Situational Interview

How a situational interview works

The method was formalized by organizational psychologist Gary Latham and colleagues around 1980. It rests on a simple idea: what people say they intend to do in a realistic situation tells you something about what they will do.

Building one takes four steps.

1. Collect critical incidents. Ask supervisors and top performers for real situations that separate good from poor performance in the job, such as a customer demanding a refund outside policy or a coworker not showing up for a shift.
2. Turn them into questions. Write each one as a short scenario with a real dilemma, where the obvious answer is not automatically the right one.
3. Write a scoring guide. For each question, describe what a poor, acceptable and excellent answer includes, based on what strong performers actually do.
4. Ask every candidate the same scenarios and score each answer against the guide, ideally with two interviewers rating independently.

Without the scoring guide, hypothetical questions become just another casual chat, and most of the value is lost.

A worked example

Role: retail pharmacy technician.

Question: "It's a busy Saturday. A regular customer is at the counter, upset that their prescription isn't ready. The pharmacist is on the phone with a doctor. The customer says they need the medication today and starts raising their voice. What do you do?"

Scoring guide (1 to 5):

• 1: Argues with the customer, blames the pharmacist, or promises the medication will be ready without checking.
• 3: Apologizes, checks the status of the prescription, gives an honest time estimate and offers for the customer to wait or come back.
• 5: Everything in 3, plus stays calm and lowers the temperature (acknowledges the frustration, uses the customer's name), checks whether there is an insurance or stock problem behind the delay, flags the urgency to the pharmacist at the right moment without interrupting a clinical call, and offers a concrete option such as a partial fill if permitted.

Two interviewers rate independently. A candidate who scores 4 and 5 across most of five scenarios is far more likely to handle the counter well than one whose answers stay at "I'd be nice to them."

Situational vs behavioral interviews

A behavioral interview asks about the past ("Tell me about a time you dealt with an upset customer"). A situational interview asks about a hypothetical future ("What would you do if...").

• Behavioral questions need candidates with relevant experience. They are harder to fake because they ask for specific past events, and they usually work better for experienced and senior roles.
• Situational questions work for everyone, including first-time job seekers, career changers and people returning to work. They test judgment and knowledge of what good looks like, but a well-prepared candidate can describe an ideal response they would not actually deliver.

Research on structured interviews finds that both formats predict job performance when they are well designed and scored. Many teams combine them: situational questions for entry-level roles or new-to-industry candidates, behavioral questions where experience is expected, and one or two of each in most interviews.

Situational interview vs situational judgment test

A situational judgment test (SJT) presents scenarios in a written or video format and asks candidates to choose or rank responses from a list. It is scored automatically and can be given to thousands of applicants at once. A situational interview asks the candidate to describe their response in their own words to an interviewer. SJTs are cheaper at scale; interviews show reasoning and communication. High-volume employers often use an SJT early in the funnel and situational interview questions later.

Tips and common mistakes

• Make scenarios real. Base them on actual incidents, with the details that make them hard. Vague prompts ("What would you do if you had a conflict?") get vague answers.
• Avoid questions with an obvious right answer. "Would you steal from the register?" tells you nothing.
• Keep them job-related. Every scenario should map to a competency in the job description. That keeps the interview fair and defensible under the Uniform Guidelines and Title VII.
• Probe, but consistently. Plan follow-ups such as "What if the customer refuses?" and use them with everyone.
• Refresh scenarios every few months in high-volume hiring, because questions get shared online.

For ready-to-adapt scenarios with what good answers include, see our bank of situational interview questions.