The Interview Guide: Chemical Engineering (Questions & Tips)

If you have an upcoming interview for a chemical engineering job, here are some handy tips for you.

Four people in a job interview

On a day-to-day basis our specialist recruitment consultants are asked about the best ways to prepare for an interview for chemical jobs within the chemistry industry. Here are our top 3 tips to help you:

  • Revise the basics and further knowledge from their chemistry background.
  • Research the company by looking at their website (useful pages are likely to be the ‘News’ and ‘About Us’ pages on their website).
  • Once you have done your research,  a great way to ensure that you apply this knowledge is to apply the STAR technique throughout the interview.  STAR stands for Situation/Task, Action and Results and can be applied in the following way: When answering interview questions, first describe the relevant situation or task, then the action you underwent, and finally the results you obtained. By structuring each answer in such a way, you are able to ensure that you answer clearly and in structured way.  This is great as clients are often looking for clear practical examples in your answers.

Questions you are likely to be asked

As a Chemical Engineer, you may work in a number of different functions, focus areas and be required to draw on a number of skill sets. As such you may be asked a number of questions at your interview, here are a few questions that may be asked:

  • Give me an example of a chemical process engineering project you have been involved in?
  • Tell me about how you have gone about continuous improvement in line with manufacturing methodologies (e.g. 6 sigma / lean manufacturing)?
  • Provide me with a practical example of when you have had to perform modeling or simulation (e.g. FEA / CFD)?
  • Explain how you ensure projects meet quality and H&S standards across the site?

Give examples of  skills and experience

As you can see they will want to see practical examples of your skills & experience, however this can often be hard to portray in an interview.

To do this you should identify examples of situations from your experiences on your CV where you have demonstrated skills and competencies that you feel are relevant to the role – This can be often obtained by comparing to a job specification.

Answer questions effectively

During the interview, your responses need to be specific and detailed. Tell them about a particular situation that relates to the question, not a general one. Briefly tell them about the situation, what actions you took, and the positive result or outcome. One proven way to structure your answers is using the STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result or “STAR”) format. Check out our graphic below.

STAR interview technique infographic

You may also like to read: 

Top tips for your next video interview

How to answer: what are you looking for in a new job?

Ways to make a good first impression

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