Interview Questions by Role

This hub holds interview question sets for 50 roles, plus 12 sets built around one competency or interview method. Each set groups its questions by competency and says what a strong answer shows. Pick a role set when you are hiring for a named job, and a competency set when you need to test one skill.

Roles are grouped by job function below, each group with a one-line note on what its questions focus on. If your title is not listed, start with the general set for any candidate and add 2 or 3 competency sets that match the hardest part of the job. The Cognitive runs these as live AI interviews: the rubric is fixed per role before the call, and the questions adapt to each answer.

How to pick a question set

Hiring for a named job: open its role set in the groups below. It covers the skills that job is judged on.
Testing one skill across several roles: use a competency set, such as leadership or problem solving.
First screen, or a role we do not list: start with the general set, then add competency sets.
Scoring the answers: agree what a strong answer looks like before the first interview, and score every candidate on the same criteria.

Start here

Questions that work for any role, with notes on what each one reveals.

Interview Questions to Ask Candidates (any role)

By competency and interview method

Sets built around one skill or one interview format, for use with any role.

Software and web engineering

Coding, system design and debugging questions for engineers who ship product code, from frontend to smart contracts.

Infrastructure, reliability and security

Incident, observability, cloud security and low-level systems questions for the people who keep production running.

Data, analytics and AI

SQL, modelling, pipeline and experiment questions, plus how a candidate explains a number to someone outside data.

Product, program and project management

Prioritization, trade-off and stakeholder questions for the people who decide what gets built and when.

Design and user research

Questions that ask a candidate to walk through a real design decision, the research behind it and what they would change.

Engineering leadership

Hiring, org design and technical strategy questions for VP of Engineering and CTO searches.

Sales and account management

Discovery, objection handling and pipeline questions for SDRs, account executives and account managers.

Marketing and growth

Campaign, channel and measurement questions for marketing, growth and content hires.

Customer support and call center

Questions on de-escalation, clear writing and handling volume without losing accuracy.

Healthcare

Clinical judgment, patient communication and operations questions for nursing, technician and healthcare data roles.

Finance, risk and compliance

Modelling, controls and regulation questions for analysts and compliance hires.

HR, recruiting and operations

Employee relations, hiring process and policy questions for HR and recruiting roles.