New York SBDC Research Network

From nectjobs : Screening for the right person for the job is always a challenge. You need someone not only qualified but with a passion for the work and a desire to serve. You do not always have the luxury of multiple interviews, following up with past employers, calling all character references, or reading through multi-page resumes to help you find the right candidate for the open position. What follows are 50 quick, easy-to-use, and immediately applied interview questions. These questions will help you to decide quickly whether the candidate you are interviewing is the right fit or not. Each question has been filtered through a vast array of human resources scenarios to determine if any are “questionable” or “offensive” based on current HR laws, regulations, and interviewing rules, (e.g., discriminatory questions based on violations of ADA, Title VI, etc.), and each one has passed the test in the US at the time of this writing.

During any job interview, there are some questions that almost always get asked. So, there's no excuse NOT to be prepared. To help you ace the interview, Glassdoor has compiled a list of the 50 Most Common Interview Questions . We sifted through tens of thousands of interview questions to come up with 50 questions you're most likely to get asked when interviewing. "What are your strengths and weaknesses?" "Where do you see yourself in five years?" Check out these questions and more that you should expect to be asked in any job interview.

Job candidates must be prepared for anything during an interview. That's why Glassdoor has combed through tens of thousands of interview questions shared by job candidates over the past year to compile its annual list of the Top 10 Oddball Interview Questions. These are the toughest and most bizarre questions you may have to answer when interviewing for these top jobs or any job this year. "What would you do if you were the one survivor in a plane crash?" (AND it includes some of the creative ANSWERS to these questions!) More from Glassdoor .

Job interviews are a nerve-wracking experience. And while we’re all prepared to answer, “What’s your biggest weakness?” or “Tell me about a time you made a mistake at work,” most of us aren’t expecting to hear, “Are you planning to become pregnant?” or “Where do you go to church?” or, “What country were your parents born in?” Such incredibly personal questions are often jarring and possible deal-breakers for some applicants. Many people think it’s illegal to be asked these kinds of questions, but in most cases it’s not against the law to ask — it’s just illegal to use that information as the deciding factor in whether or not to hire someone. So the next time you’re hunting for a job, here’s what you need to know about what your next boss can and can’t ask you — and what you can do about it if things get weird. More from Consumeerist .

Throw those standard interview questions out the window. Use these questions to find the best employees for your business. While folks seeking employment may spend hours prepping for their interviews, the failure to adequately prepare typically comes on the end of the person asking the questions. The people you hire can be your greatest strength or your biggest liability, and we owe it to ourselves and our businesses to take the time to find the most talented employees who are also a good fit for our business model. Prospective employees prepare canned responses to the questions they think you’ll ask. Their goal is to make themselves look good—to amplify their strengths and minimize their weaknesses. Your goal should be to set up a discussion that reveals patterns in their behavior and predicts how they’ll fare in your company. Past behavior predicts future behavior, so make it your goal to collect some honest, thoughtful responses that will give you a better idea of how each candid...

From the pilot of the Mary Tyler Moore Show, September 1970: LOU GRANT (Edward Asner) How old are you? MARY RICHARDS (Mary Tyler Moore) [Straightforwardly] Thirty. LOU No hedging? No "How old do I look?"? MARY Why hedge about it? How old do I look? LOU Thirty. What religion are you? MARY Mr. Grant, I don't know quite how to say this, but you're not allowed to ask that when somebody's applying for a job. It's against the law. LOU You wanna call a cop? MARY No. LOU Good. Would you think I was violating your civil rights if I asked if you're married? MARY Presbyterian.

If you are a manager at a large corporation with a well-staffed HR and legal department, you've probably gotten a wealth of training on how to conduct a job interview. But if you own your own company or are a manager in a small business, it might be up to you to keep yourself out of trouble when you start the hiring process. Do you know what kinds of questions you're legally allowed to ask? Knowing the limits will help you avoid lawsuits and make smarter hiring decisions. First of all, there are a limited set of topics that are protected -- in other words, you may not make hiring decisions based on these considerations. The good news is that the list is quite short and is mostly obvious stuff that common sense would dictate is off limits. Sometimes, though, applying this list in real-world situations can be confusing. More HERE .

The Department of Veterans Affairs has put together something called Performance Based Interviewing . PBI "is a method to increase the effectiveness of the interviewing process in selecting and promoting quality staff. With PBI, the interviewer carefully defines the skills needed for the job and structures the interview process to elicit behavioral examples of past performance." One interesting feature is a bank of interview questions designed by the job function. Following each level is a sample question. Level I: Frontline staff, those who do not supervise others. "Give a specific example of a time you had to deal with an upset co-worker, patient, or other customer. What was the person upset about and how did you handle? What was the outcome?" Level II: Work unit leaders, those who lead the work of a natural group of people, either temporarily (process improvement team leader) or as an ongoing role (foreman, section leader). "A part of this job is documenting...