Best Practices for Good Questions for Interview: Proven Strategies for HR Success

Good interview questions are open-ended, anchored to real job scenarios, and asked consistently across every candidate. The four core types are behavioural, situational, technical and values-based. Design each question to reveal how a candidate thinks and works, not to confirm what their CV already says.

Last reviewed July 2026.

Most interviews fail at the design stage, before anyone sits down. Around 33% of employers form a decision about a candidate within the first 15 minutes, which means loosely worded questions and unstructured chat leave the outcome to first impressions. This guide covers the question types, the design principles, and the mistakes that quietly skew your results.

Why question design decides interview quality

A question like "What are your strengths?" produces a rehearsed answer. A question like "Can you describe a challenging situation at work and how you handled it?" produces evidence. The difference is not the candidate, it is the design.

The stakes are real. Research suggests 58% of employees feel unmotivated at work, and a large share of that traces back to hiring people whose values and working style never matched the organisation. Well-designed questions are your best early test of that match, before the contract is signed rather than after.

The four types of interview questions

1. Behavioural questions examine past experience to predict future behaviour. Example: "Tell me about a time you faced a conflict at work and how you resolved it." These reveal problem-solving ability and interpersonal skills through real evidence.
2. Situational questions present hypothetical scenarios to test judgement. Example: "How would you approach a project with a tight deadline and limited resources?" Useful for candidates with limited work history, and for testing adaptability.
3. Technical questions verify specific expertise. Example: "What programming languages are you proficient in, and can you show projects you have completed using them?" Keep these tied to skills the role genuinely requires.
4. Values-based questions test alignment with how your organisation works. Example: "What type of work environment do you do your best work in?" These predict whether a hire will integrate with the team, not just perform the tasks.

A strong interview blends all four. If you want ready-made examples to adapt, see our guide to the most asked interview questions and answers.

Principles for writing your own questions

Whatever the role, the same design rules apply:

• Open the answer space. Start with "tell me about", "describe" or "walk me through". Closed questions invite yes/no answers and waste minutes.
• Ask one thing at a time. Double-barrelled questions get half-answers, and you rarely notice which half went missing.
• Anchor to real scenarios. Base questions on situations the role will actually throw at the person in their first six months.
• Keep the phrasing neutral. "What did you enjoy most about your last job?" beats "You enjoyed your last job, didn't you?" Leading questions tell candidates the answer you want.
• Plan your follow-ups. The first answer is usually the prepared one. "What happened next?" and "What would you do differently?" get you to the truth.
• Score consistently. Ask every candidate the same core questions and rate answers against the same rubric. Consistency is what turns interviews from impressions into data.

Prepare before you ask

Good questions come from good preparation. Review the candidate's background so your questions probe the gaps and pivots in their history rather than re-reading their CV aloud. Get clear on the role requirements so every question maps to a capability that matters. And define the values you are testing for: if collaboration is core to how you work, you need a question that asks for real evidence of it, such as "Can you describe a time you worked as part of a team to reach a goal?"

Structured preparation is also where assessment data earns its place. Running a work personality assessment before the interview tells you how a candidate naturally prefers to work, so your questions can test the fit that matters instead of fishing blind.

Mistakes that skew your results

• Leading questions. They contaminate the answer before it starts. Keep phrasing neutral and let candidates surprise you.
• Listening to your list instead of the person. Interviewers glued to prepared questions miss the follow-up that would have revealed the most. Stay flexible: when a candidate raises something unexpected and relevant, pursue it.
• Generic questions for every role. "What are your strengths?" yields the same answer everywhere. Customise to the role and you get information you can actually compare.
• Skipping values fit entirely. Skills-only interviews produce hires who can do the work but do not stay. Always include at least one question about how the person works best.

Where structured hiring takes this next

Question design gets you a long way, but interviews alone still lean on human judgement applied inconsistently. Compono Hire is an applicant tracking system that adds science-backed assessment to the process, measuring culture fit and work personality alongside the interview, so your hiring decision rests on evidence from more than one source. Interviews then do what they do best: testing judgement, depth and the questions only a conversation can answer.

Frequently asked questions

What makes a good interview question?

A good interview question is open-ended, tied to a real scenario the role will face, neutrally phrased, and asked consistently across candidates so answers can be compared. It should reveal how someone thinks and works, not just what they have done.

What are the main types of interview questions?

The four core types are behavioural (past experience), situational (hypothetical judgement), technical (specific expertise) and values-based (alignment with how your organisation works). A strong interview uses a blend of all four.

Why should you avoid leading questions in interviews?

Leading questions signal the answer you want, so candidates give it to you. Neutral phrasing, such as "What did you enjoy most about your last job?", lets candidates share genuine experience and gives you information you can trust.

How many questions should a structured interview have?

Enough to cover the core capabilities of the role with room for follow-ups, which usually means six to ten core questions in a one-hour interview. Fewer well-designed questions with probing follow-ups beat a long checklist raced through box by box.