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You need to define "team player" first. Every person has a different idea of what that means. Once you have a concise idea of what that means to your team, you'll have a list of traits to look for in a candidate. Tailor your questions to indirectly give you an idea of whether they have that trait.
So if one of the traits is "willingness to pick up another person's slack" or "ability to work with difficult people", ask them about a time they were on a dysfunctional team and how they approached that problem. Or something like that.
That's how I'd approach it at least. It's difficult though because candidates are conditioned to appear perfect at all times or have their applications thrown in the dumpster. Just like candidates are conditioned to place a greater emphasis on competitive programming skills than actually being able to write readable, maintainable code. In both cases, the former gets you a CS/SE job while the latter gets you a job at McDonald's.
Just my anecdotal opinion though as a professional interviewee.
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PHBs think "yes men" are "team players", but they're not.
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Yep. It takes way more investment in the team, product, etc to disagree.
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Jon McKee wrote: Tailor your questions to indirectly
Exactly that tailoring is what I meat to ask about.
"If we don't change direction, we'll end up where we're going"
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I would think about the ways they can answer your question and try to ensure answers will fall into a useful range. Try to answer the question yourself and if a lot of experiences come to mind that would be irrelevant to what you want to know about the candidate then rework the question - be more specific, change the scenario, or change the perspective (e.g. failed vs succeeded at a task).
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A lot of universities now assign projects that are done in teams. If a candidate worked on such a project, you could ask open-ended questions, such as what they liked and disliked about the experience, or what they believe are the advantages and disadvantages of working on a team.
However, I wouldn't over-emphasize teamwork. Development is often done alone, and poor software drags everyone down regardless of how well its author gets along with others. Teamwork involves things like sharing information, constructively participating in design and code reviews, and helping to get new staff members up to speed.
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With just some questions it's probably hard and unreliable. If feasible, I'd suggest a test where you give them a piece of oldish software, describing what goes in and what comes out and ask them to incorporate a new feature.
Primadonnas will be tempted to through away all the old code and write everything from scratch (because their code is best). Others may prove utter incompetents who cannot do any work and, if you are lucky, you might spot some that can treat a piece of code with respect and adapt their way of thinking to blend in with what's already there.
Mircea
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I've never heard the "team" use the term "team member"; only management: "He or she wasn't" (whatever that means). I think it means being part of the herd.
It was only in wine that he laid down no limit for himself, but he did not allow himself to be confused by it.
― Confucian Analects: Rules of Confucius about his food
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Or being a doormat. The term is sometimes a red flag.
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I find perhaps one of the most difficult traits to work with in a team is someone who is inflexible and overly strongly opinionated.
The reality is that most things, including software development, are nuanced and an overly opinionated person, while they might get work done and be technically brilliant, can store up a whole load of technical debt problems for later as their strong opinions may make it difficult to discuss an issue.
So I would consider asking a question that will show you how they deal with something when they have a disagreement - how willing are they to listen to and understand another person's point of view?
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
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By coincidence, I've seen recently an interesting opinion about a method of interviewing a candidate by letting him/her talk about the way how he did his favorite project and how he solved the issues which came along. The point of this method is to differentiate a smooth talker from a really useful person, as smooth talkers avoid explaining details out of fear of being caught on something, while valuable candidates do just opposite ... I'am not sure, but it seems that this method came from Elon Musk. I think that this also helps to evaluate the communication skills/style of a candidate, so there are 2 useful points in this, or perhaps more ...
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"If we don't change direction, we'll end up where we're going"
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Extract some non critical page of code from one of your product and ask them what they understand of it and how do they find them, especially on trivial stuff like formatting.
Primadonnas will invariably assert themselves as better than that.
GCS d--(d-) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
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Have you ever worked in a team before, and if so can you give us a reference to the team leader, so we can contact him/her?
ed
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How about asking them about any obstacles they had to overcome when working in a team environment and how they were able to overcome them?
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Yesterday upon the stair,
I META man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today.
Oh how I wish he'd go away!
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
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I know that chap he makes me ill
I doubt he FACE the music ever will
"If we don't change direction, we'll end up where we're going"
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You guys stop picking on me! 
ed
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Things I’ve learned
1. You can’t control what happens to you. You can only control how you deal with it.
2. Nothing is ever as good as it seems, nothing is ever bad as it seems.
3. An ounce of hard work will overcome ten pounds of inspiration.
4. Creativity is a rare natural talent. It can’t be induced, taught or trained. Very few people have it and it should be treasured.
5. There is really no such thing as a free lunch.
6. Life isn’t fair.
7. It’s a random chance universe.
8. There is no such thing as luck. Good or Bad.
9. You get what you pay for. You don't get anything if you don't.
10. Envy is stupid and harmful.
11. Pride is just like Envy.
12. Money can’t make you happy. It can, however, remove a lot of the things that make you unhappy.
13. Anyone that is constantly “happy” is heading for a nervous breakdown.
14. Beware of anyone that wears their religion on their shirtsleeve. They believe they have a divine right to screw you over.
15. Prejudice of any kind is incredibly stupid.
16. Any man claiming to understand women is delusional.
17. Fear is a built-in survival trait.
18. Dealing with things that overwhelm you is like eating an elephant, by taking one bite at a time.
19. Truly good friends are extremely hard to find. Treasure the ones you have.
20. Women have it all figured out. Men don’t have a clue.
21. When it comes to wives, what’s yours is hers and what’s hers is hers.
22. Change is inevitable, and un-stoppable. Go with the flow.
23. Insanity is hereditary. Your children are guaranteed to drive you crazy.
24. People say they want to be free, but often forget that the key component of personal freedom is the requirement that you take responsibility for your actions. (Paraphrasing Terry Pratchett)
25. Acronyms rarely communicate Information and should never be used.
26. A quiet peaceful life is the best that can be hoped for.
27. Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Terry Pratchett, and William Gibson are geniuses.
28. Whining is pointless. No one will listen to it. Just suck it up and get on with it.
29. “42” is not the meaning of Life, the Universe, and everything. I don’t have a clue what is.
30. War is insanity, tragic, and a terrible waste at a governmental level.
31. There are many good people. There are also a lot of bad rotten people. Learn to tell the difference.
32. All politicians lie. Without exception.
33. Taxes are worse than death. Death only comes once. – (Terry Pratchett)
34. Chaos is the baseline state of the universe.
35. You don’t always get what you pay for.
36. Alcohol and drug abuse is self-destructive and should be avoided.
37. Doctors may be the ones that cure you, but it is the nurses that keep you alive, while it’s happening.
38. Everybody makes mistakes. How we deal with them; how we strive to ensure not to make the same mistake again; these define what type of human we are. (thanks O.G.)
39. If you treat most strangers with respect and friendship, they will respond the same way.
40. Expressing gratitude to the people that help you out, is not only polite, it is the surest way of making it happen again, the next time you need their help.
41. Turning the other cheek is guaranteed to get you slapped again.
42. Sorry for the inconvenience.
43. The hot sex doesn't last. Good cooking does.
44. If you don't take care of yourself, you can't take care of anybody else.
45. Most good deeds do go unpunished. Some bad deeds don't.
46. Violence is the last resort of the incompetent.
47. What goes around does not always come around.
48. Most older folk's 1st wish is that they'd taken better care of their teeth. I'm one of them.
49. Getting older is hell, and it doesn't always beat the alternative.
50. It is pointless to be afraid of dying as it is inevitable.
51. People who ride bicycles in motorized traffic are asking for broken bones. Taking their children with them is Child Abuse.
52. Never hate anyone. Today's foe may become a colleague tomorrow. (Thanks Amaranth)
53. Love is definitely not all you need.
54. I will never understand tattoos or body piercing.
55. It is impossible to be unique.
56.There is no wisdom to be found in chat rooms… (Thanks DRHuff)
56(a) There is even less wisdom to be found in chat rooms frequented by developers and engineers. Pedanticism? Of course. Insults? Sometimes. Wisdom? Meh... (Thanks fgs1963)
57. Someone who treats the waitstaff badly is not a good person. (This is true EVERY time.) (Thanks Peter Kelly)
58. Always be EXTREMLY careful when zipping up you fly.
59. Everyone, without exception, gets their share of grief and pain in this life.
60. Never start a physical confrontation with anyone. However, if someone starts one with you, knock the bas***d down and kick him until your leg gets tired.
61. Nothing is better than doing something right the first time.
62. I have just realized this list is my personal phlisophy, words to live by.
Ed
modified 29-Oct-21 15:25pm.
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Too bad you didn't have 5 more, you could have moved 29 to 42. Would have been very poetic.
I’ve given up trying to be calm. However, I am open to feeling slightly less agitated.
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Did not have time. 5 more are coming soon, Stay tuned.
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38) Everybody makes mistakes. How we deal with them; how we strive to ensure not to make the same mistake again; these define what type of human we are.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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Furthering this, you don't make mistakes if you're not trying.
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Would #9 and #35 cancel each other?
"the debugger doesn't tell me anything because this code compiles just fine" - random QA comment
"Facebook is where you tell lies to your friends. Twitter is where you tell the truth to strangers." - chriselst
"I don't drink any more... then again, I don't drink any less." - Mike Mullikins uncle
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