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Communication & influencing

How a candidate transfers understanding and wins support: adapting to the audience, keeping the right people informed without noise, and persuading without steamrolling.

Almost every candidate will tell you they communicate well. The claim is easy because in the abstract it can't be checked: communication only shows up in specifics, like the memo that had to argue for itself, the status update someone chose not to send, or the unwelcome news delivered in plain words.

These communication interview questions all chase those specifics. They cover the working range: making a case in someone else's terms, keeping the right people informed without burying them, raising a disagreement early enough to matter, and winning support without authority. A couple of the questions turn the lens around and ask about communication that failed, because how a candidate reads their own misfires tells you more than a polished success story.

Pick two or three questions rather than running the whole list. Ask, stay quiet, then use the follow-up probes; the anchors under each card tell you what a strong answer sounds like and which answers should worry you.

Interview for it when

Their work only lands once other people understand it and act on it.

Where this competency comes from

Communication is not our invention: it shows up, under different names, in every major validated competency framework. Our ten-competency taxonomy keeps what at least three of the four agree on. The full reasoning is in why structured interviews work.

The Great Eight (Bartram, 2005)
Interacting & Presenting
UK Civil Service Success Profiles
Communicating and Influencing
US OPM general competencies
Oral and Written Communication, Influencing/Negotiating
Google’s four attributes
Googleyness (in part)

In the O*NET content model it maps to the work activities Interpreting the Meaning of Information for Others · Communicating with Supervisors, Peers, or Subordinates · Communicating with People Outside the Organization · Selling or Influencing Others.

O*NET mapping adapted from the O*NET content model (U.S. Department of Labor), used under CC BY 4.0.

The questions

All 12 cards in full: the question, why it works, the follow-up probes, and the anchors to score against. Still choosing competencies? Plan the interview first.

communication

Tell me about a time you needed a decision from someone who didn't share your expertise. How did you make the case in their terms?

Why this works

The failure mode isn't the explanation — it's explaining what matters to you instead of what matters to them. Anchoring on a real decision, rather than a live "explain X to me", shows whether the candidate translates stakes into the listener's terms when something is on the line.

Follow-up probes

  • What did you deliberately leave out, and why?
  • What question from them surprised you?
  • Did they decide the way you'd hoped — what moved them?

What good looks like

Framing built around the decider's stakes rather than technical completeness, a check that understanding actually landed, and a clear account of what was simplified without being misleading.

Red flags

The story is about dumbing it down for people who "didn't get it", communication equated with sending the document, or the same pitch delivered to every audience.

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communication

Tell me about a presentation or talk you gave that didn't land the way you'd hoped. How did you know, and what did you do about it?

Why this works

Everyone has a rehearsed story about their best presentation; almost nobody rehearses the flop. The recovery — noticing the room, adjusting, following up honestly — is where presenting skill actually shows, and it can't be faked with delivery polish.

Follow-up probes

  • What was the earliest signal it wasn't working?
  • What did you change in the moment, if anything?
  • How did you prepare differently for the next one?

What good looks like

A specific signal they caught — the questions, the silence, the wrong debate starting — some live adjustment or honest repair afterward, and a concrete change to how they prepare since.

Red flags

The failure is blamed on the audience or the time slot, they never noticed until someone told them, or the "flop" turns out to be a minor stumble inside an otherwise polished win.

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communication

Tell me about a time a document had to make your case for you — a proposal or memo read when you weren't in the room. What did you write differently because of that?

Why this works

Writing that persuades in the author's absence has to anticipate objections instead of answering them live. How a candidate handles that constraint — structure, pre-empted questions, what they cut — separates writing to persuade from writing to document.

Follow-up probes

  • Who was the hardest reader, and what did you write for them?
  • What objection did you answer before anyone raised it?
  • What happened after it was read?

What good looks like

A clear picture of who was reading and why they'd resist, deliberate structural choices — the ask up front, detail cut rather than piled on — and an outcome they can trace to the document.

Red flags

Length worn as a badge of effort, no sense of the readers or their objections, or the document "went out" and the story ends there.

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communication

Walk me through a time you had to tell someone something you knew they didn't want to hear. How did you actually say it?

Why this works

Bad news tests the gap between knowing and telling: delay and cushioning both transfer cost onto the listener. Asking for the actual words gets past "I was honest but tactful" to what was really said, which is where the skill lives.

Follow-up probes

  • How long between knowing and telling — and why?
  • What did you say in the first two sentences?
  • How did they take it, and what happened to the relationship?

What good looks like

News delivered promptly and plainly rather than buried in preamble, the receiver's reaction anticipated and given room, and something useful offered alongside — options, next steps — without softening the facts.

Red flags

The message was cushioned until it stopped being true, delivery pushed to email or another person to avoid the room, or the story is mostly about how hard it was for the teller.

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communication

Take one project you were deep in: walk me through how you kept the people around it informed. What did you deliberately not send?

Why this works

Most candidates claim good communication; this asks for the mechanics — who, what, how often — which only exist if they actually ran them. The "what didn't you send" clause tests noise discipline, the half of keeping people informed that status-update culture skips.

Follow-up probes

  • Who needed different information, and how did their updates differ?
  • How did you handle news that got worse between updates?
  • What did people learn from you before they had to ask?

What good looks like

Different audiences named with different needs, a rhythm people could rely on, bad news traveling as fast as good, and evidence they cut noise on purpose rather than forwarding everything.

Red flags

One identical update blasted to everyone, surprises still surfacing at deadlines despite all the reporting, or "informed" equated with having sent something.

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communication

Tell me about a disagreement you kept to yourself longer than you should have. What happened, and what made you finally raise it?

Why this works

Asking for the failure case ("too late") lowers the incentive to perform and surfaces how the candidate actually handles the cost of speaking up, not how they think conflict should be handled in theory.

Follow-up probes

  • What did staying quiet cost the team or the project?
  • What signal would make you speak up a week earlier today?
  • How did the other person react when you finally raised it?

What good looks like

An honest account with a real cost attached, insight into their own threshold for speaking up, and evidence the threshold has moved.

Red flags

Claims to always speak up immediately, frames the silence as purely the environment's fault, or the "disagreement" turns out to be trivial.

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communication

Tell me about an idea you believed in that met real resistance. How did you bring people around — and what did you concede along the way?

Why this works

Persuasion stories are heavily rehearsed, so the weight sits on the resistance — what people actually objected to and what changed their minds. The concession clause separates influence from steamrolling: someone who gave up nothing usually won by rank or attrition, not persuasion.

Follow-up probes

  • What was the strongest objection, and was it fair?
  • Whose mind changed, and what actually changed it?
  • What did the idea look like afterward, versus your original?

What good looks like

Objections stated fairly rather than caricatured, approach adjusted to specific people, a named concession that made the idea better, and support that held after the meeting ended.

Red flags

Resistance framed as others being slow to see the light, wearing people down described as winning them over, or a final idea identical to the first draft.

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communication

Tell me about a time you needed someone to change how they worked and had no authority to make them. What finally worked?

Why this works

Without authority, influence has to run on something real: credibility, evidence, or the other person's own interests. Asking what finally worked makes the candidate name their actual currency — which is how they'll operate anywhere most people don't report to them.

Follow-up probes

  • What did they care about that you connected to?
  • What did you try first that didn't work?
  • Did the change stick once you stopped paying attention?

What good looks like

The other person's interests understood and worked with, an approach adjusted after a first attempt failed, and a change that held without enforcement — plus honesty about the goodwill it cost.

Red flags

Influence that was actually escalation in disguise, one pitch repeated louder, or compliance mistaken for agreement — the change died as soon as they left the room.

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communicationsenior

Tell me about a decision you'd already made that people senior to you wanted reversed. How did you defend it, and where did it land?

Why this works

Defending a live decision under senior pressure is different from selling an idea: the cost of being wrong is now personal, and folding is always the comfortable move. The question shows whether the candidate can hold a position on its merits — and tell conviction apart from stubbornness.

Follow-up probes

  • What would have changed your mind?
  • What did you concede, and what did you refuse to?
  • What did defending it cost you with those people?

What good looks like

The decision restated in the objectors' terms, a genuine answer to "what would change your mind", and an outcome they own either way — held with reasons or reversed on evidence, not on rank.

Red flags

A position held to avoid losing face, capitulation the moment rank appeared, or a telling absence of any story where holding the line was the wrong call.

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communicationjuniorsituational

Your manager has settled on an approach you're convinced will fail, and your one attempt to say so got a polite "noted". What do you do now?

Why this works

The dilemma has no free move: pushing again risks the relationship, dropping it means watching a mistake happen. For candidates without much work history it still yields a scoreable answer, and the already-overruled setup blocks the rehearsed "I'd speak up" escape.

Follow-up probes

  • What does a second attempt look like, concretely?
  • When do you commit to their plan for real?
  • Does it change if the failure lands on someone else?

What good looks like

A second, better-built attempt — new evidence or a different frame, not the same words louder — a named point where they commit and execute fully, and their concern registered without ceremony.

Red flags

Silent compliance plus corridor complaints, escalation over the manager's head as the first move, or executing half-heartedly so the prediction comes true.

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communication

Tell me about a miscommunication you caused — people ended up somewhere you never intended. When did you find out, and what did fixing it take?

Why this works

Communication failures are usually told from the receiving end; asking for the one they caused tests whether the candidate audits their own sending. When they found out matters as much as what broke — a long gap usually means nobody was checking whether the message landed.

Follow-up probes

  • What did you say, and what did they hear?
  • What did the gap cost before it surfaced?
  • What do you do differently now when the stakes are high?

What good looks like

Plain ownership of the sending failure, specifics on where message and meaning diverged, the cost named honestly, and a checking habit — confirming understanding rather than assuming it — acquired since.

Red flags

The breakdown quietly becomes the other side's poor listening, the example is trivial while the claimed lesson is profound, or nothing about how they communicate has changed.

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communication

Tell me about a mistake you made because you didn't really listen to what someone was telling you. What did you miss?

Why this works

Listening is the half of communication candidates never expect to be asked about, so there's no script. The honest version shows what makes them stop hearing — being the expert, being in a hurry, disliking the messenger — and whether they've built any defense against it since.

Follow-up probes

  • What was the person actually trying to tell you?
  • Why didn't it get through — what were you doing instead?
  • What tells you today that you're not really listening?

What good looks like

The missed message stated in the other person's terms, a named cause rather than "it was a busy week", real consequences owned, and a concrete habit — repeating back, slowing down — in place since.

Red flags

The miss is pinned on how badly the other person explained it, the consequence is glossed over, or "it taught me to listen" arrives with nothing specific to show for it.

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Often assessed alongside

A good interview covers four to six competencies, chosen for what the job turns on. Roles that need communication usually also lean on:

Hiring for a role that turns on communication?

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