Instructional designer interview questions and sample answers
Most ID interviews have three parts: a portfolio walkthrough, questions about your process, and a design task (a storyboard or a short module from source content, often with a two to five day deadline). Agencies also check your Storyline skills directly.
The questions below are the ones that come up again and again, with answers from a Nigerian designer's point of view.
Updated October 2026 by the WorkRemote careers team
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About the role and your experience
Openers that check you understand the job and have done the work.
Walk me through one project in your portfolio.
Why they ask
It's the core of every ID interview. They want your thinking, not a tour of slides.
How to answer
Use a simple structure: the problem, the audience, what you found in analysis, design choices and why, what you built, and any result.
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A microfinance bank in Lagos had loan officers skipping steps in customer KYC checks. Instead of a policy course, I built a Storyline scenario where they review three customer files and decide what's missing. After rollout, the compliance team's sample audit showed incomplete files falling from about one in five to one in twelve.
How do you decide whether training is the right solution?
Why they ask
Good IDs push back when the problem is process, tools or motivation.
How to answer
Describe a quick performance analysis: what should people do, what are they doing, why the gap exists. Mention action mapping. Give an example where you recommended a job aid or process fix instead.
How do you use AI tools in your design work?
Why they ask
Most teams now use AI for drafts, voiceover or images, and want to know you use it sensibly.
How to answer
Be specific and careful: first drafts of scenarios or questions, AI voiceover for prototypes, always checked by you and the SME. Mention confidentiality rules for client content.
Technical questions
What you know and how you'd do the work, often with a live task or test.
What's the difference between ADDIE and SAM, and which do you use?
Why they ask
A basic process question.
How to answer
ADDIE is linear (analysis, design, development, implementation, evaluation); SAM uses rapid prototypes and repeated reviews. Say most real projects mix both and give an example.
Write a learning objective for this content.
Why they ask
Tests whether you write measurable objectives.
How to answer
Use an observable verb, a condition and a standard where useful. Avoid "understand" and "know".
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Given a customer complaint email, the agent will select the correct escalation route from the four in the policy, without help, in under two minutes.
How do you measure whether a course worked?
Why they ask
Employers want impact, not completion rates.
How to answer
Use Kirkpatrick levels: reaction, learning, behaviour, results. Name realistic measures for each and agree them with the stakeholder before building.
How would you build a branching scenario in Storyline?
Why they ask
Agencies check hands-on skill.
How to answer
Talk through slide layers or separate slides for each choice, variables to track the path and score, triggers, and consequences shown through feedback before the learner moves on.
What do you do when a SCORM package doesn't report completion in the LMS?
Why they ask
A common real-world problem.
How to answer
Check publish settings (SCORM 1.2 vs 2004, completion criteria), test on SCORM Cloud, check the LMS settings, and work with the LMS admin. Show a calm troubleshooting order.
How do you make e-learning accessible?
Why they ask
Accessibility is often a contract requirement.
How to answer
Captions and transcripts, alt text, colour contrast, focus order, keyboard navigation, no information given by colour alone. Mention WCAG 2.1 or 2.2 AA and testing with a screen reader such as NVDA.
How do you design for adult learners differently from children?
Why they ask
Common for candidates from school teaching.
How to answer
Adults want relevance to their job, control over pace and to draw on experience. Use real scenarios, let them skip what they know, and keep it short.
Behavioural questions
Past situations. Answer with a real example: what happened, what you did, what changed.
Tell me about feedback on your work that you disagreed with.
Why they ask
Every course goes through review cycles.
How to answer
Pick a real example, explain how you checked the reasoning behind the feedback, what you proposed, and the outcome. Show you stay professional.
Situational questions
Hypotheticals about problems you'd meet in the job.
An SME insists every detail of a 40-page policy must go into the course. What do you do?
Why they ask
SME management is a daily challenge.
How to answer
Ask what learners must do differently, map content to those actions, move the rest to a reference document or job aid, and agree this with the stakeholder in writing.
You have two weeks to build a course that would normally take six. What do you do?
Why they ask
Deadlines are often unrealistic.
How to answer
Agree priorities with the stakeholder, cut scope to the must-haves, use templates and Rise for faster build, and plan a second release for the rest.
Remote work questions
How you'll work from Nigeria with a team elsewhere: hours, power, internet, communication.
How do you work with a team in a different time zone?
Why they ask
Remote IDs work through tools more than meetings.
How to answer
Name the tools (Articulate Review, Teams or Slack, shared storyboards), your overlap hours in WAT and the client's time, and how you keep reviews moving without daily calls.
What's your setup for working remotely from Nigeria?
Why they ask
Clients need you reachable for reviews and able to upload large files.
How to answer
Laptop that handles Storyline and video rendering, headset, backup power, two internet connections, cloud storage for project files.
Remote interview tips
Have your portfolio open and ready to share before the call, with each piece loaded and not buffering. A broken demo on a weak connection is hard to recover from.
For take-home tests, send a short cover note explaining your design decisions. Many reviewers read that before they look at the build.
Ask about their LMS, authoring tools and review process. Specific questions signal that you've done real projects.
Questions people ask
Do instructional designer interviews include a design task?
Usually. Expect a storyboard, a short module or a redesign of existing content, often as a take-home task with a few days to complete.
What should my ID portfolio include for interviews?
Three or four pieces: a scenario, a short course, a storyboard or design document, and a job aid or video. Each needs a short case study explaining the problem and your decisions.
Do interviewers ask about learning theory?
Some do, especially universities. Corporate employers care more about practical approaches: objectives, scenarios, evaluation and working with SMEs.
How should I talk about teaching experience in an ID interview?
Translate it: lesson planning becomes design, marking becomes assessment, and parents' evenings become stakeholder management. Then show what you've learned about adult and corporate learning.
Updated October 2026 by the WorkRemote careers team
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