The Interview Question That tells me Who to Hire

As a young marketing manager, I had one interview question

that always revealed who was the right candidate.

It was a simple question:

Tell me about a great marketing campaign you saw recently.

What was great about it?

75% of candidates didn’t know how to answer the

question.

They couldn’t find one campaign/TV ad/Billboard to talk

about.

Good candidate told me about a product or company they

love and were able to explain why the campaign got their

attention.

Great candidates told me about a product or company they

love, were able to explain why the campaign got their

attention & do one of the following:

1. Tell me what they would do differently (and why)

2. Show me how they would apply the insights from that

campaign to do the job I’m hiring them to do

Here is what I learned from this one question:

1. Which candidates were self motivated (I won’t have to micromanage them)

2. Which ones were “living and breathing” the industry (they have knowledge & passion)

3. Which candidate would be able to apply their theoretical knowledge to real marketing problems, without a ton of experience (This is the holy grail! They know how to get the job done)

You can write anything on your resume, but you can’t fake any of these skills.

Originally published at https://www.mayagrossman.com on August 11, 2020.