How do you relate to people at work who are different from you?

Why the Interviewer Asks This Question
How to Answer
The Goal
1st Answer Example
2nd Answer Example

The interviewer is trying to assess how well you might fit into their team. They want to know if you are open to diversity, or prefer to work with like-minded people. Your resume might exhibit the hard skills involved with the mechanics of your position. This question helps determine your soft people skills.

Give examples of how you have collaborated with co-workers in the past. Talk about how you attempt to get to know your team! Everyone comes from different backgrounds and cultures, whether those cultural differences are local or international. Exemplify yourself as open-minded, looking for commonalities, regardless of your background. Sowing divisiveness or judgment makes it difficult to work as a cohesive team.

The goal here is to exemplify you're inclusive and that others enjoy working with you, regardless of their ethnic or social backgrounds.

"I want all of my co-workers to feel comfortable around me, so I make an effort to get to know people. I ask questions and show I am interested in the person. I also pay attention to the strengths of others, seeing opportunity rather than obstacles in the differences."

"The only range of experience I have to guide me through my life is my own. Everyone else in the world is not me. So I can't expect everyone to think or be like me. Knowing this just makes me want to learn more about everyone. I want to understand the ways in which we're the same and gain a deeper understanding of the things that are different. I feel like once you can understand that, and translate it into the language of your own experience, you can establish a bond with that other person. I guess I'm just always looking for that bond."