Interviews are an opportunity for you to showcase your personality and build a rapport with your future manager, and possibly a few peers. However, it is important to note that there still is a certain level of formality that should be maintained. Walk with us. . .
The first (or last part) of your interview will likely be filled with some small talk and an invitation to tell the interviewer more about your personal life and other aspects of your work experience that aren’t evident on your resume. Use this as an opportunity to talk about your hometown, school experience, reasons for some of your more recent career moves, and some of the things you are most passionate about.
You can expect some situational questions in nearly every interview you encounter. How do you know when you have been hit with a “situational” question? They typically begin with “Tell me about a time when. . .” and these questions are usually setup to gauge your problem-solving skills, ability to effectively communicate, and approach to collaboration. The best way to provide structure to your response, while ensuring the interviewer is getting all of the information they need to decide you are are the most appropriate hire for the job, is to use the STAR method.
What does this S.T.A.R. acronym mean?
Situation: Set the scene by giving a brief summary to introduce your example.
Task: Describe what your usual responsibility was in this scenario.
Action: Explain what specific steps you took to address the situation.
Result: Share the outcome that was achieved.
Here’s an example. . .
QUESTION: Tell me about a time when you had to solve a complex problem at work.
ANSWER:
Situation: In my previous product owner role, one of our largest projects was an update of all our critical systems due to a new compliance requirement.
Task: It was my responsibility, along with a team of associate analysts, to lead and document all user acceptance criteria for each phase of the project. Our goal was to ensure 0 defects made it into production, since all of these tools were customer facing.
Action: To ensure we met our goals, we reached out to our client specialists in sales to do peer reviews of our test cases and contribute to testing, along with validating acceptance criteria. We setup a standardized process with a workflow approval process to ensure every test was completed three times in UAT, with the final test completed by a member of sales, prior to pushing any code to production. We also created a support chat that we used to discuss progress and further monitor the systems 2 weeks after each release, just in case there were issues.
Result: As a result, not only did we meet our target goal of 0 production defects, but we also saw usage of one of our largest applications increase by 20% with raving feedback from clients that the new enhancements we were able to prioritize as part of the project increased ease of use exponentially.
Bonus Points
- Make sure you take time to run through a few scenarios in your head, so that you have examples to immediately draw from. Think about situations where you had to work with a really difficult team member, were facing a vastly approaching deadline, or had to solve a complex business problem. Have those in your back pocket and rehearse telling the story several times prior to the interview. Even with all this practice, it is still okay to ask your interviewer for a few moments to think before answering the question.
- The interviewer cares about your story, but what really drives the point home is the result. DO NOT LEAVE THIS PART OUT.
- Make sure you answer the question as asked. Don’t spend so much time setting up the story, that you lose sight of the original question and forget to answer it.
- Here is a list of common situational interview questions to get you started.