Commander’s Interview
Hey everyone! I applying for active duty and have my commander interview coming up and wanted to see if anyone has interviewed recently and would be willing to share some advice. I’d especially appreciate connecting with someone who has gone through the process recently and could share what to expect, the types of questions asked, or any other tips for preparing.
Thanks in advance for any help or insight!
Good luck andrew.richards ! Hope somebody in the BD Fam can give you some recent gouge!
-Twinkie
Much appreciated! I gotta ask, how’d you get the name?
I don’t have much information but what I do remember being asked was “Name a time you handled adversity?” “Name a you had to lead and how did you handle that?”
caleb-durham-honer Thank you! That helps me out a lot
I had one a few months back. Lots of tell me about a time. A few I remember were "tell me about a time when upper leadership made changes that you didn't agree with.", "tell me about a time you had conflict with peers/subordinates and how did you handle that." Something I used to help me organize my answers was using the STAR method, helps to prevent me rambling. Situation, Task, Action, Result. Very similar to what some of my coaches on BD have taught me. Overall good experience, he opened up for questions on the back end and I wish I took more advantage of that. Let me know if you've got more questions. Good luck!
Phillips Thanks!! This is super helpful
Hey Andrew, my interview was a long time ago, but my questions were very similar to the ones posted above, and on par for the types of questions that most boards ask. They will ask you a leadership question framed in various ways: “Tell me about a good leader you’ve had and why they were good.” “What makes a good officer?” “What do you expect out of a leader?” Then they will probably ask you how you handle conflict. “Tell me about a time you had a disagreement with someone and how did you resolve it?” “What would you do if you were working with an airman and their performance was lacking?” Then they might ask you to list your strengths, tell a story about your strengths, or share your weaknesses. These questions can get tricky to answer- so let me know if you need some ideas or a mock interview to practice. Best of Luck!
Match
Match Thank you so much! I definitely should do a mock interview before. I’ll check your schedule for a 1-1 coaching session
andrew.richards ya absolutely! If there’s a time that you’d like to do that isn’t on my availability sheet, send me a DM and I’ll squeeze you in. Active Duty life limits my standard availability a bit, but I can definitely open it up if there’s a specific time you are looking for.
andrew.richards did mine last week. DM me
akphl sent a DM, thank you
I did mine about 6 months ago and got selected for an active duty pilot slot. feel free to dm
ashleynlee2019@gmail.com sent a Dm, thanks!