Internship Interview Questions HR Should Know

Improve recruitment efficiency with effective intern interview questions. HR can accurately and comprehensively evaluate intern candidates on their competency, attitude, skills, suitability, and more. Find out now!

1. Issues businesses should consider when recruiting interns

Businesses are always developing policies to support student interns and finding flexible solutions for temporary personnel situations. Here are the key factors to consider when recruiting interns:

• Determine if the business needs to recruit interns

Recruiting interns is often done to meet short-term business needs. If the company has stable projects and needs experienced personnel to execute them, it may be better to consider hiring full-time employees or freelancers.

• Agree on a reasonable salary for interns

Since interns are not considered full-time employees, their salaries are usually not high. However, businesses should ensure compliance with labor laws and provide reasonable benefit policies to recognize their contributions.

Currently, the average salary for interns in Vietnam typically ranges from 2 to 4 million VND per month, though this can vary depending on each company’s policy.

• Discuss the internship duration in detail

The internship period for interns usually lasts from 3 to 5 months, depending on the business. Recruiters should discuss this specifically with the intern and respect the candidate’s opinion.

• Ensure a training and guidance plan for interns so they can integrate and not feel left out.

Interns often lack experience, so getting accustomed to the work can be very difficult. To support them, the business should provide an overview of the job, assign a mentor, and encourage them to learn the necessary tools. For interns who are shy or have weak communication skills, ensure there is always someone available to assign tasks and guide them so they can work effectively.

2. Set of intern interview questions

2.1 Sample get-to-know-you interview questions

Question 1: Can you tell us a little about yourself?

This is the first question that almost every recruiter will ask. Through the candidate’s introduction, HR can learn about their work experience, skills, and personality, and assess their suitability for the job. At the same time, this question also gives the candidate an opportunity to demonstrate their communication skills and show the importance of future collaboration.

Question 2: What are your future career goals?

This question helps recruiters assess the candidate’s alignment with the company’s future direction and development goals. Sometimes, a candidate may fit the company’s environment and culture but not align with their personal expectations and career direction.

Question 3: What do you know about the products or projects we are working on? Please share your opinion on them.

Researching the company before applying for an internship demonstrates the candidate’s seriousness and interest in the position. This is an important factor that recruiters should not overlook when evaluating candidates.

Question 4: Why did you choose to apply to our company?

When a candidate provides a thoughtful answer from their perspective about the company, it shows their seriousness towards the business.

If the candidate can provide an overview of the company’s work style, organizational culture, and policies, and explain why they are interested in the company, the recruiter can highly rate their potential for long-term commitment.

However, if the candidate’s answer is hesitant, uncertain, or generic, HR may need to reconsider. It’s possible that these candidates will not complete the internship period sustainably and may quickly lose interest or decide to quit.

This question helps companies better select suitable interns, saving time and resources in the recruitment process.

Question 5: What are your strengths and weaknesses?

This question helps recruiters evaluate and understand the candidate more deeply. Candidates who are prioritized are often those whose answers highlight strengths relevant to the job position. If they have weaknesses that can be overcome through work and development, these candidates are also likely to be selected.

Question 6: Why are you interested in this internship position?

This question aims to determine the candidate’s level of interest in the position being recruited, as well as how they understand and set expectations for it. From this, the recruiter can assess the candidate’s work ethic.

Question 7: What are your salary expectations?

Interns usually contribute to the company for a short period, have little work experience, and focus on learning. Therefore, the salary they request is often in line with the general market rate.

Recruiters should use this to assess the candidate’s suitability for the position. If a candidate demands a high salary but cannot demonstrate their abilities during the interview, their potential to perform as expected may be questionable.

Question 8: Do you have any questions for us?

This question is usually asked at the end of the interview to ensure that candidates have the opportunity to ask their own questions or raise concerns. This shows the company’s interest in the candidate and helps them feel respected.

Here are some additional questions HR can ask:

Why did you choose this major or field?

Do you plan to pursue higher education in the future?

What achievement are you most proud of?…

2.2 Sample Situational Questions

Transitioning from an academic environment to a professional workplace often requires adaptability and situational handling skills. Asking situational questions during the interview is a crucial part of assessing a candidate’s abilities. Below are some situational questions that HR can use.

Question 9: Do you have good teamwork skills? Please share an example of a team project you participated in at university.

This question helps the recruiter determine if the candidate is eager to learn or seeks opportunities for self-development and knowledge enhancement. It also helps assess the candidate’s teamwork skills, providing insight into their ability to work in a collective environment.

Question 10: Are you able to work for X period of time?

The candidate’s answer helps the recruiter understand their ability to manage time, prioritize tasks, and handle pressure in academic and work environments. Additionally, this represents a situation they might encounter at work, and you want to see if the candidate is willing to handle it when required. This demonstrates the candidate’s sense of responsibility.

Question 11: Have you ever proposed or contributed a creative idea to a past project or task?

With this intern interview question, recruiters aim to gain a deeper understanding of the candidate’s creativity, thinking process, and potential contributions in a work environment. This helps the recruiter assess whether the candidate can identify problems and be creative at work.

Question 12: If you were given an opportunity to improve one aspect of a project or task, what would you do and why?

With this intern interview question, recruiters often assess the candidate’s self-awareness and learning ability. From this, HR will gain a deeper understanding of the candidate’s mindset for improvement and their potential to contribute to enhancing work performance.

3. How to Evaluate Potential Interns After the Interview

Carefulness and Meticulousness

Recruiters should not have high expectations for an intern’s experience, regardless of how excellent their academic performance is. Instead, they need to be guided, assigned tasks, and have their mistakes corrected step-by-step.

However, you certainly don’t want to repeatedly correct the same mistake for an intern. An excellent intern is someone who knows how to self-correct past mistakes. They are careful, meticulous, and often show a desire to learn.

If a candidate demonstrates these qualities, recruiters will highly value them and consider them a strength.

Knowledge and Understanding

Assess the candidate’s basic knowledge of the job’s field. This helps evaluate the intern’s foundational knowledge and what they have learned in school. Additionally, check if they have any previous part-time work experience. Have they participated in any practical projects at school?

From this information, you can gauge the intern’s knowledge level and subsequently plan more suitable training or work arrangements for them.

Work Ethic

Hiring an intern with little experience is not a major concern. However, it is more important to ensure the candidate has a proactive and learning-oriented attitude. Without careful screening, you may face many difficulties in the future.

Therefore, recruiters should assess the candidate’s attitude during the interview through direct conversation and by observing their reactions. This helps evaluate the candidate’s work ethic and determine if they are a good fit for the position.

Does the candidate fit the company culture?

A final important factor to consider is the intern’s fit with the company culture. This ensures a healthy and harmonious work environment within the organization.

In addition to screening through interviews, HR can also research and evaluate candidates through their social media activities and posts. This can partially reflect the intern’s personality and values.

During the interview, recruiters should also ask questions related to personal goals and direction to assess their alignment with the organization.

Besides asking interview questions, the recruitment process needs to be detailed, with a clear evaluation scale. The assessment criteria must be clear and used to make the final decision.

4. Important Tips for Interviewing Interns

• Be transparent about the recruitment process with candidates:

During the recruitment process, transparency about the interview rounds is very important. In addition to clearly communicating the company’s recruitment process to all candidates, you also need to guide those with little or no experience through it.

Especially for candidates who have never or have only participated in a few job interviews, describe each stage of the recruitment process in detail. For example, you can let them know who they will meet during the process, what they should prepare, and what they will discuss in the interviews. This information helps them visualize what they will experience and builds their confidence.

• Set clear expectations and goals for interns:

Treat the recruitment of interns like hiring a regular full-time employee. Provide clear requirements and expectations for the person you want to bring into the business, and conduct the interview rigorously.

Ask questions related to the salary the company offers and observe the candidate’s reaction. A question like ‘Does the salary offered by the company meet your expectations?’ can help you assess their work attitude and their ability to meet your expectations.

• Assign tasks to assess the candidate’s skills

Create scenarios based on real problems the company has faced in the past and have the interns solve them. When they face these situations, recruiters can assess their ability to apply their learned knowledge to solve practical problems.

To help candidates succeed in solving these tasks, ensure you provide appropriate advice, guidance, and support. This helps candidates complete the assigned tasks effectively and provides valuable information about their ability to adapt and utilize their knowledge.

• Always maintain professionalism with candidates:

Always showing professionalism and respect for candidates is a crucial factor in the recruitment process. Demonstrate dedication, thoughtfulness, and seriousness during the recruitment interview as well as throughout the internship.

By doing this, HR will build a positive impression of the business, making candidates feel that your organization is a worthwhile place to learn and work. This can attract and retain young talent in the company.

In addition to developing a set of interview questions, businesses should also use supporting software during the recruitment process to enhance efficiency. Among human resource management software, HRM 1Office has been trusted and highly rated by many recruitment experts. It is part of the comprehensive business management software – 1Office, and it provides many useful tools to help HR easily perform various activities, including:

• A repository/library of sample interview questions.
• Saving detailed interview result history.
• Evaluating candidates effectively based on standard recruitment processes and criteria.

Above is a set of interview questions for interns that HR cannot overlook. HR professionals should save this article’s content and apply it to their business’s recruitment activities! Wishing you success!

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