{"id":67859,"date":"2014-04-10T07:30:03","date_gmt":"2014-04-10T12:30:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=67859"},"modified":"2014-04-11T05:08:26","modified_gmt":"2014-04-11T10:08:26","slug":"but-what-if-the-interviewer-asks-me-a-question-about-myself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=67859","title":{"rendered":"But what if the interviewer asks me a question about myself?"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Bradley Woodruff, Head Editor,\u00a0INALJ Wisconsin<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

But what if the interviewer asks me a question about myself?<\/span><\/h3>\n

\"bradleywoodruff\"<\/a>Give an example of a goal you reached and tell me how you achieved it.
\nTell me about how you worked effectively under pressure.
\nHave you ever made a mistake? How did you handle it?
\nHow do you handle a challenge? Give an example.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ve seen these before; they\u2019re behavioral interview questions. Since you\u2019re an avid INALJ reader, I\u00a0don\u2019t have to remind you that Roselle Pendergrast, Head Editor for INALJ Minnesota<\/a>, touched on these\u00a0in her recent post, \u201cDarn those Tough Interview Questions!<\/a>\u201d She cited one of the most effective ways to\u00a0approach these questions: the STAR method (or SOAR, if flying is more your thing).<\/p>\n

STAR\/SOAR<\/strong>
\nThe acronym above (we love acronyms, right?) is a formula for how to structure your response to a\u00a0behavioral question. It stands for Situation, Task\/Objective, Action, Results.<\/p>\n

Situation<\/strong>
\nBriefly paint the scene for your interviewer. Give an overview of the situation and relevant background\u00a0information. Be specific. Be succinct.<\/p>\n

Task\/Objective<\/strong>
\nDescribe the task you were trying to achieve in the situation. Give specifics, not a generalized overview.<\/p>\n

Action<\/strong>
\nTell the interviewer(s) the action you took to achieve the goal. Make sure you talk about yourself, and\u00a0what you did. If you\u2019re talking about work you did as part of a group, stay away from \u201cwe\u201d as much as\u00a0possible. Your group is not applying for the job. Do talk about how your work fit in with the work of the\u00a0rest of the team though.<\/p>\n

Results<\/strong>
\nThis final, crucial piece is often forgotten. People share what actions they did and forget to talk about\u00a0what happened as a result of those actions. Don\u2019t be shy about taking credit for your behavior here, and\u00a0include multiple positive results if you can.<\/p>\n

How you can SOAR and be a STAR (yes, I went there).<\/strong>
\nAs you prepare for your interview, practice putting together a few answers in this format. You\u2019ll get\u00a0accustomed to formulating this type of response, plus you\u2019ll have a few rehearsed answers in your\u00a0arsenal that you can call upon in an interview. Want to SOAR higher and get a gold STAR? Share your\u00a0response with a friend or colleague. Ask them what impression they think your response gives and see if\u00a0it aligns with the image you thought your answer portrayed.<\/p>\n

Example<\/strong>
\nYou want an example? Ok. Here is one. This is not my own, but stolen from someone I know.<\/p>\n

Give an example of a goal you reached and tell me how you achieved it.<\/strong>
\nWhile I was a student in my MLIS program, I was involved with (insert student group here). Our program\u00a0had a large number of students who lived far from campus. Our group wanted to increase attendance\u00a0of our regular meetings by finding a way to include distance students. I suggested we create a new\u00a0position, Digital Liaison, and volunteered to fill the role. I researched teleconferencing software,\u00a0coordinated live webcasts of all our meetings, and distributed a survey to online attendees to learn how\u00a0we could improve. By the end of the school year, we had seven distance students regularly attending\u00a0the webcasts. Our group benefited from the increase in member presence and I think distance students\u00a0appreciated that we made an extra effort to include them in our programs. The next year, two other\u00a0student groups copied our model.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s all about good storytelling. Set the stage, introduce a problem, throw in some action, and bring us\u00a0the resolution.<\/p>\n

Hopefully you are now ready to SOAR into a STAR position, because I\u2019m running out of space as well as\u00a0corny ways to use these acronyms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Bradley Woodruff, Head Editor,\u00a0INALJ Wisconsin But what if the interviewer asks me a question about myself? Give an example of a goal you reached and tell me how you achieved it. Tell me about how you worked effectively under pressure. Have you ever made a mistake? How did you handle it? How do you…<\/p>\n

Read more \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":57179,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[145],"tags":[69,5965,3592,5920,3597,217,4514,111],"class_list":["post-67859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","tag-article","tag-being-interviewed","tag-blog","tag-bradley-woodruff","tag-inalj-wisconsin","tag-interview-questions","tag-interview-tips","tag-tips"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/bradleywoodruff.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1WoMK-hEv","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=67859"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67859\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/57179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=67859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=67859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=67859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}