Critical thinking is the heart and soul of learning and questions involving this becomes the deciding point of whether you’ll pass the interview or not.

It’s important to keep enhancing your critical thinking skills no matter what profession you are in. If you are an employer, you would need employees who are good at critical thinking.

And if you are an employee then you would obviously need to impress the interviewer with your critical thinking skills.

These questions are almost always asked during a job interview because any company would want an employee who has a skill of problem solving aka critical thinking. These are usually asked in the HR round where you are given an example situation where you have to tell what would you do if you found yourself in the mentioned situation.

Such questions can never be answered with a simple no or yes. These questions determine how quickly your brain can process a solution to a problem in a given time.

Degrees and experience obviously matter but you need to ace these interview questions for critical thinking if you want that dream job.

What is critical thinking?

Critical thinking as defined by the National Council for Excellence in Critical Thinking, 1987 is

‘The intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action.’

I know a very scary definition. In my opinion (and words) critical thinking is the art of problem solving in the quickest and the most efficient way possible.

Related: Step by Step Planning Strategy to achieve your goals.

What skills do you need to ace these interview questions for critical thinking?

1. Observation

The process of critical thinking starts with this. The ability to observe and analyse a potential problem determines who has strong analytical skills.

2. Creativity

After all the observation and analysis, comes the role of creativity. Creativity involves thinking outside the box. Critical thinkers would answer such questions in the most unique way possible. They’ll find the best solution to a given problem in a much less time.

3. Communication

Now, any employer would want an employee who has strong communication skills whether the person is in sales, management or customer service.

The importance of communication cannot be stressed enough and it’s seriously lacking in most of us. You can really impress anyone if you have great communication skills.

4. Problem Solving

This involves the execution of the solution you came to after carefully analysing the problem. Many people and by many I mean A LOT, fail to execute their rather perfect solution. Your perfect solution is worthless if you cannot execute it the way it should be.

Lack of resources, understanding etc could also be the reasons for the failure but in the end, you would be the one to blame. Any critical thinker would solve the problem with the given resources most efficiently.

Recommended: How To Become A Millionaire By Changing Your Thoughts

Interview questions for Critical Thinking

All the questions for critical thinking start with the following:

1. Who

• Who would benefit from this?
• Who will be the key people in this?
• Who is the most directly affected?
• Who would be the best person to consult?

2. What

• What are your strengths and weaknesses? (The most FAVORITE question)
• What is the best solution for this problem?
• What is the worst that could happen with this solution?
• What could get in our way of action?
• What is another alternative?

3. Where

• Where would we see this in the real world?
• Where do we need this the most?
• Where can we get more information about this?
• Where will this idea take us?
• Where do we go for help with this?

4. When

• When would this benefit us/ our company?
• When could this cause a problem?
• When is the best time to take action for this?
• When will we know we have succeeded?
• When can we expect this change?

5. Why

• Why do we need to solve this problem?
• Why is this relevant to us?
• Why has it been this way for so long?
• Why is there a need for this today?

6. How

• How does this disrupt things?
• How will we approach this effectively and effeciently?
• How does this benefit us?
• How can we change this for our good?
• How does this harm us/others?

Commonly asked critical thinking Interview questions:

• Give me an example of a time where you had to solve a problem without proper information or resources.
• Tell me about a time when you presented a well put new and unique idea to your team.
• What would you do in case a deadline is coming up but you still haven’t finished the project?
• Describe a situation where you found a creative way to overcome a business challenge.
• What would you do if are having trouble cooperating with your teammates?

These questions are clearly based on your past experience. You would likely face the similar situations in your future company too and that’s why these questions would help the interviewer determine your critical thinking skills.

Why interviewers ask these questions?

The main reason behind asking you these situations in which you successfully used your critical thinking skills is to get an understanding of how you think and act in specific challenging situations. This would help them determine how your brain functions and how capable you are in similar situations.

Before hiring a candidate, employers want to determine if you are:

• Responsible enough to identify, analyze, and solve problems
• Able to solve a problem without having all the information or resources
• Creative enough to come up with unique solutions
• A strong communicator who can explain issues effectively and involve others in the problem-solving process
• Taking responsibility for your actions

I have found this amazing book to be very useful to improve my critical thinking skills. Books are the only way to learn and grow if you want to be successful in your respective field.

Conclusion

These interview questions for critical thinking are absolutely necessary both for an employer and an employee.

It all comes down to how much you are willing to learn. As I have mentioned in my other articles, Bill Gates till date try to read as much as possible.

The more you read, the more you learn. And the more you learn, the better critical thinker you become.

Businesses which encourage it’s employees to think critically flourish way more than the businesses that don’t. The idea behind growing is evolving. That’s why they say

Grow as you evolve.

So don’t wait and try to come up with creative answers to these questions.