“You have one hundred people about to arrive for an event when someone spills an entire can of maroon paint across the main entrance. What do you do?”

This was an actual question heard at a recent job interview. A little strange, right? Like, why is the paint maroon? Are we interested in cleaning it up or turning it into an art project? Who would be careless enough to mishandle a can of paint right before a major event? What’s even stranger, this isn’t one of the truly weird questions creeping into interviews. Questions like, “What animal would you be?” “What would your ad slogan be?” and “How many slices of pizza would circle the Earth end to end?” are practically commonplace these days. But they still catch interviewees off guard. And that’s exactly why they’re so important to ask—they deviate from the typical rehearsed interview  to uncover how candidates think, how they handle unexpected situations, how creative they are, and how they might fit with the organization’s culture.

When deployed correctly, weird interview questions are powerful tools, but to get results, the interviewer has to know what to look for in an answer. In the maroon paint example above, it’s all about problem-solving. Practical candidates may walk through a procedure, saying they will put up caution signs, reroute guests, and launch a cleaning effort. Creative candidates may say they’ll use the paint to make a sign for the event entrance. It’s the interviewer’s job to know what personality traits will fit best in the job opening. This goes double for cultural-fit questions like, “If you were stranded on an island, what three things would you bring?” A candidate who would bring a survival knife, a matchbook, and an insulated blanket is very different from a candidate who would bring a bottle of whiskey, toe socks, and a copy of The Lord of the Rings.

So remember, a weird question is not about tricking or throwing off your candidates, it’s about getting an intimate snapshot into their personality and thought processes—one you can’t get with the interview questions they’ve answered a thousand times. You just need to know what you’re looking for. And you can guarantee that weird question will stick with your candidates, enough for them to share it with their family and friends. And as one final note, oddball questions should not replace more traditional experience and skill-based questions but they do make an interesting addition to the middle or end of an interview! You may even get a smile from the candidate. So enjoy crafting your oddball interview questions!