Working Together interview questions are designed to find out what you do when delivery depends on other people, especially when relationships are not effortless.
A strong answer shows that you can understand other perspectives, share ownership and deal with disagreement without losing sight of the common result.
If you are still writing the application, use the Working Together 250-word statement guide.
What the panel is looking for
The panel will listen for the relationship decisions inside the story: who you involved, how you handled competing needs, where you offered support and whether challenge was safe enough to improve the work.
At higher grades, Working Together often extends beyond the immediate team into professional networks, partner organisations and peers with their own priorities. Junior answers can be much more local as long as the cooperation is genuine.
Common Working Together interview questions
| Theme | Example question |
|---|---|
| Cross-team delivery | Tell me about a time you had to work with another team to achieve a shared outcome. |
| Conflict | Describe a disagreement with a colleague or stakeholder and how you resolved it. |
| Support | Give an example of when you supported somebody else so the wider team could succeed. |
| Different perspectives | Tell me about a time another person’s view changed your approach. |
| External partner | Describe a time you built an effective relationship with somebody outside your team or organisation. |
| Compromise | Tell me about a time you had to compromise to move a shared piece of work forward. |
| Inclusive teamwork | How have you made sure quieter or less experienced colleagues could contribute? |
Know the relationships and decisions in your examples rather than memorising wording. That makes it easier to adapt when the panel asks the question differently.
Use B-STAR to keep the answer focused
Use the Belief to frame how you work with others, not to give a speech about teamwork. Then keep the context brief and let the relationship decisions dominate the answer.
I try to make the shared outcome explicit and understand what each group needs to deliver it. Good collaboration is not everybody agreeing; it is being able to challenge, compromise and still work constructively together.
Full worked interview answer
Question: Tell me about a time you had to bring several groups with different priorities together to deliver a shared outcome.
I try to make the shared outcome explicit and understand what each group needs to deliver it. Good collaboration is not everybody agreeing; it is being able to challenge, compromise and still work constructively together.
As an HEO, I coordinated a service change involving policy, digital, operations and an external support partner. Policy wanted the full feature set launched at once, digital had limited development capacity and the partner needed training material early enough to prepare its staff.
I needed to create a plan that people could genuinely deliver rather than one that only worked on paper.
I brought the groups together around the end-to-end user journey and asked each to identify the point where failure would have the greatest impact on customers. That changed the discussion from defending team priorities to comparing consequences. We agreed that two lower-value features could follow later, which released digital capacity for the core journey.
The support partner still faced a training problem, so I shared one of our operational subject-matter experts for two workshops and gave the partner early access to the draft process. During planning, a quieter operations colleague raised a concern about an exception route that the rest of us had overlooked. I paused sign-off, asked them to walk the group through a real case and changed the process before launch.
The core service launched on the agreed date, the partner was ready to support users from day one and the deferred features were added in the next release. The same cross-team planning group was kept for later changes.
Why this answer works
The candidate gives each group a legitimate constraint rather than turning one stakeholder into the villain.
Using the user journey creates a common frame for the decision and helps the groups decide what can be deferred without simply trading political favours.
The support offered to the external partner is practical and reciprocal. The relationship is not limited to asking them to meet a deadline.
The quieter operational voice materially changes the process, demonstrating that inclusion affected the outcome rather than appearing as a slogan.
Compare your example with more worked answers
The grade-specific interview guides cover all nine behaviours with worked questions and answers, so you can practise showing real collaboration rather than simply describing meetings or stakeholder contact.
Expect follow-up questions
The panel may want to understand the relationship decisions in more detail. Likely probes include:
One likely question is: Which relationship was hardest to manage and why?
They may also ask: How did you decide the deferred features were genuinely lower priority?
Another useful probe would be: What would you have done if policy refused to compromise?
You could also hear: How did you make sure the external partner could challenge your team?
A final follow-up might be: What did you learn from the operational colleague’s intervention?
What changes by grade?
AA/AO
Build supportive relationships, share information, ask for and offer help and treat different backgrounds and viewpoints with respect.
EO
Build cooperation within and beyond the team, share information and resources, support colleagues and contribute to an inclusive working environment.
HEO/SEO
Create joined-up working across groups, build professional relationships, develop common purpose, support wellbeing and actively seek different perspectives.
G6/7
Maintain networks that move shared objectives forward, challenge assumptions while knowing when to compromise, support people and create an environment where challenge is safe.
Know what the other side wanted
Before interview, practise explaining the other team’s position fairly. If your answer makes every stakeholder except you sound unreasonable, the collaboration will not feel convincing.
Prepare an example with real give-and-take
A story where you changed something, shared resource or accepted a compromise often demonstrates Working Together more clearly than one where you simply chaired meetings.
Difficult-colleague questions
If the panel asks about a difficult colleague, resist the temptation to prove how difficult they were. That often makes the answer sound personal and one-sided.
Focus on the work impact, what you did to understand their position and the practical agreement you reached. The behaviour is about the relationship you built, not winning an argument about who was right.
External partners and shared accountability
Partnership examples can be particularly strong when neither side controls the other. Be ready to explain what your organisation needed, what the partner needed and how you handled accountability when something slipped.
Good answers show that you protected the relationship without avoiding difficult conversations about delivery.
Common interview mistakes
The invisible candidate. Everything is “we”, so the panel cannot identify what you personally contributed.
One-sided collaboration. The answer is really a story about persuading other teams to do what you wanted.
No disagreement. A perfectly harmonious project gives the panel little evidence of how you build relationships when they are tested.
Ignoring support needs. The candidate focuses on tasks and dependencies but never notices when another person or team needs help.
Relationship without delivery. Everybody gets along well, but the answer never shows what the cooperation achieved.
Prepare across the full behaviour set
The grade-specific interview guides cover all nine behaviours with worked questions and answers, so you can practise showing real collaboration rather than simply describing meetings or stakeholder contact.
Need the written application instead? Go to the Working Together 250-word statement example.
