competency based interviews - help please!

[keeplaughing]

Anyone got any experience / advice re competency based interviews - I have one next week and haven't had an interview for 10 years as was with the same company. Have not worked for past 3 months

[zippitippitoes]

preparation is the key

do you have alist of the competencies?

and despite what they might say about using examples from your everyday life ime they roll about laughing if you do

have you been working or not recenytly?

and don't take any advice from me because my attempts to get a job sank after the tests and interviews!

good luck with someone else's useful advice

[zippitippitoes]

can see you have only been not working for 3 months so you should have good examples to use from work

[keeplaughing]

d'you think a day's preparation is enough? Darn school hols next week

[zippitippitoes]

I'm useless but there have been some helpful advisers on this before so I expect someone useful will be along

I should think so if you've had a similar job or even one where you have been able to show the competencies you should be fine

[exbury]

keeplaughing. It probably means "give us an example of a situation where you showed x" where x is one of the attributes listed on the job description.

My only advice would be to think of a few examples spread over a few years - situation/problem, what you did, what the result was, what you would do differently (if anything) because otherwise, if you are anything like me, you will find yourself using the same example for everything and the interviewer ends up thinking you only ever did one thing

Do you have or can you ask for a decent job description? If it is pretty close to what you were doing then the examples should be reasonably easy to come up with - if it is poles apart it makes it a little harder!

[keeplaughing]

sorry, had to go out to the PO.

thanks zipp...and exbury, luckily have got job desc and think it has required competencies on it. will take close look. thanks for thought re not using same example. Has anyone ever performed one of these on others - what are they really getting at? - ok evidence but what is behind the probing? , great word. Am quite fatalistic about these things usually but i do reeeely want his job. and the pay is ginormous. On the plus side I had a senaky in to this job through someone I know and have already had an 'informal chat' with the guy I'd work for. (1.5 hours) S'pose this is a good thing? Think I need some confidence boosting as have had bad few months...

[Trix11]

Ive interview people using competency based questions, the interviewer is looking for you to give examples of what you would do in said situations. If you have no direct experience then speak in hind sight, explaining what you would do.

The questions tend to be something like this: "Tell me about a time when you were faced with a difficult customer how did you deal with the situation? What was the outcome?"

[chocolatekimmy]

The info copied below is a response to a thread I replied to a few months ago - hope some of it is useful. K

Do you want possible answers as well?

Plus, make sure he is prepared with a list of good questions for them at the end as that can be a deciding factor between 2 good candidates (search on my name for some as I put some suggestions on a thread in January)


How do you galvanise your team into action? (Lead by example, not afraid to muck in, have a full understanding of my role plus theirs to appear credible, be enthusiastic, explain required outcome for what they are doing, ensure praise given when due as they will remember that)

How do you motivate your staff? Ensure the rate they are paid reflects the role they are in, carry out regular performance reviews, ensure they have set goals and realistic targets, have regular catch up meetings to assess workloads and see if they need help with anything, hold team meetings to keep them updated, delegate work to give them extra responsibility and exposure to new things, be honest with them, make sure you know your stuff so they respect you, give them development opportunities.

Competenty questions relating to honesty/integrity, leadership ability, communication, planning and executing work, prioritising, managing change, budgeting, dealing/diffusing with conflict/difficult situations, pressure, teamwork etc (think of examples for each so you are prepared)

Staff issies such as dealing with disciplinary or performance or grievance (depends on company policy)

What are your main strengths
What are your main weaknesses (or areas that require improvement) - have examples prepared

[WideWebWitch]

Use the STAR technique:

Situation: think of several where you showed that you have the competencies required for the job
Task: what was the task?
Action: what action did you take?
Result: what was the result of that action?

Competency based interviews are based on assuming that if you've demonstrated competency in xyz in the past you'll likely do so again in the future. All it means is "give me an example that shows me you have X competency" so if the requirement is that you are able to complete a mapping of an end to end process then you need to show when you did it before.

[keeplaughing]

thanks for this, it's really helpful. the 'weakness' bit i struggle with a bit - not that i'm perfect Any suggestions / thoughts / good answers? ChocKimmy I'll look at the other stuff, thanks

[chocolatekimmy]

Start with something like:

Well its not a weakness as such, just an area for improvement.

I have recognised that sometimes take too much work on, and then find I'm putting myself under too much pressure to get it completed. Its probably that i have a difficulty in saying no to people when they ask me and because I don't say no, people sometimes take advantage of me. To help this I am being more assertive and explaining if I have a heavy workload and that I will come back to them if I find that I can help once my work is cleared.

[keeplaughing]

that'd a good one, and i like the start off - re area for improvement. Will try to think of something else and frame it in this way. Am today and tomorrow on FT preparation. Is there anything interviewers really hate iyo?

[Mossie]

If it's a true competency based interview its unlikely you'll get asked the strengths / weaknesses question. I second everything WWW said, use the old STAR technique.

However on the odd occasion that I couldn't be bothered doing a CBI and did fall back on strenghts / weaknesses / situation questions (i.e. What would you do in X situation) the one thing that really p*d me off was when a candidate would talk about something that clearly wasn't a weakness.

So, "my weakness is, I'm a perfectionist / I work too hard / I just don't know when to stop / etc." Used to drive me mad; I'd ask, "so why is that a weakness?" My own fault really for being lazy, to be fair.

Do you have a list of the competencies they're seeking? If so, great, and I would recommend "revising" several STARs for these competencies. If not, why not look on the company's web site and see what "buzz words" they use; it's likely some of these attributes may be key competencies.

What else used to drive me mad? Lateness, one word answers, but conversely the thing that really wound me up was candidates who just would not shut up! We aimed to make interviews 40 mins max and occasionally you'd get a candidate who would keep you in there for over an hour wittering on about how crap their last job was etc. etc.

HTH. Don't know if it would be any use to you at all, I still have a very basic interview factsheet (it is obviously based around interviews that you get through agencies, so some of it may be no use) I can email to you if you want it. I dealt with quite junior level jobs though so you may find it a bit "trying to teach you to suck eggs"! Let me know if you want it, email msrlmoss @ hotmail . com (take out the spaces).

[WannaBeAYummyMummy]

Hi KL

Not sure if this is too late but thought I would add my opinion - from an interviewers perspective.

1. Definitely echo what Mossie says about the answer to the weaknesses question. Don't try and use the same old responses that everyone does which are SO obviously meant to be a strength really. V irritating. What I want when/if I ask that question is to guage someones self-awareness and honesty - the reality is that EVERYONE has real weaknesses and they are much easier to deal with if they are openly acknowledged.

1. In terms of what interviewers are really looking for when they use competency based interviews, my experience is that it is to have an objective way of comparing candidates that takes personality/cultural fit out of the equation. We use them at my company to "mark" candidates - eg. a possible 5 marks in total for each competency dependent on how far and at what level we feel the answer given matches the competence required. It's therefore SUPER important to be relevant and concise. If you waffle on for hours the interviewer will lose the will to live and will probably end up marking you down...

1. Finally, this may be personal, but I always get intensely irritated by:

a) candidates who are clearly only telling me what they think I want to hear - just tell me the true answer and then I can decide whether that works for the organisation or not!
b) candidates who assume that they know the ins and outs of the organisation just because they have read the website. It is good to be prepared but don't make assumptive comments about the way the business operates as you will more likely than not be wrong and that will have a negative impact on the employers perception of you.

HTH - and sorry if I come across as a mardy old interviewing moo!!

G

[keeplaughing]

Not too late Wannabe, interview is on thursday. thanks for comments - i will think of a suitable REAL weakness, just in case then. Especially good advice re concise and relevant.

Despite prep it's always possible that I get a left field question. Is it acceptable to say i can't think of a direct example right now, can we come back to this later (and hope sth pops into mind in the meantime?)

[Mossie]

During the interview: Difficult questions
 Complement the question (?That?s a really good question?).
 Ask for time (?Can I have a minute to think about it please??).
 Take the time ? take a full minute if need be ? and THINK!
 Thank them for the time (?Thanks for the time?)
 Tell them the answer (?I?ve thought about the question, and I think??)
 Alternatively, if you still don?t know the answer, tell them, and ask to move on (?I?ve thought about the question, but I?m afraid I don?t know the answer. Can we come back to it later / move on to the next question please??).


(Sorry about typos I copied and pasted it from word) hope it's of use.

[keeplaughing]

thanks Mossie, i s'pose it's all about staying calm and composed...

[Mossie]

Yes, I have always thought so anyway. Although a little bit of nervousness can be a good thing, gets the adrenaline going etc. Good luck!!