Back in March, Entrepreneur magazine website had an article listing 7 Interview Questions to measure Emotional Intelligence. (I have no idea why it says it was published on July 20, 2016 at the bottom.)
Emotional Intelligence is one of those qualities you would think an arts organization would be seeking in an employee. Perhaps I have been working too long with the relatively regimented government human resource system for too long, but I haven’t really seen questions like most of those the article lists used during an interview process.
The first one about who inspires you is almost a no-brainer for the arts. I would say that is probably the one conversation that would naturally unfold in an interview for an arts job without any planning.
I like the second question – “2. If you were starting a company tomorrow, what would be its top three values?” because it is so revelatory about the type of person an interviewee is.
More importantly, the interviewers should ask the same question of themselves…and then evaluate if those values are being exhibited in the organization they are running.
The third question about how one handles communicating and execution changing priorities and the fourth question about building lasting friendships are important for people who are going to be part of a team. Given that non-profit arts organizations are often faced with changing their priorities due to funding, the answer can be helpful in learning how people handle change.
I feel like the fifth question, “5. What skill or expertise do you feel like you’re still missing?” might show more emotional intelligence on the part of the interviewer if it were revised to ask “what skills do you feel like you are missing that this job/we can help you develop.”
The question they ask is essentially a rewording of the standard, “what are your weaknesses.” I think the tweak I gave it can help both reveal the candidate’s self-knowledge as well as their perception of (and research about) the type of work the organization does and what the position will require of them.
I liked the sixth and seventh question for the useful qualities the article outlined.
[highlight]Are there any interview questions you have used/encountered or can think of that are particularly useful for illuminating the emotional intelligence of a job candidate?[/highlight]
Excellent points! I only recently discovered that Emotional Intelligence is one of my strengths – perhaps it has been developing over the past decade or so. I was once asked and later used a question similar to your tweak to #5: “What skills are you missing that you would like to develop while working with us?” With a follow-up question (prior to #6) similar to “What are your strongest skills that you see may be missing in our team/ organization?” This pair of questions (especially using your language) seem to set the tone for a two-way growth relationship.