Team Player Interview Questions

Need to assess if your candidate is a team player? Check out the examples of the best interview question to ask job candidates in order to uncover if they are prone to teamwork!

➡️ Before we dig deeper into the interview questions that will help you uncover if your candidate is a team player, make sure to download our free Guide for Conducting Job Interviews & The Ultimate Candidate Interview & Employee Onboarding Checklist!

Why should you assess teamwork when hiring new employees?

Working on a team is crucial to almost every job position, from entry-level to executive. Teamwork will drive your company forward and make it truly successful.

Hiring the best candidate with the most impressive job history, experience and skills won’t mean a thing if this star candidate isn’t able to fit in with your existing employees.

You need to hire the best candidate not only for your job, but also for your existing team.

If you don’t assess your candidates’ propensity to teamwork, your star candidate might easily turn out to be a bad hire.

According to a press release published by Career Builder, around 74% of the companies make bad hiring choices, and each of the bad decisions costs them $17,000 in an average.

Don’t let that happen to you! Don’t get swept away by your candidates’ perfect resume and interview answers. Make sure that your star candidates are team players before you offer them a job!

Asking the right interview questions will help you verify if your candidates are indeed true team players. That way, you will be able to make more informed hiring decisions.

How to tell if a candidate is a team player?

The best way to tell if your candidate is a team player is by assessing their past working experience.

In other words, you should ask behavioral interview questions related to teamwork.

If you ask the right interview questions and listen carefully, you should be able to tell if your candidate is a real team player at heart – or just posing as one.

Examples of the job interview questions used to uncover team players

Here is the list of the best interview questions designed specifically to help you evaluate if your candidate is a real team player.

Asking these interview questions will help you uncover the best candidates who are also the best fit for your open job position and your company culture.

• Do you prefer working alone or as part of a team? Please explain your answer.
• Are you more productive when you work on your own or as a part of the team?
• What makes you a good team player?
• How do you deal with difficult people? Please provide an example.
• Do you have experience of leading a team? Tell me about it.
• Tell me about your best and worst experience of working in a team.
• Did you become a really good friend with any of your colleagues at your previous (or current) workplace? What do you think about having close relationships with your coworkers? Is this a good or bad practice?
• Tell me about a time where there has been a disagreement within your team. What did you do?
• Have you ever had difficulty getting your team members to accept your suggestion or an idea? What happened?
• What are the three most important characteristics of people you like to work with?
• Tell me a few pros and cons of working in a team.

Looking for more great interview questions?

If you’re looking for more great interview questions to ask in your hiring process, browse our list of interview questions by type.

Make sure you also check out our Complete guide for asking candidates the best interview questions.