The Best Ways To Answer Behavioral Interview Questions / Competency Job Interview Questions

Hi, I'm James Ball, founder and director of The Interview Academy and today I'm going to talk to you about

behavioral

or

competency

interview

questions

. I'm going to go over exactly what they are, how you should

answer

them, and I'll also go over a couple of examples with you so it all makes a lot of sense. This video will help you prepare and practice

answer

s that are specific to you and put you in a position where you will never face these types of

questions

again. So grab a pen and paper and let's get going. So what is a

behavioral

question?

You may have heard them called

competency

and situational questions before. But, in essence, they are all the same. They are used to evaluate you on a variety of skills and characteristics based on your history and previous actions. The main difference from other

interview

questions is that you must answer in great detail. You have to give real-life examples to back up everything you say. They allow the interviewer to focus on key characteristics with laser-like precision. As I will show you with the use of follow-up questions, they are a tool that does not release you until you have given a complete and detailed answer.

You will definitely recognize them. They usually start with something like "...describe a situation when," "...tell me about a time when," or "...give me an example of when." Your answers will usually be graded based on some kind of hidden criteria. You may be asked, "Describe a time when you had to work as part of a team." Or "Give me an example of when you had to lead a project." Do you remember them now? The most important thing to remember when answering them is not to leave out any information when answering. Give as complete an answer as you can.

Interviewers love asking these types of questions because they give them the

best

possible opportunity to get as much detail out of a candidate. Plus, they demonstrate exactly how you acted in certain situations in the past, meaning the interviewer doesn't have to guess what your character is like based on vague answers to other interview questions. And if you're lying, it will be obvious because you probably won't give a detail that you would if you were telling the truth. And after a little pressure, you're almost guaranteed to make a mistake. Basically, you can expect to be questioned if an interviewer believes that he is not expanding enough on his answers.

Behavioral questions are really complicated and tend to trip up unprepared candidates. That's why I created this video. I hope it helps you do it right. So, let's take a look at the

best

way to answer competency questions. I'm going to go ahead and assume that most of you will have at least heard of the 'STAR Method'. But in case any of you haven't, it's basically a mnemonic you can use to remember how to expand your answers to behavioral questions. It helps you give the most detailed and impressive answer you can. If you use it correctly, your interviewer won't need to ask any follow-up questions.

Is that how it works. S strands for the situation. T means task. A is for action. R, the most important bit, represents the result. Now go and write it down if you're not sure. S for situation, T for task, A for action, R for result. When they ask you a question about competencies, you should respond with a story. That story should be something impressive from your past that shows how good you are in terms of whatever skill they are trying to evaluate. It should now be pretty clear what skill they are looking to assess from the question asked, so don't worry too much about that for now.

Start by setting the stage for your interviewer. Tell them what the situation was, and by the way, that's your S. Then, to be clear, state what task you had to complete as a result of the situation, and there's your T. Followed by your action, which is your A, that you took to complete a task. And finally, explain what the result, or the R, of your action was. Make sure the story is positive. You never want to tell a negative story about yourself. There you go. This is basically how the STAR Method works. STAR, Situation, Task, Action and Result.

That's the best and easiest way to answer any behavioral interview question. Remember, if you don't provide enough detail in your answer, your interviewer will almost certainly probe you with more questions like: What was the specific challenge you faced? How did you resolve the situation? And how did you come to that decision? Now that you know what it is and how it works, let's look at a couple of examples. Imagine an interviewer asks you, "When was the last time you had to think quickly?" With this question, you want to talk about something work- or education-related that has happened to you in the past.

Choose something that shows how quickly you think under pressure, which is obviously the skill they are looking to test. So you could say, "A colleague and I were supposed to do a sales presentation" for a really important client, "but my colleague called in sick that morning." That's your situation. This will immediately tell the interviewer a couple of things. Number one, you can make presentations, and number two, the company trusts you to deal with important clients. That's great. Next, you need to clarify what task you are facing as a result of your coworker's illness. The task bit can be a little difficult at times because it often tends to be included in the description of a situation.

If that happens, that's okay, just try to keep your response natural. For the sake of this example, your task would be to solve a situation. in a way that wouldn't make the entire company look bad. Considering we had two hours left until the presentation, so with this example, you are basically positioning yourself as the hero of the story. Your task was to save the day. Positioning yourself as the hero of the story is definitely the best way to approach competition questions. Next, you should tell the interviewer what you did. Then you might say, "I called another colleague "who I know was an expert in this field" and she agreed to back me up, "especially for any technical questions" I might be asked at the end. "I spend the hour learning and rehearsing the rest. "of the presentation to the best of my ability." This shows that you are willing to pitch in when things go wrong, but also that you can delegate and take control of difficult situations.

All this is very positive so far. There is no need to badmouth the sick colleague or anything like that. Let the interviewer make her own decision. So now is the decisive moment. You have to tell your interviewer what happened as a result of your actions. Remember, this should al

ways

be a positive thing. There is no point in telling a story that ends on a sour note. So in this example, you could say, "In the end, the presentation certainly wasn't perfect," but we were complimented on how natural it seemed "and that we were clearly very passionate about the topic." We got the sale in the end, "so it can't have been that bad." So this answer says that you think on your feet, plus you're clearly a great salesperson and are passionate about what you do.

Al

ways

remember, be positive and stay positive at all times. However, you're not done yet because at this point your interviewer may ask you, "If you could do it all over again, would you do anything differently?" And many people fall at this last hurdle with this question. It's a real favorite because it shows whether you have self-awareness and/or the willingness to learn and grow from your mistakes. If asked, you might say, "I'll make sure we always have a backup "who knows the presentation inside out," in case some unforeseen circumstance "takes the keynote speaker out of action." And with those answers, you've shown your ability to think on your feet, how quickly you act under pressure and learn from your mistakes, plus a host of mini-skills along the way. improve the business while you're at it.

I've given you this example to show you how easy it is to get your own interview responses once you understand the 'STAR Method' and how to implement it. You can practically change any story, you have to adapt to this method. Before we continue, I'll just go over one more example to help you understand it. Imagine the interviewer tells you question: "Tell me about a project you successfully completed as part of a team." This is a very common competency question because employers like to know if you can work well with others. I'd say, "We were asked to host an event for our client," and that's my situation. "My job was to organize the entire event and get as many people as possible to sign up.

This meant working with the entire team, venue managers and external suppliers such as caterers and entertainers." And that is my task. "Working with the venue staff, I managed to get a famous comedian for the event. Then, using some of my connections in the industry, I managed to get some favors like discounted food, a DJ, and alcohol. Finally, working with the marketing team , we came up with an email launch campaign that filled the event in two days." And that is my action. The event was a great success. My client raised over £10,000 for charity and gained a handful of new clients.

We will run it again next year. That is the result. And what would I do differently? I would use the venue team more to take care of the nitty-gritty stuff like decor and front desk staff, etc. As it would allow me to spend more time on core tasks." Again, this answer shows a variety of different skills and competencies, not just teamwork. I'm not going to lie, the STAR Method can take some practice and will definitely take some preparation on your part. But after a while, it almost becomes instinctive. So, to round out, use the STAR Method, Situation, Task, Action, Result, to answer competency questions.

Make sure to give lots of details and always be positive Practice makes perfect, so it's a good idea to try it with your friends or family or even with a video so you can decipher it correctly. That's because you still want to look as natural as possible. You don't want to sound robotic or like you're reading from a script. You want these things to be second nature." If you like more behavioral question examples and sample answers, be sure to download our free guide on behavioral questions by clicking the link below. For more information on behavioral questions and other videos on how to answer a variety of other interview questions, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel by clicking the subscribe button on this page Good luck with the interview.