pharmaceutical sales interview questions that are negative in nature are designed to make the candidate reveal the “worst” part of themselves to interviewers. I’ll teach you how to recognize these damaging questions BEFORE your pharmaceutical sales interview and how to answer them in a controlled and confident manner…proving you’re the best person for the job!
What’s the toughest question you might encounter in a pharmaceutical sales interview, or any other interview?
Without a doubt, it is any question about your previous or current managers. This type of question is designed to highlight any negative issues you may have about past or current managers and authority in general.
First, remember that you should NOT, under any circumstances, provide negative feedback about your past or current managers, nor is it appropriate to blame your past manager for your lack of success at work.
Why?
Because the interviewer may believe that you will speak ill of him one day, as your boss. This question often exposes bitterness, grudges, and an inability to handle authoritarian relationships.
To combat any negativity, your response should be as elegant as possible about your previous (or current) managers and show how you’ve learned from them.
How to answer one of the most dangerous pharmaceutical sales interview questions:
Even if you’ve had THE BOSS FROM HELL, there’s at least one positive skill or attribute you could talk about… it might take a while, but you’ll eventually come up with one!
You can answer this interview question with the following:
She was a very confident manager; she trusted her skills and abilities and hoped that others would also be sure of themselves. As a result of her high expectations, I became more confident, organized, and knowledgeable. From her I understood that trust sells. The more confident you are in yourself, the more confident others will be in you. This has shaped my sales ability dramatically. Confidence reassures my clients and establishes me as the “expert”, especially when my product is positioned as the solution to their needs.
wow! See how you turned the ONE positive aspect of your evil boss into a statement that makes you look like the perfect candidate for a pharmaceutical sales job?
In short, to answer one of the most complicated pharmaceutical sales questions in history, remember these 2 strategies:
- 1. Choose a positive skill/skill from a current or former manager that relates to pharmaceutical sales jobs.
- 2. Relate that skill/skill to yourself by indicating how you learned from your previous manager and now possess that skill/skill. This is a great way to answer one of those complicated pharmaceutical sales interview questions and turn the question into an answer that “sells” YOU!