The ICT Job Hunter Blog

Gone are the days when interviewers only asked standard, factual questions.  These days, you could be faced with anything from these to the downright oddball questions, situational questions or behavioral questions.  But what is a behavioral question?

As opposed to situational questions, which ask ‘What would you do if…’, behavioral ones require you to ‘describe a time when…’  Focusing on a job-related situation, they call for you to think of an occasion where you actually experienced a particular scenario and describe how you handled it.

Let me give you an example.  The interviewer asks you to describe a time when you showed great initiative at work.  Where do you start?  Simply ask yourself:

1.    What was the problem?

2.    How did I deal with it?

3.    What were the results?

Your answer might look something like this:

‘One morning, one of the company directors announced to our team that our immediate boss had just been diagnosed with a serious illness and would be off work for an indefinite period.  He did not provide any guidance as to what to do in her absence, but just said that he was sure that we would cope. 

The other team members just went back to what they were doing, but I could see that we needed a plan to make sure that the team could still fulfill its obligations to the company in my boss’s absence.  I had a good idea of my boss’s responsibilities, so I asked each member of the team to arrange a meeting with the business heads that we were accountable to, to establish what work was ongoing, the timescales for delivery and the deliverables that were expected.  I used this information to prioritize the extra workload and consult with the rest of the team, and others within the organization who could help, to divide up the work to ensure that our goals were met. 

It was actually four months before my boss was able to return to work, but during that time the team managed to meet all of its commitments within the necessary timescales and to the satisfaction of our CEO.  It was hard work, but we all learned a great deal from the experience.’

Behavioral interviews require you to have ‘stories’ like this to tell to demonstrate a range of skills and abilities, and the way to be able to predict these questions is simply by studying the job advertisement or description.  This is precisely what interviewers do to formulate the questions.  Sit down and list all of the abilities required by the role, think of specific occasions when you have demonstrated these abilities and prepare your ‘stories’ in advance.  Ideally, they should take two to three minutes to tell and you should be looking for examples which emphasize your accomplishments and demonstrate a successful result.

If ever you are tempted to believe that some people are just naturally better at handling interviews than others, then think again.  Successful interviewing comes from one thing alone…thorough preparation.  To find out all you need to know about how you can stand out from the other interview candidates, take a look at The Job Search Ninja Guide To Acing The Interview…and Good Luck!