10 Remote Job Interview Questions You’ve Got to Be Ready to Answer

Ask anyone who’s transitioned from working in an office to working from home and they’ll tell you: It’s not the same. While working from home comes with some undeniable luxuries (like no commute and the ability to work in your PJs), it poses some unique challenges, too (like less facetime with your manager and more distractions). Hiring managers are well aware of these differences and drawbacks, so when they interview candidates for remote roles, they’re going to be looking for people who not only have the skills to do the job itself, but also understand what it takes to successfully work from home.

“Remote work—whether temporary or permanent—requires a different skill set and type of experience than in-office jobs,” says Neal Taparia, founder of Unscrambled Words, a startup with a primarily distributed team. So while the remote jobs you’re pursuing may be very similar to in-office roles you’ve had in the past, working from home requires a different work style. 

That means when it comes time to interview, you’ll need to be ready to answer questions that are focused around a specific set of remote work skills—in addition to the usual interview questions you might get for a traditional in-office job and questions specific to the role or industry.

“The skills and experience that make you successful in a remote role are more focused around work styles and habits,” says Jennifer Leech, COO and cofounder of Truss, a fully remote organization. “Certain traits that would only have been moderately important in an office environment become essential when working from home.”

While every company is different, these are the most common traits recruiters and hiring managers will be looking for when interviewing a candidate for a remote job:

• Reliability. First and foremost, your potential future team needs to know they can count on you to show up to meetings, adhere to deadlines, and keep them updated on your work. Building trust with your prospective coworkers by showing them that they can count on you will be crucial—and that starts during the interview process. Showing up on time and well prepared is a great way to start building that credibility. Bonus points if you’re armed with a real-world example of how exceptionally reliable you are!
• Communication. “Because almost all communication is done via Zoom, Slack, and email, how well a person communicates via those mediums is even more important,” Leech says. “People need to be able to establish trust, build rapport, and express ideas clearly and succinctly to avoid misunderstandings.” Luckily, the remote interview process is the perfect opportunity to show off your virtual communication skills.
• Independence. “You can’t tap on someone’s shoulder for help when working remotely,” Taparia says. “You have to be comfortable to a large extent working independently and finding answers on your own. If you’re always Slack messaging questions, you could become a distraction to your team.” Understanding when to reach out for help and when to try to figure something out for yourself will be especially important. So you’ll want to be prepared to discuss your resourceful, independent work style (using examples from your past experience whenever possible) during your interviews.
• Initiative. “Managers can’t peek over your desk to see if you’re lost or idle, so it becomes significantly more important that you raise concerns [proactively] if you’re stuck or otherwise need assistance,” Leech says. Asking questions throughout your interview process, following up with a thank you note after every call, and preparing for every interview in advance are all great ways to demonstrate your proactive nature.
• Collaboration. Leech points out that it can be harder to get aligned with your team when everyone is working from home, so being a good collaborator (and communicator!) is crucial. There are myriad ways this may come up during your interview process—you may be asked what successful collaboration looks like to you, for example, or your prospective manager might want you to share a story about how you’ve collaborated on projects in the past.
• Organization. “It’s easy for items to slip through the crack when you’re working remotely,” Taparia says. Interviewers will want to know you can stay organized and regularly loop your team in on your work to help avoid unnecessary holdups. You can demonstrate your stellar organization skills by staying on top of your interview schedules, taking notes during calls, having a list of questions prepared in advance, and, of course, being ready to discuss how you stay organized.
• Conflict Resolution. “In a remote environment, conflicts can be amplified. Something said in chat could be interpreted in half a dozen ways that the author never intended,” Leech says. “The ability to quickly sense and unravel conflict significantly reduces the impact of inevitable miscommunications.” You probably won’t run into any conflicts during your interview process (at least I hope not!) but you can come prepared to discuss how you’ve managed conflicts, straightened out miscommunications, and built rapport with your team.

You probably noticed that these are all soft skills, which means they aren’t as easy to quantify as, say, whether you know JavaScript or can manage a Twitter account. And while questions about your technical skills are sure to come up throughout your interview process, you’ll probably notice an increased focus on your less tangible traits when you’re interviewing for a remote job.

“Hiring managers are going to put more weight on your ability to present soft skills like listening, tone, and body language via a virtual medium because you’ll likely be doing these things on a daily basis in a remote role,” says Lizzie Jones, founder of Hey Lizzie Ann, a career coaching service for early career tech and remote job seekers. And they’ll likely be asking you questions aimed at teasing these traits out.

With that in mind, here are ten questions you’ll probably be asked when you interview for a remote opportunity—plus advice on how to respond and sample answers.