You're in a job interview and have successfully fielded a range of different questions – like behavioural questions and questions about your skills. Suddenly there’s a curveball: ‘What’s your superpower?’
A job interview is to help hiring managers get a grasp of your skills, knowledge, experience and cultural fit. Curveball questions help provide interviewers with deeper insights into your personality and mindset. There’s no right answers to these questions; they’re just designed to reveal more about you as a person.
Questions like these are hard to predict – but it’s still worth preparing responses that reflects your strong points, relevant to the advertised role.
What kind of insights does this question provide? While it’s interesting and fun to think about what your superpower might be, you should answer this question in the context of relevant job skills (rather than being able to shoot laser beams from your eyes).
Take the opportunity to gear your answer towards your skills and personal traits as they relate to the essential criteria of the role. Here are a few reasons why hiring managers ask this question during a job interview:
What is the best superpower to choose? Although one skill or personality trait isn’t necessarily better than another, certain superpowers often indicate specific characteristics the hiring managers may be looking for. Here’s a breakdown of what different superpowers might say about your personality.
Superpowers relating to influence reflect strong persuasive skills and natural leadership qualities. Here’s an example response:
“I think my superpower is my ability to influence and inspire others. I get satisfaction from motivating my team, and feel I have a natural talent for connecting with people. I’ve always felt a natural affinity for sales, due to my powers of persuasion.”
If endurance is your superpower, it indicates that you thrive on challenges and use them as opportunities to build strength of character. Here’s how to incorporate endurance into your answer:
“If I had to choose a superpower, it would be endurance. I love a challenge and once I lock into a job I find it's easy to lose myself in it for hours.”
The superpower of mind-reading highlights high emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence and intuition are critical for success in some workplaces, contributing to communication, collaboration, conflict resolution and teamwork. It’s also a critical trait for leaders to have.
Here’s an example:
“My superpower is mind-reading. I have strong intuition and find I can often anticipate my colleagues’ and customers’ needs. I find it relatively easy to build relationships with coworkers, which is one reason why I think I’ve been successful in my past management roles.”
X-ray vision typically translates to a talent for analysing situations thoroughly before making decisions. It can also be linked to strong attention to detail.
For example:
“My superpower is x-ray vision. I love to untangle problems and trouble-shoot issues. I’ve always been a natural problem solver; even as a kid I was very analytical and perceptive.”
This power represents your ability to handle varied tasks, and adapt to different roles. It shows flexibility, adaptability and open-mindedness – qualities that employers value.
Here’s how to draw on shape-shifting in your response:
“My superpower is shape-shifting. I find it exciting to take on different roles and duties when the opportunities arise. I especially love projects where I can take on a wide range of different tasks and collaborate with other departments.”
Speed tends to reflect excellent time management, focus on efficiency, technical competency and confidence, and a drive to improve work processes.
Here’s an example that highlights speed as a superpower:
“If I could choose a superpower, it would be speed. I am highly motivated at work when I have a lot to do and find I can work efficiently under tight deadlines. I feel most mentally engaged and stimulated on my busier days.”
Being able to teleport emphasises your value for efficiency and strong time management skills. It could also indicate you're a team player who's happy to help where they're most needed.
For example:
“My superpower is teleportation. By that I mean I can quickly shift gears and work on different tasks as needed. I also enjoy helping my coworkers when they’re busy and supporting the team wherever I can.”
This superpower highlights your ability to forecast trends and predict outcomes at work by learning from past results. You’re able to make informed decisions, anticipate needs and strategise.
Here’s an example response for seeing the future:
“I think my superpower is being able to see the future. I have always felt I was ahead of the curve and in my past roles I've been able to strategise to stay ahead of market trends.”
Follow these steps to help you come up with a thoughtful response to this increasingly popular interview question.
Start by reflecting on your core skills, personality traits and work experiences that help you stand out from other applicants. From here, you can focus on a superpower that reflects your strengths and will benefit the organisation you’re interviewing at.
Once you’ve identified your strengths, think creatively and translate those strengths into superpower terms. When it comes to choosing a specific superpower, stick to those that are self-explanatory. For example, if you’re a good multitasker, you might choose shape-shifting as your superpower as it would allow you to adapt to different roles and environments.
Answering the question in one word won’t be enough. Instead, you need to explain how your superpower translates to real-life characteristics and connect it back to your work approaches, character traits or skills. Take it one step further and detail how this superpower can benefit your potential employer and contribute to the team’s success.
It’s essential to match your answer to the specific job description and company culture. This is why researching the company and role before interviewing for a position is important. Highlight exactly how your superpower would directly benefit the team and the company as a whole.
Showing enthusiasm reinforces your excitement for the role. Being confident reflects competency and builds trust with the hiring manager. It’s essential to be confident and enthusiastic throughout the interview.
You should always be prepared for a job interview, even for curveball questions. Though there is no correct answer to the superpower question, there are many options for responding in a way that shows your best and most relevant traits. Use your unique strengths to your advantage and impress potential employers with an interesting, well-thought-out response.
There are many different examples of interview superpowers that you can draw on, including:
Each of these superpowers tends to represent real skills and personality traits, so it’s essential to choose a superpower that aligns with your characteristics while providing benefits to the organisation or role.
To help you choose a superpower, it’s important to start by reflecting on your strengths, personality traits and professional experience. From here, you can choose a superpower that not only lines up with your unique selling points, but also serves the organisation you’re applying to. Essentially, you want to highlight how your superpower would benefit them in the role you’re interviewing for.
Questions about superhero powers in job interviews shouldn’t be taken literally. These questions are used to gauge your creativity and ability to think on the spot. The superpower you choose provides insight into your skills and experience and highlights the value you could bring to the organisation.
The flying superpower is often associated with vision and perspective. You can see the bigger picture, representing the ability to think strategically and understand complex situations from a broader perspective. Flying can also embody bravery and the willingness to take risks, confidently venturing into the unknown.
It’s important to explain how your superpower relates to a real-world skill, so that the interviewer can easily see how you’d be an asset to their organisation.
There’s no harm in adding a touch of humour when discussing your chosen superpower. Drawing on humour throughout a job interview can be a great way to connect with the interviewer. Even if you use humour, you should still connect your superpower to a real-world workplace skill.