30 interview questions for account executive candidates

If you’ve got an account executive opening at your company, you must know how to vet your candidates. Too much competition for the role can make it challenging to make a final decision, and you might end up hiring the wrong person.

A good way to avoid this is to write an effective account executive job description, put applicants through an Account Executive Screening Test, and schedule an interview with the top-scoring candidates.

We have provided you with this list of 40 interview questions for account executives – so that you’re prepared once you send invitations to interviewees.

5 opening account executive interview questions and answers

It’s a good idea to open with general questions that will put the interviewee at ease during their interview. Here are our five top opening questions for your account executive interview.

1. What first interested you in becoming an account executive?

This interview question is an excellent starting point. Since the question is relatively open-ended, it will allow the candidate to share a lot about themselves.  Candidates might discuss their education, strengths, or career path. They may also refer to when they first developed the skills necessary to become an account executive.

You’ll learn a lot about each candidate if you start with this question. And it will give you plenty of room to ask additional questions and find out more about specific interests and accomplishments your candidate mentions.

2. What do you know about our company?

Whether the candidate has researched the company is a good indicator of their interest in the role. 

A keen interest in the role and the company is essential in a new hire – they will make more effort to integrate into your company and adopt your company values. Try to identify whether a candidate has researched your company in their answer. They might show this by referring to your values, competitors, market niche and other unique company characteristics.

3. How did you hear about this opening?

You must be prepared for a short answer if you ask this question. After all, the candidate may have simply heard about the job from a job listing site. 

However, it will also reveal whether they have any existing relationships with your company.. It may also lead to further questions about why they plan to leave their current position.

4. Why are you leaving your current position?

This question can tell you very many things about your candidate. Firstly, it will tell you whether your candidate has a sense of company loyalty. If they speak ill of their current employer, they may not be satisfied with your company’s operations, either. 

Additionally, it will tell you what your candidate is looking for and what’s missing in their current role. This is an excellent indicator of whether the job will fulfill the candidate in the account executive position.

Look for candidates that are willing to discuss what they learned from their previous position. Watch out for a candidate that uses this question as an opportunity to bad-mouth their old employer. 

While unsatisfied employees are sometimes inevitable , positive additions to your company will instead spin this question and use it as a chance to discuss how they’re looking for development opportunities in a new role.

5. Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

Asking your candidate about their vision for the future will tell you how ambitious they are. You will be able to gauge whether this is someone willing to work towards career progression. 

A candidate might reference their ideal role for the future and how they plan to achieve this goal, such as present strategies for progressing into more senior positions.

This question will also help you to understand their values. For instance, if they would prefer to ascend in the same company or move along within a few years.

9 questions for account executive candidates and answers to quickly learn about your applicant

When you get into the interview, you must ask questions about the candidate’s experience level, motivation, and personality. Here are some account executive interview questions to quickly know your candidate’s attributes.

1. How well do you handle rejection and criticism?

Account executives must liaise with clients regularly, handling criticism and learning to adhere to their objectives. If a mistake is made, you must know that your account executive can take a solutions-based approach to maintain a strong relationship with clients.

When you ask this question, give an example of the critiques and rejections they may face. The more specific your question, the more detailed their answer will be. The ideal candidate should give you an example of their response plan for rejection and criticism to ease the client’s mind.

2. What’s your strategy for discovering sales opportunities?

You want to know about your candidate’s approach to the role. They might explain how much time and effort they choose to put into research and how often they reinvent their lead acquisition techniques. These candidates can offer a fresh perspective to your sales team and may be the ideal candidate for the role

3. Tell us about a time when you solved a client’s problem.

Your perfect candidate will have experience handling problems for your clients and customers. By asking this question, you can gauge the challenges they can face and overcome already. Even if the candidate cannot provide an example, the ideal candidate should outline a different achievement, offering insight into their relevant experience.

4. What are your strengths and weaknesses?

Although this interview question is standard, it will tell you about your candidate’s approach to life. When they tell you their strengths, candidates will explain what they value and what values they think are necessary to be successful in the role. Additionally, their weaknesses will tell you whether they are honest with themselves about their areas of improvement. 

The best candidate will be as comfortable discussing their weaknesses as they are their strengths, so look specifically for candidates who embrace their weaknesses and offer tangible ways of overcoming this.

5. How do you plan to overcome your weaknesses?

If your candidate provides an honest view of their weaknesses, you can gauge their self-discipline and dedication to improvement. 

For instance, if the interviewee states that their liability is overtalking and wasting time, they may be able to set a clear and structured plan to ensure their chatty habit does not hinder their productivity.

6. What makes you a successful account executive?

You need to know why your candidate thinks they are a good fit for the job. This will show their passion for the role and reveal what they bring. Ask them about the personality traits they possess that make them a good fit for this particular job. A candidate can explain the specific skills and abilities they believe are central to the role. 

Watch out for answers that provide the same skills listed on the job advertisement. Including these keywords is a positive indicator that your candidate has researched the role. Why not use one of our 300+ tests to help you streamline your process of selecting candidates with the most applicable skills. 

7. What do you enjoy most about the job?

Of course, you can only ask this question to the candidates with experience in the role. Knowing what your candidate enjoys about the job will give you insight into where you’ll find them most useful. For instance, if they enjoy the social aspects of the job, then they will be well suited to cold calling and handling client meetings and calls.

If your candidate doesn’t have experience, you can always ask them what they expect to enjoy about the position you’re hiring for.

8. What do you enjoy least about the job?

You need to get to know where your candidate is comfortable. For instance, if the candidate does not enjoy cold-calling, and the position will mostly comprise cold calls, then they may not be a good fit for the position.

An ideal candidate will embrace their limiting features and explain to you that they’re willing to work on what they enjoy the least in their next role. 

9. How would your supervisor describe your approach to the role?

If you want to understand more about what the candidate will be like when working for your company, you can ask how their current supervisor feels about their work. Their answer to this question should tell you where they shine best. 

A candidate might explain that they excel at account management or discuss their great communication skills. The best answers will relate their supervisor’s assessments to the primary skills and abilities needed for an account executive role.

6 questions for account executive candidates about background and education

Education and employment history can provide candidates with additional knowledge and experience to bring to the role. Consider asking the questions below to understand the candidate’s background thoroughly.

1. What is your experience with CRM software?

The best candidate for the role will be experienced with the tools and techniques you use for everyday operations. Since CRM software is such an essential element in daily operations for account executives, they must know what the tool is, how to use it, and how to optimize it. 

You can have your candidates take our TestGorilla CRM software tests like Salesforce and Hubspot to ensure their skills are compatible with the software you use at your business. 

2. What learning and qualifications do you have relating to the account executive role?

Of course, you don’t need to know the candidate’s entire educational background. To save time, you can ask them about their qualifications and learning that align with the role. Candidates  might refer to courses they have taken in a previous role, a degree, or simply learning through experience.

3. How do you intend to improve your skills in the future?

The perfect candidate will not simply be content with their existing skill set. They must be willing to enhance and upgrade their skills. 

Candidates might offer specific strategies they plan to use when up-skilling, such as pursuing relevant extra-curricular activities. Asking this question will allow you to see if the interviewee has any insight into the next steps for career progression.

4. What are the responsibilities in your current role?

Many hiring managers like assurance that the candidate’s experience aligns with the role. You can ask this question to see if there is a disparity between the difficulty level of the candidate’s current job and the role they are applying for. 

If your role would involve less responsibility than their current role, you can ask the candidate whether they’re looking to take a step down. They may become bored with your account executive role if it does not provide enough challenges. 

Look for answers that explain what they’re hoping to see differently in their next role, such as progression opportunities, projects and much more.

5. How has your educational background enhanced your skillset?

Your candidate may have unrelated educational qualifications, which means they can bring something new to the position. Their answer could show that they have an educational background that has taught them business, sales, administration, or sales psychology.

6. Do you have any experience in a leadership role?

An account executive has a number of responsibilities – including instructing, motivating, and supervising others. 

If your candidate already has experience in leading or training others, this will bring added benefits. If your candidate doesn’t have leadership experience, they might use this answer as an opportunity to explain why they would make an effective leader.

7 challenging interview questions for account executive candidates

Once you have warmed up your candidate by asking some questions about their past, you can begin to challenge them with harder questions. You will see how well they converse and maintain composure under pressure – which is especially important for an account executive role.

1. What makes an effective presentation?

Your ideal account executive candidate will understand the importance of slide titles and the relevance of keeping the audience’s attention. They should be able to give specific examples of elements in a presentation that help to persuade and communicate. 

2. Which steps would you take to improve a business relationship?

Building and strengthening relationships is a top priority target for the account executive. This involves creating a personal bond with clients and customers. 

Candidates can explain the importance of remembering personal details about clients – such as where they went on holiday, their birthday, or a significant life event that has happened lately.

Your candidate could surprise you with a relationship-building strategy you’ve never heard of, showing their genuine interest in the field.

3. How do you deal with reluctant prospective clients?

You need to know applicants have persuasive skills to be successful in the role. Prospective clients often bring up reasons not to make a purchase or continue with your company. 

Your ideal candidate will know how to reason with the client, understand their perspective, and take steps to change their mind. The best account executive client should provide a strategy for tackling this issue, and explain why this is effective when responding to this question.

4. How do you prioritize between different clients?

You need to know that you can trust your new account executive to prioritize between clients and manage their workload effectively.  

A hiring manager will benefit from asking for more than one condition or rule that the candidate uses to prioritize between clients, as many different factors contribute to the decision.

 Your candidate should be able to present a coherent plan for prioritizing candidates, showing strong business judgment skills.

5. What is the biggest challenge you’ve overcome thus far?

The candidate should have experienced a challenge in their career or personal life that shows their strength and adaptability. 

This is an entirely open-ended question and gives your candidate a chance to share a problem they have overcome that makes them an excellent fit for the role. They could respond with a work-related issue or something entirely different.

Your candidate should confidently offer their solution to overcoming this challenge and explain why it was effective. This shows comprehensive problem-solving skills that are central to the role. Improving business confidence comes from recognizing one’s flaws and weaknesses.

6. What would be your response to a client switching suppliers?

Sometimes, your clients will switch suppliers. When this happens, it’s great to have an account executive who can take the right steps to bring your client back on board. When you ask this question you should look for the following responses:

• Provide them with reasons to stay.

• Show appreciation for their previous loyalty.

• Follow up on any chance to salvage the relationship.

• Ask for feedback to prevent losing further clients.

7. What’s your strategy for responding to customer complaints?

Your brand reputation can significantly decline if your account executives are not good at handling customer complaints. This is why asking your candidates how they would respond to customer complaints is important. You should look for answers along the lines of:

• Accept and acknowledge the customer’s frustration.

• Take a solutions-focused attitude to provide the customer with a good outcome.

• Apologize to the customer and assure them this mistake won’t happen again..

• Appreciate the customer’s feedback.

3 interview questions for account executive candidates to learn about their personality

Account executives need to have certain type of personality to be truly successful. Winning people over and building relationships comes from being charismatic and a good listener. Here are some questions that’ll help you to understand your candidate’s personality.

1. How would you describe your personality in 5 words?

This question gives your interviewee a chance to communicate five of the most critical aspects of their personality. 

Make note of candidates who reference some traits like shyness or antisocialness, as they may not be happy in a customer-facing role.

The traits to look for are confidence, cheerfulness, empathy, and conscientiousness. Since personability is so important in sales and customer relationship management, this is a important question.

2. What do you do when you’re not working?

This question isn’t really about the candidate’s hobbies or interests. It will give you more insight into their ability to hold a conversation. If they are engaging and thoughtful with their answer, this indicates their ability to engage with customers and clients quickly. 

Candidates might reference unique activities, like volunteering or specialist hobbies. When answering, listen out for candidates who are passionate about their hobbies, as this shows enthusiasm and engagement.

3. What’s your favorite movie, and why?

Most hiring managers ask questions like these to gauge how well interviewees think on their feet. It also allows you to spark casual and friendly conversation, and get a good idea of how well they will get along with your existing team members.

When should you ask account executive interview questions in the hiring process?

At TestGorilla, we recommend starting your hiring process with an account executive assessment. The candidates who perform well in the initial assessment will then move through to the interview stage.

Once you have performed a skills assessment, the results will illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of each candidate – providing you with more subject material to discuss during the interview. 

Sign up for your free plan with us, or book your free 30-minute live demo to find out more about how useful TestGorilla can be in helping you find your next account executive.

Hire a skilled account executive with interview questions and skills assessments

TestGorilla offers many engaging skill assessments to help you narrow down the top percentile of applicants. Starting with skill assessments gives you a ranking of candidates to review once you’ve learned more about them during the interview process.

If you need help with hiring, why not try out a 30-minute free live demo with the TestGorilla team? We can help you to review your existing processes and help you to construct a new effective method for screening candidates.