Logistics Manager Interview Questions

Logistics Managers are the eyes and ears of a Logistics Department. They will know how much stock is in each warehouse, what the staffing arrangements are and they will have communications with team leads from each logistics team at all times. Because of their extensive knowledge when it comes to logistics, knowing you’re making the right hire is essential!

The right skills to seek in a Logistics Manager are:

Knowledge and awareness of multiple logistics systems.
Rapid and clear communicator.
Excellent analytical skills and problem-solving ability.
Strong project management ability.
Solid budgeting and forecasting skills.

Interviewing a Logistics Manager

A good Logistics Manager will give you peace of mind when it comes to stocking, staffing and delivery arrangements. With the right hire, you can be assured that your warehouses are running smoothly and customers are getting the correct deliveries in an efficient amount of time. Therefore, the interviews for this role need to be perfect.

That’s why we’ve assembled this Logistics Management interview guide, which you can utilise at the beginning of your interview process to ensure that you’re making the right choice early on.

How to open the job interview

There’s a high chance that your potential Logistics Manager will be nervous before their interview, it is only natural! A great way to combat this and fully assess your candidate’s attitude and ability is to set their nerves at ease with a couple of gentle warm-up questions.

This will only take a few minutes and have lasting benefits throughout the interview process.

Job Description available

See our Logistics Manager Job Description here

For the interview

A positive opener to start

How did you choose a career in Logistics Management?

What is a proud moment from your Logistics career?

Behavioral Questions

When managing several logistics projects at once, how do you stay organized and motivated?
A Logistics Manager will oversee several projects at once, from staffing arrangements to stock levels to inputting on delivery schedules. Knowing they can keep on top of things and have some preprepared behavioural techniques to deal with this is great.
What is your ideal work environment?
This question gives you an idea of how your candidate prefers to work and how this matches up with your logistics department. It is also a chance to see if they mention adaptability, which is a good trait to have in this role.
Logistics is a fast-paced and ever-changing industry, what steps do you take to ensure you’re constantly informed on these changes?
A Logistics Manager will help to funnel down relevant information in the logistics industry to their teams, and set a best-practice example for the whole department. Knowing your candidate is motivated and practices good behaviours to stay up-to-date is a huge peace of mind.
If you made a management mistake that impacted the rest of your department, how would you deal with this? What would your learnings be?
Nobody is perfect, and that counts for management too! Mistakes are bound to happen, and knowing your candidate can effectively communicate and take steps to minimise the disruption here will tick all the boxes.

Soft Skills

If you noticed your staff were beginning to lack motivation and productivity, how would you deal with this?
Since the Logistics Department are often working to tight turnaround times and will control how quickly your customers can expect their orders, a drop in motivation can be detrimental to the whole business. Knowing your Logistics Manager can work to rectify this and make changes to boost productivity is essential!
Occasionally, disagreements between departments or team members will arise. How do you help to resolve these conflicts quickly and effectively?
While serious conflict is best resolved by HR professionals or Relationship Managers, small disagreements can often be solved by management professionals. Here, you’re looking for the candidate’s communication skills, and evidence that they can minimise disruption to productivity while valuing their team’s opinions.
Which skills do you have which you think to make you a perfect fit for this role?
Here, a candidate may mention soft or hard skills. You’ll get a great idea of their confidence areas and how well these fit with your expectations for this position, you may also get an insight into their work history as well as their ability to communicate their skills.
When working with an unfamiliar system or department, how do you ensure you’re making the right decisions?
This answer will highlight the collaboration and problem-solving skills of the candidate. They should be comfortable collaborating with a colleague on this task to expand their knowledge and minimise mistakes or disruptions.

Hard Skills

If you noticed a team member struggling with certain tasks, how would you approach this matter and ensure they were brought up to speed?
Here you should be looking for specific examples on management skills, for example, training and development offers and regular check-ins with the employee.
Which logistics software and programmes do you have experience using?
This will give you an idea of how well the candidate’s experience fits in with your current working environment and what they will need to be trained in.
Which tools or techniques do you use to manage a department's performance? What steps would you take to streamline this performance based on your analysis?
Here, you’re looking for the ability to set KPIs for your company’s logistics, as well as the ability to analyse a team’s performance and make changes to support this analysis.
What experience do you have with working with local, national and international suppliers?
Depending on your business, working with suppliers locally or overseas may be part of your Logistics Manager role. This is a great opportunity to gauge their experience and match it with your needs from the role.
How do you ensure that your inventory taking is as accurate as possible?
Having accurate inventory measurements helps to influence everything from budget planning to logistics timelines. Therefore, knowing your candidate has the tool knowledge and techniques to do this task as accurately as possible is critical.

Operational / Situational Questions

Tell me about a time when you’ve received significant delays when dealing with suppliers, and how you overcame this problem?
Supplier delays have a knock-on effect for every part of the business and can have huge impacts on performance. Knowing that your Logistics Manager can help to minimise this damage, negotiate with suppliers and adjust stock levels, storage space and calendars accordingly will bring you peace of mind.
Walk me through a time you’ve not been happy with stock received from a supplier.
This is something that can happen from time to time when working with suppliers. Knowing that a Logistics Manager can help to report this problem, negotiate with suppliers or the Supplier Management team and rectify the issue as soon as possible will help you to make the right hiring decision.
Have you ever dealt with a situation where you’ve needed to warn, or fire, an employee whose performance was not adequate? Walk me through your process.
A Logistics Manager may sometimes need to make difficult decisions when it comes to reprimanding an employee. Knowing that they can do this in an empathetic way, which will positively represent your company, is important.
Describe a time when you’ve had to make a quick decision related to your role. How did you prepare for and learn from this?
Occasionally, a Logistics Manager may have to make rapid decisions, this will give you an idea of the candidate’s ability to do this.