hey everybody don georgevich of it here job
interview tools in this video I'm going
to show you the formula for answering
behavioral questions and then I'm going
to break it apart and give you all the
strategies that you need to implement
the formula and then I'm going to give
you a couple of examples to show you how
it's done
sound like a good plan so let's get
started let's talk about how to answer
behavioral interview questions using the
star formula now if you don't know this
star stands for situation task action
and result and the first thing that you
want to do when answering a behavioral
question is describe a work-related
situation or a task that you needed to
accomplish and you want to be concise
the next thing you want to do is
describe the action that you took don't
tell them what you might do or you would
do you need to tell them what you did
and finally you need to describe what
happened this is the result phase what
did you accomplish what did you learn
how much time or money did you save and
most importantly does your results solve
the problem that you described in step
one I mean that's it
that's the formula for answering any
behavioral question now behavioral or
competency-based interviews are simply a
set of questions that ask you to talk
about examples from your past work
experience so you can help an
interviewer figure out you know what
your strengths are behavioral
interviewers are going to look at three
parts they're gonna look at the problem
the action and the result of your answer
and they're going to take notes about
how you answered the question now you
don't necessarily have to talk about all
three parts in order it's best to talk
about the part that your interviewer is
most interested in hearing now before
your interview I want you to think about
your stories and your experiences and
how to best make your point every
situation is different so you need to be
prepared for what you think they will
want to hear
now let's take a look at some strategies
that you can use on your next interview
number one carefully listen to your
interviewer and the questions they are
asking you and let them finish asking
you the question and don't jump to any
conclusions about how to answer it you
might even want to repeat the question
back to them to help you get a better
feel for it number two carefully choose
your language when answering their
questions try to use language that is
specific to your industry so you look
like more of an expert number three
before your interview research keywords
terms buzzwords that might be used by
the company that you're interviewing
with and incorporate that language into
your answers number four when giving
your answers don't go into extreme
detail just give them the basic facts
because this allows for two things one
it shortens the length of your answer
making it more digestible to your
interviewer and basically they'll have a
better idea of what you said because you
explained it in a shorter and simpler
manner number two a shorter answer
allows your interviewer to ask follow-up
questions about some of the details and
now this gives you the opportunity to
further demonstrate your competencies by
answering those specific questions and
you'll see what I mean in my examples
that I give later in this video
okay back to the list number five
carefully choose examples from your past
that you want to talk about and I say
that because if you're unwilling to go
into detail about certain topics then
avoid bringing those up in the first
place number six one of the best tips I
have for you is not to blame anyone for
failure on answering and interviewers
questions even if someone else is to
blame it's your goal to remain positive
when answering their questions companies
don't like to hire people with a
negative influence and who failed to
take responsibility for their actions
the only person that you can blame is
yourself
everyone else is off-limits you're not
there to defend yourself you're there to
get hired so don't act like you're there
to defend yourself number seven the best
way to answer their questions is to talk
about the most important part first
this strategy simply applies to our
human nature we like to hear the best
part first as it keeps us interested in
the conversation and when you do this
it's easier to keep them interested in
you now I want to cover seven behavioral
guidelines that will better prepare you
for your next interview number one you
need to identify the key competencies
for the position that you're
interviewing for basically you'd be to
know how your strengths relate to the
requirements for the position number two
look back to your work history what are
some of your strongest accomplishments
that demonstrate you are highly skilled
in each of the key competency areas for
the position number three it's best not
to list all of your accomplishments on
your resume so you have other
accomplishments to talk about during
your interview number four choose
accomplishments that are relevant to the
job that fully demonstrate your skills
don't talk about unrelated strengths
because they don't want to hear them
they want to hear what's related to the
job number five think about the best way
you can explain your accomplishments to
an interviewer number six try not to
prattle on with your answers keep them
short and to the point
number seven keep your answers positive
and make sure your verbal communication
supports your nonverbal communication so
you want to use facial expressions move
your hands just talk naturally and you
should be fine okay that covers the top
seven guidelines now let me show you how
to implement them let's take a look at a
couple of example behavioral questions
here's a good one for there
and give an example of a time you had to
take charge in changing a corporate
policy now first we're gonna start off
by describing the situation or the
problem so here we go at fidelity when I
took over the senior fund managers
position I found that the other
financial managers were not very
aggressive and had a tendency to play it
safe
with one of our 529 fund portfolios
being conservative was good because the
fund did not lose any money but at the
same time it had a very low return rate
then we're gonna go into the action part
this is where we tell them what we did
so for the next nine months I worked
towards educating other fund managers
about diversifying and taking about 20%
of the 529 fund and putting it into
hedge funds and various other investment
strategies with the hopes of boosting
the funds performance I work directly
with all of the managers and showed them
the benefits as well as the mitigated
risks of my plan now we're gonna go and
we're gonna give them the result we're
gonna tell them how it worked out here's
the result we received support from
upper management and the CEO fidelity to
change our policy and allow up to 20% of
the 529 portfolio to be invested with
hedge funds and other more risky
investments within a 12-month period
fund performance was up 17% you know and
that's it that's why you have to do a
short and sweet answer is all that is
needed to satisfy the interviewer for a
question like this now if you noticed I
tied the result back to the original
problem the problem was low fund
performance the action I took was to
educate fund managers to be more
aggressive
the result was improved fund performance
pretty cool huh
that's what you want to do so let's do
another one so you get the hang of this
here's the question if someone on your
team didn't do his job how did you
resolve this problem now the key to
answering this question is by using an
example from one of your past jobs
how you've had this problem before and
what you did to resolve it so here's the
situation back at General Electric my
work depended on this other guy getting
his work done so by him not doing his
job
he made me look bad and the last time
this happened our whole team was at risk
of missing an important deadline if he
didn't pull through then they want to
tell them what we did
to solve the problem the action part of
our answer I scheduled some time to
speak with him in an attempt to find out
what was slowing him down and as it
turned out he was confused and not clear
of what was expected of him and he did
not know how to move forward I then
helped him prioritize his tasks to where
it made sense to him
so for the next two weeks I paid more
attention to him and I made it a
priority to stop by his desk and follow
up with him to make sure that he
remained on track and now we're gonna go
and we're gonna give him the result
we're gonna tell him how the whole thing
worked out here's the result and this
only took an extra 20 minutes out of my
day but was well worth it because we
completed our project on time I also
didn't have to talk with his supervisor
to get this done it was just a small
case of where one of my co-workers was
falling a little behind and I'm glad I
was there to help him get back on track
so that's it that's a perfect answer to
a question like this so to recap the
problem was the risk of missing future
project deadlines the action was simply
education and the result was the
avoidance of a missed deadline because
the project was completed on time do you
see how the result ties back to the
problem in both of these examples my
answers are very short but they're to
the point and you can do the same so
let's take a look at some behavioral
questions you are likely to face on your
next interview here's a good one
describe a situation in which you felt
you made a good decision
and yet the consequences were less than
desirable
how did you handle it here's another
describe time when you had multiple
projects to complete with minimum human
and fiscal resources what did you do how
did you make the decisions give an
example of how you handle ever-changing
priorities and multiple assignments now
some of these questions you will get and
others you won't but what I did was I
put a link on this page to a complete
list of behavioral questions that you
might get asked now with some of them
they they will they'll be similar to
this they'll come in different forms all
shapes and sizes so you need to watch
out for them but just being exposed to
them in this video is a sneak peek of
what's coming at you and what you should
be preparing for so to help you with all
these crazy behavioral questions I've
developed a special program called the
interview answer accelerator and in this
program this is where you can send me
your answers to behavioral and identity
questions via email and I'll review your
answers to these questions to make sure
that your answers are making the grade
and then I'll reply back with my
comments and advices for how you can
approve your answers I'll talk to you
more about this program in the last
video and if you're interested in
getting my take on your answers you can
sign up for that it's really inexpensive
right now but if that's something that
you want don't wait around too long
either
because the program fills up really fast
because I can only handle about 25 new
student registrations at a time
well that's all I have for you today be
sure to let me know what you think and
leave me a comment tell me if you
recently had a behavioral interview and
what happened what did you do did they
catch you off guard with any of these
questions or were you prepared for them
I'd really enjoy hearing your story so
leave me a comment and I'll see you in
the next video where I'll show you how
to answer identity questions now if you
want you can watch the next video right
now all I ask is that you share it on
Facebook tweet it or share it on Google+
and I'll get it all queued up for you or
you can wait a day or two and I'll send
you an email with a link that will take
you directly to that video I'll see you
soon
hi Don this is Karen thank you so much
for helping me out with getting the new
job I start my new job and anyway I
really appreciate it I got a promotion
out of it and I really appreciate all
your help and emails with a few
questions that I did have and the guide
was very very easy to follow and I
directed a few people some of my friends
to your website so thanks again bye-bye