Behavioral Interviews — A Job Candidate’s Toughest Obstacle
By Damir Joseph Stimac
The interview begins like any other, exchanged pleasantries and then the interviewer starts asking really strange, specific questions. “Give me a specific example of a time when you didn’t meet a deadline.” Your mind races for an example which answers the question and then turns that failure into a success as suggested by your highly regarded interviewing book. The problem is that your outdated book taught you how to interview for traditional interviews-not behavioral (competency-based) interviews.
So where did behavioral interviews come from? In the late 1970’s Industrial psychologists studied the effectiveness of traditional interviews and concluded that they aren’t very effective in predicting a candidate’s ability to do a job. The questions are often hypothetical or theoretical. Job candidates often end up giving hypothetical answers that sound great but aren’t a true representation of what they would do in real situations.
An example of a traditional question may be: “How would you deal with an angry customer?” It isn’t difficult to figure out what the interviewer probably wants to hear so you end up saying something like, “I would politely ask them to tell me the problem, then I would offer my assistance in solving the problem.” That doesn’t sound too bad. The problem is that your answer is theoretical. It doesn’t represent what you would “actually do” in that situation.
An interviewer using behavioral techniques would ask the same question this way.
“Give me a specific example of a time when you had to address an angry customer. What was the problem and what was the outcome?”
Your mind races and you come up with an answer. Imagine a lengthy interview with questions that ask for specific examples of past experiences. Interviewers asking behavioral interview questions also target negative outcomes, when a situation or a task didn’t turn out the way you expected. “Tell me about a time when you made a mistake at your previous job that cost the company time and money.”
Your mind races again and you search for an event that wasn’t too terribly bad. The interviewer follows up with, “Is that the worst mistake you ever made?” The questions are very difficult and if you try to dance around the question, the interviewer has been taught to press even harder to get to the truth.
“The basic premise behind behavioral interviewing is that your past performance is the best predictor of future performance. In essence, if you ask behavioral questions, you’re no longer asking questions that are hypothetical, but are asking questions that must be answered based upon fact,” says Hewlett-Packard’s Bill Smith.
The interviewer determines the knowledge, skills, and behaviors (often referred to as competencies) that are essential for success in a position. Competencies may include: Assertiveness, Clarification, Commitment to Task, Dealing with Ambiguity, Decision Making, Interaction, Leadership, Management Skills, Communication Effectiveness, Organizational Orientation, Problem Solving, Team Building and others. Each competency contains various questions that are designed to determine to what extent the candidate has performed successfully in previous situations similar to those they will encounter in the position for which they are interviewing.
“With a behavioral question, you’re looking for results. You’re not just looking for an activity list. So you’re listening for things like names, dates, places, the outcome and especially what the individual’s role was in achieving that outcome,” says Smith.
Candidates can prepare for behavioral interviews by identifying specific examples for each of the above competencies. “The competency associated with interpersonal effectiveness is very important, particularly in the office environment. The relationships people have and how they get along with each other –that’s an important part of being successful,” says Pamela Cook, a staffing representative at US West.
When preparing, identify an unsuccessful example for each competency because you will probably be asked to give an example of a time when things didn’t work out as planned. One way to end an answer to a negative probe is to say something like “the mistake caused me to delay the project, but it helped me to develop a project tracking system which would minimize the chance of that happening again.”
Remember, mistakes are what help us learn. Whatever you do, don’t tell the interviewer that you really can’t think of any mistakes that you made. Don’t make up an answer either because interviewers trained in behavioral interviewing techniques will probe deeply into your answer. You will have a hard time keeping your story straight if you start making things up. Inconsistent answers will cause you to be assessed negatively.
More and more companies are adopting behavioral interviews because they are very effective in identifying which candidate has the best possibility of success for the position. Understanding behavioral interviews is the key to preparing for one. Preparing for behavioral interviews can significantly help you in traditional interviews because you can give traditional interviewers specific answers to theoretical questions.
Example:
Interviewer:
“How would you address an angry customer?”
Applicant:
“I can give you a specific example. I was the manager of the department when a really irate customer came in yelling at everyone. He was upset because…. I invited him to my office and… He apologized for his outburst and bought the top of the line air compressor.” When you give specific examples to interview questions, you establish credibility and believability, and that can ultimately translate into a job offer.
Best wishes, Joe Stimac