Building Interviewing Confidence: Answer questions like a STAR

Interviews can be challenging for so many reasons. Add the curve ball of a global health pandemic: interviews are now happening through phone screens and first impressions need to be made behind face masks. These added hurdles can make it even more difficult to make a great impression. But today's post can help you on the journey towards building interviewing confidence, no matter the means by which your next interview will happen.

Among the toughest of interview hurdles, people often stumble through behavioral interview questions. These questions are meant to assess what you have done in a past scenario. So for example, an interviewer might ask:

- Tell me about a time where you demonstrated leadership.

- Have you ever had to help a difficult customer? Describe how you helped them.

How to answer behavioral questions

These questions are open ended, which means that you need to give details about past action, instead of a mere "yes" or "no". But you don't want to give a long-winded answer that is hard to follow and will lose your interviewer's interest. There is an easy acronym you can follow to ensure that you are providing an answer that is only not too long, but gives the information that hiring managers WANT to know:

STAR

STAR has helped me land my own personal interviews in the past, and many other people that I've coached. With enough practice, it will be easy to answer any behavioral question. Let's break it down.

Situation: State the context that the interviewer is asking about. What was the issue or problem?

Task: What was your role in the scenario in question?

Action: What did you do in the situation to solve the problem?

Result: What was the outcome of your action? Many people forget to talk about it, but this will probably resonate the most with the hiring manager. If you can, give numbers, or any other description that shows the impact of your intervention.

Common behavioral questions are easy to find online, but the muse provides a list of great questions that will go a long way in your preparation. I recommend jotting down your answers on paper using the STAR method and review first. Then get in front of a mirror, or practice with someone delivering your answers without your notes. Don't forget to also practice the tips from my other posts.

Questions about the future

Questions about what you WOULD do to solve a future problem if hired I consider to be behavioral questions too, and by all means, use STAR to answer these as well. Here is how I would use STAR in this case:

Interviewer: "Shani, what could you do differently to help educate more of our clients about resume writing?"

Me (on a zoom call): At ABC Coaching Network as a Career Specialist, I would find our community job search groups on Facebook and post about our free career workshops weekly. I would also work with the team to create an ABC Facebook page with weekly posts featuring resume tips covered in presentations. Social Media outreach as a learning tool will be useful because so many people use it daily. These easy to access reminders about resume writing can result in your clients reporting more invitations to interview."

Situation: ABC Coaching network/ need to educate people about resume writing.

Task: Career Specialist.

Action: Recruit new clients & educate about resume writing by posting on Facebook groups for current clients.

Results: Anticipated that the social media outreach will result in more clients learning and applying those tips successfully, and getting more interviews. It is okay to project an outcome.

To wrap it up, any question that asks about things you've done or will do is a behavioral question. Once you recognize what type of question is being asked, use STAR to provide an answer that will not be too short nor long.

I hope this helps! Let me know if it does, or if you have any questions. What other interview questions do you consider to be difficult? Let me know and we can chat about it:)