their assignment. Additional module questions can be asked, however, the questions that pertain to the reading assignment should be accompanied by a high level of candidate involvement and an obvious impression as to how serious they were about the reading assignment.
Culture of Experts Interview Questions: Module #1 – Unconventional Positions
1) Give a specific example of a time when operational company-process was not there to help you perform a task and you needed to create your own individual work-process to make the task more structured?
2) What was the most complex work that you’ve done? What made it complex and what did you do to meet the challenges?
3) Give an example of a previous position that required strong creativity?
4) Give a specific example of a time when you developed a complex strategy and executed it successfully?
Go to Module #1 for a quick review of Unconventional Positions
Culture of Experts Interview Questions: Module #2 – Unconventional Expert Characteristics
5) Shown below, is an example of a general process, as a worker creates an individual work-process to address a complex task. How does this compare to your individual work-process, as you perform complex tasks?
1) Foster curiosity
2) Initiate activity
3) Gain relevant information
4) Discover possibilities
5) Strategize
6) Commit to a project
7) Create ideas
8) Realize ideas
9) Test ideas, find success or failure
10) Use failure as a platform for new and better ideas
11) Repeat part or all of the process
12) Eventually, find achievement
Bonus – Ultimately, gain some level of mastery
6) Within a career task or personal task, name a specific task that best leverages your individual work-process?
Tasks may include:
• A complex career task.
• A personal hobby, art, craft, DIY home improvement, connoisseurship, invention or discipline.
• The process for buying a big-ticket item, like an automobile or a house.
Go to Module #2 for a quick review of Unconventional Expert Characteristics
Culture of Experts Interview Questions: Module #3 – Expert-Trek: The Journey to Mastery
7) What professional skill holds your highest-level of expertise and how close do you consider yourself to master-level?
8) Within one of the categories below, what person skill holds your highest-level of expertise and how close do you consider yourself to master-level?
• Hobbies
• Arts
• Crafts
• DIY home improvements
• Connoisseurship
• Inventions
• Disciplines
Go to Module #3 for a quick review of Expert-Trek: The Journey to Mastery
Culture of Experts Interview Questions: Module #4 – Process-Replication
9) Give a specific example within your career when you developed an individual work-process into a methodology or technique; then shared it with others?
Go to Module #4 for a quick review of Process-Replication
Culture of Experts Interview Questions: Module #5 – Mentor/Protege Structure
10) Give a specific example within your career when you acted as a protege and learned from a mentor?
11) Give a specific example within your career when you acted as a mentor, providing guidance to a protege?
Go to Module #5 for a quick review of Mentor/Protege Structure
Culture of Experts Interview Questions: Module #6 – Unconventional Projects
12) If, for one year, you had to run this company as the CEO; would you be successful? In general, how would you approach this role?
13) Within your career, describe the most impressive project that you worked on. What was the result of the project and what did you learn?
14) Within one of the personal project categories below, describe the most impressive large project that you worked on. What was the result of the project and what did you learn?
• Hobbies
• Arts
• Crafts
• DIY home improvements
• Connoisseurship
• Inventions
• Disciplines
Go to Module #6 for a quick review of Unconventional Projects
Do you like Culture of Experts? Share with a colleague or group right now:
Hi, I’m sharing an interesting website with you, check it out: www.cultureofexperts.com
Culture of Experts Interview Questions: Module #7 – Ideas
15) Within your career, name one idea that you had, big or small, that stands out? Why does it stand out?
16) Within one of the categories below, name one idea that you had, big or small, that stands out? Why does it stand out?
• Hobbies
• Arts
• Crafts
• DIY home improvements
• Connoisseurship
• Inventions
• Disciplines
17) Give a specific example within your career when you tested an idea and it resulted in failure? How did you overcome failure?
Go to Module #7 for a quick review of Ideas
There are no Culture of Experts Interview Questions for module #8 – Unconventional Training
Go to Module #8 for a quick review of Unconventional Training
Culture of Experts Interview Questions: Module #9 – Behavior Within Corporate Culture
18) Give an example of a time when a clique existed within your work environment? How did you position yourself inside or outside of the clique?
19) Within companies that you worked for, describe the most immature environment; where jealous comparison, peer rivalry and status envy were a part of the corporate culture? How did you position yourself within this culture?
Go to Module #9 for a quick review of Behavior Within Corporate Culture
Gauging Intellectual Curiosity
In addition to the module questions above, interviewers can ask questions to explore a candidate’s intellectual curiosity. As a starting point, these questions can be general questions about a candidate’s personal interests; hobbies, arts, crafts, DIY home improvements, connoisseurship, inventions and disciplines. For example, if a candidate renovated a bathroom as a DIY home improvement project, the questions might look like this:
What materials did you chose for the bathroom renovation? What materials were used on the floor? walls? Bath surround? Was tile used? If so, why did you chose tile? If not, what other materials did you use? Why? What products were used for the sink and bath? Why? What part of the bathroom took the most skill to install?
If the candidate had prior employment, a similar line of questioning can then be asked about the goods or services that their employer offered. For example, if the candidate previously worked for a furniture manufacturer, the questions might look like this:
What type of furniture did the company manufacture? What style of furnishings did they focus on? Tradition? Country? Modern? What kind of customers purchased the furniture? What kind of price points did the furniture reach? Where did customers buy the furniture? How long has the company been in business? What types of changes did the company go through?
If a candidate has a high degree of intellectual curiosity, they should know the answers to all of the questions above. If they know much more about topics that reflect their free time activities; they are showing intellectual curiosity, but have not activated, controlled or fed their curiosity, within their career.
Culture of Experts is a free talent acquisition and employee development program created by Martin Haslinger. All Rights Reserved. Unauthorized duplication is a violation of applicable laws.
Please proceed to module #13: Recruiting Unconventional Experts
© 2024 Martin Haslinger