The RCMP Attribute Evaluation and Suitability Interview: What to Expect

Searches for “RCMP interview questions” tend to return lists that claim to be the real thing. This page does the opposite: it sets out what the RCMP itself publishes about its interviews, then gives you original ETHOS practice questions, clearly labelled as ours.

Two interview components, two purposes

The RCMP describes two related pieces. The Attribute Evaluation (AE) Interview is a behavioural interview designed to assess the personal qualities the RCMP has identified as necessary to perform successfully as a constable. The suitability interview includes behavioural questions as well, and in every one the RCMP conducts a detailed review of your Regular Member Applicant Questionnaire (RMAQ) to understand whether past actions or behaviours may affect your ability to become a police officer.

Where they fall in the sequence depends on the route. In British Columbia and Yukon’s Project Red Serge, the RCMP’s “Ready to Serve” page lists the Police Fitness Assessment and Attribute Evaluation Interview together as the first step, with the suitability interview (including RMAQ review) as the next one. The national pages describe the stages separately. See the full RCMP application process for the wider picture.

The five competencies the RCMP publishes

The RCMP says the AE Interview assesses five competencies, and publishes a definition of each. In brief:

• Problem solving: breaking problems into parts, identifying solutions, making timely decisions, and understanding cause and effect.
• Teamwork: achieving common goals by working cooperatively and helping the teams you belong to operate.
• Communication: receiving and conveying information so the audience understands, and communicating interactively.
• Self-control and composure: keeping emotions in check and refraining from acting on strong emotions such as anger when provoked, opposed or under prolonged stress.
• Courage of convictions: belief in your own capability to make difficult decisions and take appropriate actions that may not be popular but are in the best interest of others.

The RCMP says the questions are fairly general so applicants from a wide variety of backgrounds can relate to them and describe relevant experiences.

Original practice questions

These are original ETHOS practice questions written to match the published competency definitions. They are not RCMP questions, not from any official question bank, and not a prediction of what you will be asked.

• Problem solving: Describe a time you faced a problem with no obvious answer. How did you break it down, and how did you decide what to do?
• Teamwork: Tell me about a time a team you were on was not working well together. What did you do to help?
• Communication: Describe a time you had to explain something complicated to someone who did not share your background. How did you know they understood?
• Self-control and composure: Tell me about a time someone provoked or confronted you and you had to stay measured. What did you do, and what did it cost you?
• Courage of convictions: Describe a time you made a decision you knew others would not like because you believed it was right.

How to answer

The RCMP asks for specific past examples rather than general statements, and recommends the STAR technique (Situation, Task, Action, Result). STAR is a starting frame, not the whole answer; Structuring a Behavioural Answer covers how to add the reasoning and reflection that follow-up questions tend to probe. Prepare a few real experiences from work, school, sport, or volunteering, and check how each could speak to more than one competency. Choose examples where your own actions are clear, not ones where the outcome flattered you.

Follow-ups and consistency with your questionnaire

Expect to be asked why you did what you did and what happened afterwards. Your interview answers will also sit alongside your RMAQ, and the RCMP states that the RMAQ “focuses on honesty” and that it checks responses carefully to confirm they are truthful. Its guidance to applicants is that if an answer might not look perfect, “honesty is what matters most”, and that giving false information can result in termination of the application. It also notes that a pre-employment polygraph may ask about the honesty of your answers.

The practical consequence is simple: preparation means recalling real events accurately, not shaping a more impressive story. If an experience does not fit a competency, choose a different real one rather than embellishing.

Practise out loud

Saying an answer aloud exposes gaps that reading it silently hides. Interview Lab has behavioural prompts with follow-up questions for practising this. It is practice, not a prediction of any interviewer’s scoring, and nothing here guarantees a result.

What this article is not

This is general educational information based on the RCMP’s public pages. It does not contain official or recalled interview questions, and ETHOS Prep has no affiliation with the RCMP.