11 Most Important Managerial Round Interview Questions

Managerial interview questions evaluate leadership, problem-solving, and decision-making abilities. Since these questions go beyond technical expertise, recruiters assess how the candidate responds to diverse and challenging scenarios. Ready to impress your recruiter yet?

Managers fulfil four primary management functions – planning, organising, leading, and controlling. They bring out the best among team members by motivating them to reach goals on time. They troubleshoot day-to-day issues among co-workers, streamline workflow, and more. These form the basis of managerial round interview questions for any industry. 

Here are the eleven frequently asked questions if you are preparing for the managerial role. 

Q1. What is the correlation between management and leadership?

Ans. For this managerial round interview question, you have to explain how they are interconnected. 

By definition, managers assign tasks, maintain work reports, and ensure efficiency standards in a team. Leaders focus on aligning goals and influencing a team with broader business objectives. 

A manager works under a hierarchical system with a title. Good leadership qualities are essential for this role. Simply ensuring that work gets completed on time does not ensure team growth. They must have emotional intelligence, vision, and the ability to inspire team members when implementing new ideas. 

Explore the top strategy and leadership courses. 

Q2. How do you set priorities for your team and yourself at work?

Ans. To answer this question, show you are consistent with setting priorities.  

1. Make sure every team member has clarity on the objective by discussing priorities regularly
2. Create a list of tasks for every team member using a project management tool
3. Identify urgent and important tasks, and schedule them accordingly
4. Create a realistic time frame when delegating tasks and be flexible

It is important to consider best practices when it comes to such skills. Explore the Personal Productivity, Time Management and Prioritization course from Coursera and master techniques like the Eisenhower matrix and similar. It's a short course to enrol for free and perfect for binge learning!

Q3. How would you handle conflicts with your co-workers?

Ans. Your recruiter wants to know how you have handled working relationships in your previous organisation. In short, they want to know how adaptive your communication skills are. 

Do mention that you focus on actively listening to their concern. Elaborate that you listen and show empathy towards the co-worker without blaming their behaviour. 

It is essential for managers to listen and react with no biases when co-workers have conflicts. You can try to understand the root of the issue and resolve them objectively. At the same time, you have to communicate HR policies clearly and focus on building mutual trust. 

If you sense that your previous conflict resolution strategies at work haven't worked much in your favour, you can check Coursera's Negotiation, Mediation, and Conflict Resolution specialisation. Comprising a capstone project to apply your skills in the real-world, enrol in this one four to five months before the managerial interview.   

Q4. What is your definition of success?

Ans. Success can be a very subjective term. But you have to voice out your work perspective when you define success. 

Here, the recruiter wants to see how you manage daily work and help team members achieve targets. Speak about your previous achievements and mention what was expected from you there. Also, do mention your work ethics and soft skills as a manager. 

Q5. What is your ideal work environment?

Ans. The recruiter asks this management interview question to know if you are suited for their work culture. They would want to know the situations that can potentially create a bottleneck for you. 

Be honest and tell them how you can deal with high-pressure and unexpected changes. You can even highlight difficult situations in your previous job. Take your prospective employer through your past hurdles at work and emphasise the steps you took to overcome them. 

Q6. What is the most crucial skill you have learned in your previous managerial job?

Ans. Such managerial round questions are tricky. The recruiter wants to know how you will apply your skills in managing and completing projects for the new company. 

Try to answer this question with examples. Maybe you learned how to negotiate timelines with your previous team members. Elaborate on that. 

Q7. Take us through the steps you take for project presentations for stakeholders.

Ans. Here, with this techno managerial interview question, the interviewer wants to know your basic skills in project management and data visualization. At the same time, you also have to show that you can simplify complex reporting, so everybody can understand. Based on that, you can highlight the following steps. 

1. Use MS Excel, PowerPoint, or similar to represent the information graphically
2. Show how tasks are assigned on a Gantt chart
3. Summarise the project

To support this managerial interview answer, you can read more on tips of managing stakeholder expectations. 

Q8. How do you handle your team when they disagree with your idea?

Ans. It is a general management interview question in every industry. Since you act as a team lead and implement new ideas, not everyone in the team will agree every time. 

Mention that you provide evidence to support your idea. If team members still do not agree, you ask them for suggestions. Then you and your team members come to a common conclusion. 

Answering this question for the managerial round in this way helps the recruiter understand your communication and negotiation skills. It also demonstrates how you can handle unexpected conflicts, because sometimes a small query can escalate quickly when the manager does not give importance to active listening and maintaining a cool head. 

Try adjusting your answer to this managerial interview question depending on the organisational structure.  Look up on the company's website about the flow of hierarchy or recent press releases, for instance. 

Q9. How do you motivate yourself when there is high pressure?

Ans. Managers deal with a lot of pressure. When they are not motivated enough, it isn’t easy to align team members with business objectives. 

For such managerial round interview questions, you can mention that you love your job and believe in what you do. Also mention that you are a team player and that, when your team members succeed, you encourage them. 

Q10. How do you react to criticism from your seniors?

Ans. Show that you learn from your errors and do not shy away from accepting your mistakes. This answer will show that you are willing to learn and help the organisation meet its goals. 

Q11. What do you think of our company’s managerial style, and how can you contribute effectively?

Ans. This is a purely theoretical management question, and the recruiter is looking for an answer related to your practical knowledge. You could discuss the company’s management style through your research before the interview.

Also, ideally frame this interview question for managers based on what organisational structure that company has, as the leadership style could drastically differ.  

Suppose the company follows a democratic management style, or a combination of different types of industry-standard leadership.

You could discuss collaborations, the promotion of creativity, etc., in this form of organisational leadership. Along with that, you could discuss potential challenges that come with some of the well-known management styles, and how you find a moderate way to overcome them.

Parting Thoughts

These are the top 11 managerial round interview questions and answers. Also, prepare for related questions such as salary expectations, gaps in resume, etc, especially, when you are appearing for bigger companies, like for, TCS or Infosys managerial interview rounds. And check out the top management courses. 

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