In my opinion, with the possible exception of a handful of fluke candidates who really care about your company, all these questions do is measure how well an applicant can tell you what you want to hear. Personally, I'm a researcher, I love doing research, and I will always do it to the best of my ability, but I really don't care about the "mission" of the company where I currently work, at all. For that matter, I don't care about any company's mission, especially since most of the time that mission is just an empty statement anyway, because the real mission of every company is to make money. I, as an employee, just want to do interesting work in exchange for good benefits. I wish we could just be honest about that.

Additionally, I'm a complete introvert and loner, and I really couldn't care less about being part of any team. I can and do work in teams because I have to, and I do it well, but that doesn't mean I like it. But who cares if I like it as long as I do it? What really matters, much more than being a "team player," is that I am a very good communicator, and even though that does not require any degree of extroversion or team spirit, it is what really facilitates smooth collaboration between people. I think in many cases when people say they want a team player, what they really mean is they want someone who can collaborate well. That's not necessarily the same thing.

So when recruiters ask me about my personality or why I care about the company, of course I have to tell them some bs story, because if I go around being honest I'll never get hired anywhere. I know it, and I believe they know just as well that they're likely being fed bs. It just so happens that I get hired because I'm good at figuring out what they want to hear, and they never find out that I was full of **** because in the end I do a good job, even though I do it for completely different reasons than they imagine. There's probably a ton of candidates out there that could do an equally good job, but that don't get hired because they're not as good at the bs required to get hired in the first place.

Long story short, questions like this are just a pointless dance that wastes everyone's time, except maybe the recruiters' time because they need this sort of nonsense to justify their existence. I've met a few good recruiters and managers that prove that interviews don't have to be this pointless, but unfortunately they are a tiny minority. Most recruiters I've met lack the skills and know-how to ask any sort of meaningful question that predicts anything at all about actual job performance, especially when it comes to highly educated jobs.