What’s Your Choice? Tips for Answering One Common Question in Your Next Interview

While job interviews vary greatly from position to position, you can almost always count on a least a few standard questions that will likely be included by your potential employer and/or HR staff. One of these questions (in at least some form) is:
“Would you prefer to work in a small or large company?” 
Truthfully, there is no right or wrong answer to this inquiry, since it completely depends upon the company in question, your own personal preferences and personality, and the requirements demanded by the job in question. However, we have a few tips to help you get points with your interviewer regardless:
  1. Do your research. Look up the employer and/or company beforehand to determine the size of the business, style of management (small team, individual workloads, large work groups, etc.) Doing your homework ahead of time means you can tailor your answer to meet both your preference AND the needs of the company.
  2. Think through your personality traits and determine how they affect your decision. If you are sociable and enjoy being around people, but struggle to delegate a work load to others or collaborate with peers, having the majority of your workload being team-oriented each day could be a struggle. In this same way, if you tend to be a loner, but are better motivated to work when forced to be with a group, you might actually prefer working with a team. Your personalty, preferences, and requirements of the job are a huge part of navigating your answer to the above question.
  3. Go generic. You can actually answer the question somewhat ambiguously, or “dodge” it, by letting the interviewer know that size doesn’t matter to you as much as X factor. For you, that could be the mission statement, company values, office culture, etc. Whatever you feel is most important to you about a work environment, or whatever you think is most important to the employer and company, could be a good way to offer an explanation without requiring you to make a choice that could cost you the job if  answered incorrectly.
Use the above tips and go into your next interview with confidence. PHR Staffing Solutions is here to help. When you apply with us, we walk you through the entire hiring process, from applications and prerequisites, to resume building and interviews. Our goal is to get YOU hired into a job you love, so give us a call or apply for one of our current openings online.