Project Manager Interview Questions Template

When you're ready to hire someone new for your team, it's important to think about what questions you should ask during the interview. You want to focus on the questions that are most relevant for your team and role you're hiring for, so you can understand how candidates will use their skills and experience to contribute to your company.

Look for someone with different areas of expertise from your own—this way, you can supercharge your team and get more done!

What Are the Questions Asked in a Project Manager Interview?

Sitting someone down for an interview is often stressful and difficult, but with some preparation ahead of time you can make it much easier to find the right person for your team.

We’ve put together a list of Project Manager interview questions that will help you evaluate candidates and determine whether they’re a good fit for your team.

Below are the Project Manager interview questions we've had the most success with over the years. They're meant to be used as a guide. You can add your own questions and tweak them as needed.We've divided them into three sections:

Background

Situational

Technical

Background

Describe a time when you set a goal for yourself and achieved it. How did you go about that?

What are you looking for in your next job?

Please tell me why you believe you will be successful in this role.

What do you envision as your career goals for the next five years?

What are your working habits?

What's your favorite project you've worked on? Why is it a favorite?

Please share some of your strengths and weaknesses with me.

Situational

Share a time when you set a goal for yourself and achieved it. What strategies did you use to accomplish your goal?

Please describe a situation when you resolved a conflict between team members.

What situation have you experienced that required you to explain a complicated issue in a simplified way? How did you accomplish this?

Describe a time when you disagreed with a coworker and how you handled it. What was the outcome?

Tell me about a time you performed a feasibility analysis. What tools did you use?

Describe a difficult negotiation that you were involved in. How did you achieve success? What communication styles did you use?

Describe a time when you delivered results despite a challenging environment or context. Please include the situation, your goal, and the results.

Tell me about a time you experienced friction due to team members being unclear about a project’s goals. How did you, or would you, resolve things?

Projects require the cooperation of different teams and individuals with competing or differing interests. Tell me about a project where you had to engage these types of people.

Describe a time when you had to develop a new skill. What steps did you take to learn it?

Please tell me about a time when you felt that you did not communicate effectively or that your communications were poorly received. What corrective steps did you take?

Describe to me a time when you had to deliver on multiple competing priorities. What did you do and what were the results?

When you are working on two projects at once, how do you prioritize the work?

Tell me about a time when you had to make an important decision with limited data. What did you do, and what was the outcome?

What was the most challenging decision you've had to make, when you didn't have consensus with your team or relevant stakeholders?

Describe a time when you made a mistake at work. How did you communicate that mistake?

Please share an example of when your scope was expanded. How did you handle the increase in workload?

When do you try to solve problems on your own, and when do you involve others in the problem-solving process?

Technical

What organizational structure do you believe has the best potential for project work? Why do you feel this way?

If you were assigned to increase the number of users for a new, free email service, what would you put in place to track and measure the project's success?

Imagine you are tasked with running the production of a site build. What method would you prefer to work with, agile or waterfall?

Please provide a detailed description of the organizational structure or structures you have previously worked in.

What information would you collect to understand what materials, changes or people are needed for a project?

Please describe a time when you managed a project, either personally, at work or in school. How did you determine what order the tasks should be completed in?

What strategies do you use to keep track of information and tasks when working on a project?

How would you ensure that a project is complete? When do you know when to stop working on a project?

Define a project. What makes a project a project?

If you worked on an Agile project, what steps would you take to set up and execute the project?

Interview Scorecard Templates by InterviewTime

To save everyone’s time, InterviewTime has created a list of templates available for you to use as-is or as inspiration for creating your own interview scorecard template based on what information will be useful for hiring in your company!

To learn more about scorecards, check out our article - Interview scorecard: pros & cons.