How to Assess Soft Skills in an Interview

My team was interviewing a candidate with a strong resume for a customer support role. We were uncertain about her because during the interview, she was soft-spoken and reserved–typically not the personality you’d look for to deal with irate customers venting their frustrations. However, her interview answers were thoughtful and showed a high level of emotional intelligence and problem-solving–two critical customer service soft skills. We decided to give her a shot.
It paid off; she became one of our client’s top-performing agents. Customers gave her excellent feedback scores, citing her patience and ability to handle tough situations tactfully, and her colleagues took notes from her on how to communicate effectively. Lesson learned: When it comes to making the right hire, soft skills often outweigh personality.
Soft skills are those hard-to-pin-down capabilities like communication and leadership that are difficult to quantify but that play an outsized role in both job performance and cultural fit. They differ from hard skills like mathematics, which can be more easily measured via an objective assessment.
We’ll explain how to assess soft skills in an interview to ensure that a candidate with a strong resume will be a valuable member of the team.
The Importance of Soft Skills
We’ve all come across that person who’s great at their job–maybe they’re a whiz at programming or know every inch of the production floor by heart–but they’re a total pain to deal with personally. These people have technical skills but lack soft skills.
Soft skills allow teammates to interact effectively with one another (and customers). They facilitate creative problem-solving and enable people to adapt under uncertain circumstances–skills that are critical for success in most types of work.
A candidate might have all of the right technical skills, but without soft skills, they will be A) pretty miserable to work with, B) ineffective in their role, or C) both of the above. That’s why it’s so important to consider hard and soft skills equally when interviewing.
Challenges for Assessing Soft Skills
Soft skills are hard to screen for.
Soft skills have many more gray areas than technical skills, which can be assessed via questions with black-and-white answers. For example, more than one idea can solve a problem, meaning there’s no single “right” answer to an interview question about problem-solving.
Also, interpretations of soft skills can vary depending on who’s judging the candidate. One interviewer’s idea of creativity may differ from another’s, making setting up an objective scoring system challenging.
And even if you do formulate a sound system for assessing soft skills, it’s not always easy to get an accurate read on them during the hiring process. An applicant interviewing for a job is simultaneously nervous and trying to make the best impression possible, which is an unusual combination that can influence their answers and behavior.
In short, there’s no way to definitively grasp a person’s soft skills until you actually work with them. Still, it’s in an employer’s best interest to assess soft skills as closely as possible to ensure a strong fit and a successful hire.
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How to Assess Soft Skills in an Interview
Take a structured approach
To ensure fairness and objectivity, your strategy for assessing soft skills should be the same every time, with every candidate. Ask the same questions in the same order, incorporating follow-up questions as necessary to draw out more information.
Interviewers should avoid “going with their gut” or deviating from the prepared questions, as this leads to less accurate hiring.
Involve multiple interviewers
Additional interviewers can add diverse perspectives and help prevent hires from being determined by a single person’s opinion.
You can incorporate multiple interviewers in two ways: either by doing multiple rounds of one-on-one interviews or by doing a panel interview in which a candidate takes questions from two or more interviewers simultaneously.
Related: Interview Formats to Use When Hiring
Use a mix of behavioral and situational questions
Behavioral and situational interview questions can help you understand how a candidate might handle different on-the-job situations.
In behavioral interview questions, candidates are asked to give examples of their past behavior in specific scenarios, like “tell me about a time you had to communicate a piece of negative information.” These questions can be used to identify whether a candidate has experience successfully using the soft skills that are most important to the job.
Situational interview questions are similar but deal with “what ifs.” They ask candidates to explain how they’d react in a given situation in the future, for example, “What would you do if you had to cut our budget by 10%?” Situational interview questions give you a glimpse into how a candidate thinks and shed light on how their soft skills would influence their actions.
Utilize a scoring system
While interview questions about soft skills don’t usually have a right or wrong answer, answers can definitely be favorable or unfavorable. Using a scoring system allows you to observe patterns and judge a candidate’s cumulative interview performance.
One of the best ways to score soft skills is by using a points system, i.e., scoring a candidate’s answers on a scale of 1 to 5. This lets you see at a glance whether most of their answers were positive and also lets you compare different candidates against one another via their total scores.
Giving each number a clear meaning helps with accurate scoring and promotes consistency among different interviewers. Here’s how that might look:
- 1: Answer was severely lacking in relevance or depth and demonstrated inadequate proficiency with the pertinent skill
- 2: Answer demonstrated a lack of understanding and/or limited proficiency with the pertinent skill
- 3: Answer was satisfactory, demonstrating adequate proficiency with the pertinent skill
- 4: Answer was thoughtful and clear, demonstrating strong proficiency with the pertinent skill
- 5: Answer was thorough and relevant, demonstrating an exceptional level of proficiency with the pertinent skill
Another aspect to consider is that some skills may be more important than others to a particular role, like communication for a customer-facing position or problem-solving for an IT role. If this is the case, you might assign more weight to that category of questions (i.e. multiply the score by 1.5) so that candidates demonstrating the most critical skills are given preference.
Related: The Ultimate Guide to Interview Scoring Sheets
Leverage job auditions
Hearing candidates talk about how they’d handle a situation is great, but seeing them in action is even better. In a job audition, a candidate is asked to complete a task or assignment that mirrors what they’d be doing on the job.
You can use job auditions to assess soft skills by incorporating them into the assigned task. Here are a few examples:
- Asking a sales candidate to pitch a product to assess their persuasive skills
- Having a customer service candidate role-play troubleshooting with a customer to see how they communicate
- Asking a design candidate to read a creative brief and explain how they’d approach the job to judge their creative thinking
Don’t rely on interview “tricks”
Some companies are known for using quirky interview questions like “What type of fruit would you most like to be and why?” The idea is to force a candidate to think on their feet and show their creative side, but in reality, such questions have little bearing on a candidate’s actual ability to do the job (which is what you’re ultimately looking to find out).
If you really want to evaluate soft skills accurately, stick to questions that are relevant to the role and avoid trying to throw candidates for a loop.
Ask references about soft skills
In addition to the interview, you have another great tool at your disposal to use when assessing soft skills: references. Ask references directly about the soft skills you value and prompt them to describe examples of how they’ve seen the candidate use them.
Related: Ace Your Reference Checks With These Sample Questions
What Soft Skills You Should Look For
Here are some of the most important soft skills that are useful across roles and industries.
Leadership
Strong leaders take initiative, motivate others, and drive projects forward. They aren’t afraid to tackle challenges and their actions inspire their teams. Look for candidates who show confidence, decisiveness, and a proactive approach to their work.
Leadership skills are valuable even in non-management roles. One entry-level marketing associate we hired stood out for her strong leadership qualities. In her 90-day review, we learned that she stepped up to coordinate a plan when a key product launch was delayed. Even without a senior title, her leadership skills proved valuable during a stressful time.
Teamwork
No matter how talented an employee is as an individual, their success often depends on their ability to work as part of a team. Look for candidates who can demonstrate how they shared knowledge, supported their peers, and put the good of the group above their own personal recognition or success.
Communication
Miscommunication is one of the biggest culprits behind workplace conflict and mistakes. Candidates who can clearly express their ideas, actively listen, and adapt their communication style for different contexts are far more effective in the workplace.
I often tell the story of a top-notch engineering candidate who turned out to be a terrible hire because of his poor communication skills. He spoke tersely, sent blunt messages that were perceived as rude, and talked down to anyone who wasn’t at his level of expertise. Our experience with him proves that even excellent technical skills can’t compensate for an inability to communicate.
Critical thinking
Employees who can analyze situations and make sound decisions are invaluable in everything from accounting to automotive repair. They don’t follow instructions blindly; they ask questions to gather more information, analyze the available data, and anticipate potential roadblocks.
Problem solving
Every job comes with challenges. Employees who remain calm under pressure and find solutions instead of dwelling on problems make a big difference.
The customer support agent I mentioned earlier is a perfect example. She wouldn’t get hung up on a customer’s complaints no matter how bad their attitude was. Instead, she went straight to diagnosing the issue and coming up with relevant, helpful solutions that both solved their problem and alleviated their frustration.
Time management
Meeting deadlines and prioritizing tasks are crucial skills across disciplines. Organizations need employees with strong time management skills to balance workloads without constant supervision.
Creativity
When we think of creativity, roles like designers and marketers often come to mind. However, creativity is useful in a much broader range of positions because it allows people to see beyond the obvious and forge new, unexpected paths forward. Creativity is closely linked with innovation and problem-solving and can help companies stay competitive.
Adaptability
Personally, I feel adaptability is the most important soft skill of any on this list. In the market we’re currently experiencing, technology and demands are changing faster than employees’ skill sets, and adaptability is essential to keep up. Look for candidates who embrace change, actively work to learn new skills, and adjust to unfamiliar situations successfully.
Work ethic
A strong work ethic means a candidate is reliable, dedicated, and takes ownership of their responsibilities. They go beyond the bare minimum and demonstrate accountability.
One way my recruiters like to zero in on work ethic is by talking about a client’s employee development initiatives or advancement opportunities. Candidates with a strong work ethic will perk up when hearing about these aspects and ask follow-up questions, while those who are merely looking for a paycheck won’t show much interest.
Related Podcast Episode: How to Hire for Soft Skills
Soft Skills Interview Questions to Ask Candidates
Here are some example interview questions you can use to identify the top soft skills.
Leadership
- Describe your leadership style.
- How do you motivate a team?
- What would you do if there was a conflict between two of your team members?
- Describe how you delegate tasks.
- How do you coach employees?
Teamwork
- What role do you take when working on a team?
- Describe a time when you worked successfully on a team.
- Have you ever worked on a team project that failed?
- What would you do if someone on your team was not doing their fair share?
- How do you see yourself contributing to our team?
Communication
- What’s your communication style?
- Tell me about a time when you had to communicate sensitive information.
- How would you explain [complex concept] to a customer?
- What would you do if there was a misunderstanding about something you said?
- Do you prefer written or verbal communication?
- How would you deal with a coworker who isn’t great at communicating?
Critical thinking
- Tell me about a time when you had to make a decision quickly.
- What would you do if you had to decide without all the necessary information?
- Have you ever disagreed with your manager? What did you do?
- How would you handle it if you spotted a mistake one of your peers made?
- What’s the most difficult decision you’ve had to make at work?
Problem solving
- Tell me about a time when you solved a problem on the fly.
- Have you ever anticipated a problem in advance? What did you do?
- How do you deal with demanding customers?
- When you’re faced with a problem at work, what’s your first step?
- How do you solve a problem when there are multiple people giving input?
- Have you ever dealt with a work-related crisis?
Time management
- Describe your approach to time management.
- How do you juggle multiple important projects?
- What would you do if you knew you would miss a deadline?
- What’s your ideal work schedule?
- How long does it take you to do [task]?
- When you return from vacation and are swamped with to-do’s, how do you decide what to work on first?
Creativity
- What role does creativity play in your job?
- Give me an example of a time when you had to think outside the box.
- What’s the most creative project you’ve worked on?
- How do you encourage your team to be more creative?
- Let’s say a team member suggested a wacky, creative idea. How would you respond?
- When do you feel most creative?
Adaptability
- How adaptable are you at work?
- How would you handle it if your manager asked you to try a new approach on a project?
- Tell me about a time when you had to learn a new skill quickly.
- Have you ever been asked to take on duties outside your job description?
- How do you respond to change?
Work ethic
- What does work ethic mean to you?
- Tell me about a time you were asked to take on responsibilities beyond your usual job duties. How did you handle it?
- How do you stay motivated when working on repetitive, difficult, or boring tasks?
- Have you ever done something that needed to be done, even though it wasn’t your job?
- Describe a time when your hard work paid off.
Treating soft skills with the same level of attention you do when assessing technical skills increases the likelihood of landing on a candidate who will not only perform to a high standard but also fit in well on your team.