If you want more innovation and courage on your team, start with hiring people with the courage to innovate. In this article, we share how to interview for the right mix and leadership competencies. And, provide sample interview questions to get you started.
Interviewing For Courage and Innovation? Avoid These Common Mistakes
Has that ever happened to you?
You deliberately recruit from a company with the culture you’re looking to create. Your recruit looks great on paper. S/he’s got a tremendous track record of success. But within the first ninety days, you know you’ve made the wrong choice.
When it comes to hiring for employees with the courage to innovate and the ability to execute with clarity, it makes sense to fish where the fish are most likely to be—to identify companies with cultures that are doing this well and to recruit for the leaders who are making this happen.
Make sure you also dig a level deeper to ensure your candidate has actually been instrumental in what you’re looking to accomplish and in similar circumstances to what they’ll encounter in your organization.
Ideally, your candidate will have demonstrated that they have both the courage to innovate and execute so they can be an integral part of your courageous culture. (Learn more about our courageous cultures research here).
Or you can strategically build integrated teams with complementary skill sets.
Why Hiring People with The Courage to Innovate is So Tricky
Violet recruited Brian into the General Manager role because of his long track record of success at an established Fortune 500. Her company was on a trajectory of fast growth, so she wanted Brian to up their game. In the interview, he shared lots of best practices from his old company.
Brian’s previous employer was known for its best-in-class training and consistent customer service. The more she heard in the interview, the more excited she was. Brian was perfect for the job.
Until he wasn’t.
As it turns out, Brian thrived in a high-clarity culture. When handed a playbook, he knew exactly what to do. And did it flawlessly. But in the whirlwind of a fast-growing start-up, he was completely lost. He had trouble transferring what he had learned in his old role to his new job. Frustrated by the lack of guidelines and procedures, he kept going to his boss for help in making every little decision. He was too overwhelmed to innovate. He was lucky to just get through the day.
In the interview, Violet had been so focused on what the company was doing, she didn’t get a good sense of Brian’s capacity to replicate it on his own.
On the rebound from Brian, Violet went in a different direction. This time hiring Sal, a bright millennial with tons of ideas. Sal was the poster child of gung-ho. He had been wildly successful in his last gig at a company known for their innovative culture BECAUSE he had a right-hand guy who operationalized his ideas.
Without that guy, Sal was lost. Violet had been so impressed with Sal’s energy and charisma in the interview, she forgot to ask him about his role in actually making those ideas come to life.
Courageous Culture Interview Questions
Here are a few structured interview questions that will help you dig a level deeper with your candidate to gauge their experience in contributing to, and building, a courageous culture.
Their Track Record of Courage and Innovation
- What’s the best idea you’ve ever had to improve the business? Tell me about the idea. What did you do with it and what happened as a result?
- Tell me about a time that you strongly disagreed with your manager. What was the issue? How did you work to resolve the conflict?
- Describe the most difficult problem you’ve ever faced at work. How did you work to overcome it? What are most proud of about your approach and what would you do differently the next time?
- What’s the biggest mistake you’ve ever made at work? What did you learn?
Leading Others to Be Courageous and Innovative
- Have you ever led a team through a large-scale change? What was it? Describe the process you took. What was the result?
- What techniques do you use to encourage employees to share ideas to improve the business?
- In this company, we require every employee to think and act like a customer advocate. How would you know if that were happening on your team?
- How do you build problem-solving and critical thinking skills in your employees? Tell me about your biggest success story in this arena?
Does your company need a Courageous Culture – with higher engagement and a results-oriented approach to innovation? Where your employees speak up, share their ideas and drive quality performance and productivity? Check out our Strategic Leadership and Team Innovation pages for more information on our leadership development programs. Then, watch the video below about our book – your roadmap to a Courageous Culture.
Your turn. What are your favorite interview questions to uncover courage and innovation?
See more in our latest book Courageous Cultures: How to Build Teams of Micro-Innovators, Problem Solvers, and Customer Advocates.
You can download the First Chapter FOR FREE here.
You may also enjoy:
How to Be a More Courageous Manager
Psychological Safety or More Courage: What Your Team Needs Now
Love your questions. We used some of them in state government, but my ace in the hole was not about assessing how they answered questions, but looking at where they received their education and what they thought of it. Uncanny. Works. It gets at how they learn and what they do with it.
Hi Byron, thanks so much for adding that! I think that would be very interesting to hear how they applied there education! Really appreciate you sharing that.
Thank you, you have guided me, I thought managerial courage meant dealing with conflicts only