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Wouldn’t You Take a Pay Cut to Get a Better Job Title?

August 27, 2021 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Venture capitalist Ben Horowitz on giving employees ego-boosting new job titles to appease them for not receiving a promotion or a pay increase:

Marc Andreessen argues that people ask for many things from a company: salary, bonus, stock options, span of control, and titles. Of those, title is by far the cheapest, so it makes sense to give the highest titles possible… If it makes people feel better, let them feel better. Titles cost nothing. Better yet, when competing for new employees with other companies, using Andreessen’s method you can always outbid the competition in at least one dimension.

Wouldn't You Take a Pay Cut to Get a Better Job Title? Millennials tend to consider work as the defining aspect of their identity (see Horowitz’s What You Do Is Who You Are (2019).) Job titles aren’t just descriptors of what they do but a reflection of who they are—not just service technicians at an Apple Store, but Geniuses. A self-elevating job title helps them cling to the notion that work has meaning and, consequently, their work-lives make sense.

Moreover, since they’re experiencing more of their lives online than any generation before them, millennials tend to be conscious of their personal brands on social media. Being a ‘senior numbers ninja’ rather than a mere ‘cost accountant’ offers instant branding appeal.

Idea for Impact: However superficial they sound (“bogus grandeur,” I called them previously,) a fancy title could help you land a better position further down the line. Get creative with your job title even if you have to take a hit on your expected salary—it could pay off in the long term.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. I’m Not Impressed with Your Self-Elevating Job Title
  2. Not Everyone is Chill About Tattoos and Body Art // Workplace Norms
  3. Job-Hunting While Still Employed
  4. Don’t Use Personality Assessments to Sort the Talented from the Less Talented
  5. Before Jumping Ship, Consider This

Filed Under: Career Development, Managing People Tagged With: Career Planning, Human Resources, Job Search, Marketing, Winning on the Job

Why You Should Interview For a Job Even if You Don’t Want It

May 21, 2021 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Why You Should Interview For a Job Even if You Don't Want It When you’re uncertain about a position or the company that’s invited you, attend the interview anyway. Do your best. At the very least, it’s an excellent opportunity to practice your interviewing skills.

It’s good to endure the uneasiness—or panic—leading up to interviews. The more interview styles and settings, and the variety of interviewer personalities you’re exposed to, the more prepared you’ll be when you land that dream job interview. Presenting your best self in an interview is a rehearsed performance.

Better yet, any interview could open doors. You may discover details of a position, team, or company that you may end up liking. Job descriptions tend to be nondescript, and you don’t get a real sense of a role or a company until you’ve had a face-to-face or telephone conversation. Too, if you make a positive impression, the interviewer may refer you to another job opening that’s a better fit.

If the interview is definitely not what you were going for or if you have an attractive job offer lined up already, don’t waste your time—and the interviewer’s time.

Idea for Impact: Every interview could be worth your time, even if you don’t want the job.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Job Interviewing #2: Interviewing with a Competitor of your Current Employer
  2. What’s Behind Your Desire to Job-Hunt and Jump Ship?
  3. Job-Hunting While Still Employed
  4. Before Jumping Ship, Consider This
  5. Don’t Use Personality Assessments to Sort the Talented from the Less Talented

Filed Under: Career Development Tagged With: Job Search, Job Transitions

Not Everyone is Chill About Tattoos and Body Art // Workplace Norms

December 10, 2020 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Over the last decade or so, body art has gained more acceptance as a form of personal expression—akin to clothing, jewelry, or hairstyle. Workplace attitudes toward body art have slowly shifted.

Certain trades—especially arts and media—value individuality, especially in creative roles. Visible tattoos and body piercings are common and acceptable. However, consulting, law, management, recruitment, and other “traditional” trades are likely to find body art less compliant with the industry norms. Having a tattoo can even be seen as unprofessional and defiant—even intimidating.

You have the right to express yourself as long as you are respecting the company’s norms

Not Everyone's Chill About Tattoos and Body Art For some conservative people, visible art suggests that you may have a problem with authority. One study showed that tattooed people are perceived to be less honest, motivated, and intelligent.

At some workplaces, your insistence on leaving large earrings and nose piercings on or dressing in short sleeves that reveal your tattoos signals to that employer that you don’t care about norms. You may be judged as a willful person insistent on exerting your individuality rather than fit in and belong.

Your appearance and behavior are expected to reflect your workplace’s values and culture, particularly in customers’ presence.

Employers are free to impose dress codes and grooming guidelines. Discrimination law does apply to matters related to age, gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, nationality, and religion—but not your sense of fashion.

Idea for Impact: Offensiveness is subjective, and everyone draws their lines differently

Don’t put yourself at a disadvantage. Consider the micro-cultural stereotypes concerning body art.

Seek a happy medium between personal style and dressing for work. Cover up and limit the number of visible piercings.

If you’re starting a new job and aren’t sure how body art will be perceived, consider a pilot. Instead of going “all in,” test the waters by displaying a little body art and see what sort of response you get.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. I’m Not Impressed with Your Self-Elevating Job Title
  2. Wouldn’t You Take a Pay Cut to Get a Better Job Title?
  3. Job-Hunting While Still Employed
  4. One of the Tests of Leadership is the Ability to Sniff out a Fire Quickly
  5. Don’t Use Personality Assessments to Sort the Talented from the Less Talented

Filed Under: Career Development, Managing People Tagged With: Attitudes, Career Planning, Conflict, Etiquette, Human Resources, Job Search, Winning on the Job, Work-Life

I’m Not Impressed with Your Self-Elevating Job Title

October 12, 2020 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

I'm Not Impressed with Your Self-Elevating Job Title

Ben Horowitz of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz discusses giving employees ego-boosting new job titles to appease them for not receiving a promotion or a pay increase:

Should your company make Vice President the top title or should you have Chief Marketing Officers, Chief Revenue Officers, Chief People Officer’s, and Chief Snack Officers? There are two schools of thought regarding this.

Marc Andreessen argues that people ask for many things from a company: salary, bonus, stock options, span of control, and titles. Of those, title is by far the cheapest, so it makes sense to give the highest titles possible… If it makes people feel better, let them feel better. Titles cost nothing. Better yet, when competing for new employees with other companies, using Andreessen’s method you can always outbid the competition in at least one dimension.

And, as a counterpoint, the pitfalls of job title inflation:

At Facebook, by contrast, Mark Zuckerberg… avoids accidentally giving new employees higher titles and positions than better performing existing employees. This boosts morale and increases fairness. Secondly, it forces all the managers of Facebook to deeply understand and internalize Facebook’s leveling system which serves the company extremely well in their own promotion and compensation processes. He also wants titles to be meaningful and reflect who has influence in the organization. As a company grows quickly, it’s important to provide organizational clarity wherever possible and that gets more difficult if there are 50 VPs and 10 Chiefs.

It’s become trendy to create and bandy about outlandish job titles and inflate career profiles.

I’m never impressed with self-elevating titles (e.g., Revenue Protection Officer for a Train Ticket Inspector, Director of First Impressions for a Receptionist) that make you sound like a pretentious, egotistical, and obnoxious person.

Your job title is supposed to help me understand what you do without having to open up the dictionary.

Yes, vague and puzzling job titles surface partly because the world is changing, and so are trades and occupations. Some new job titles are going to be needed.

But it’d be great if we could get by with a much smaller and simpler inventory of descriptive job titles.

Idea for Impact: Avoid bogus grandeur—challenge job title inflation. Don’t assign senior-sounding job titles to those with middle-ranking wages.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Not Everyone is Chill About Tattoos and Body Art // Workplace Norms
  2. Wouldn’t You Take a Pay Cut to Get a Better Job Title?
  3. Job-Hunting While Still Employed
  4. Don’t Use Personality Assessments to Sort the Talented from the Less Talented
  5. Before Jumping Ship, Consider This

Filed Under: Business Stories, Career Development, Managing People Tagged With: Career Planning, Human Resources, Humility, Job Search, Winning on the Job

Don’t Use Personality Assessments to Sort the Talented from the Less Talented

October 25, 2018 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator---Developed by Katharine Cook Briggs and her daughter Isabel Briggs Myers based on Carl Jung's Psychological Types

Personality assessments have featured in personality development and career counseling for almost a century. Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) and other tests form the basis for helping people deal with conflict, understand team interplay, outline career search, sharpen decision-making skills, and cope with stress.

Personality Assessments Cannot Predict Performance

Even as their use has grown significantly over the last two decades, personality assessments—including strengths inventories, and emotional intelligence assessments—have been criticized at length:

  • An individual’s personality cannot be summed up by a personality assessment. Individuality is described best by continuous (not discrete), normally-distributed attributes. For example, the MBTI Step I classification of individuals into 16 categories (or 4 dichotomies from Carl Jung‘s book Psychological Types (1921)) does not encapsulate the full range of personality variance.
  • An individual’s behavior cannot be limited to one side of a dichotomy. For instance, every person can be outgoing and assertive in the external world (extraversion,) while requiring time for some contemplation (introversion).
  • Many academic studies question the tests’ predictive validity and poor reliability. Moreover, personality assessments have poor test-retest consistency. Test takers have been shown to change at least one dichotomy when they take the MBTI Step I survey a second time.
  • Personality assessments can initiate confirmation bias (“Barnum Effect”)—the test scores are self-fulfilling because people tend to behave in ways that are predicted for them. In other words, a person who learns that he or she is “outgoing” according to MBTI may behave that way.
  • Personality tests are decidedly fakeable, especially when used to evaluate future career opportunities. All personality assessments are contingent on a degree of honesty, but MBTI test-takers are often motivated to match up to extraverted, sensing, thinking, and judging (ESTJ) proclivities in the modern organization.
  • Assessments are regularly offered as universally applicable. Not only do they tend to mirror the biases of the test developers, but also they are skewed in preference of the social groups the developer studied.

Personality Assessments are Starting Points for Change, Not a Predictor of the Outcome

Academics have long acknowledged the previously mentioned criticisms of personality assessments. They’ve argued fruitfully that many of the criticisms should be directed to how HR practitioners understand personality tests and use them in the development arena.

MBTI and many other personality assessments were never intended to sort the talented from the less talented. They are designed for the individual who takes the assessment, and not for the HR practitioner. In other words, personality assessments were designed to help individuals discover their underlying preferences regarding learning styles, problem-solving styles, self-awareness, ethical inclinations, emotional intelligence, and stress management.

Intended for Increasing Self-awareness, Not Appraisal

On the contrary, HR practitioners tend to interpret test scores speciously to gauge behavior, rather than as pointers of categorical preferences. Besides, HR practitioners often fail to factor in the test-takers’ past and current environmental influences.

And then there’s the risk of people being pigeonholed or pushed into a particular course regardless of his or her preferences. HR practitioners and career counsellors who put too much emphasis on personality assessments may compartmentalize people into rigid categories. This flies in the face of a central tenet of the MBTI premise—that individuals could choose to act against their preferred type if the occasion demands it. People’s attitudes and behaviors often change over time because of emotional experiences or socialization into specific work and social cultures.

Idea for Impact: Use Personality Assessments to Facilitate Self-Awareness, Not for Categorization or as Predictors of Achievement

If you’re a manager or a HR practitioner, don’t use personality assessments to categorize people or as predictors of achievement. Encourage people to take personality tests, but help them interpret these pieces of data about themselves—only they could make sense of test results in the context of their life history, social environment, and ambitions for career and life.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Before Jumping Ship, Consider This
  2. Some Lessons Can Only Be Learned in the School of Life
  3. What Every Manager Should Know Why Generation Y Quits
  4. How to Improve Your Career Prospects During the COVID-19 Crisis
  5. Who’s Responsible for Your Career

Filed Under: Career Development, Leading Teams, Managing People, Mental Models Tagged With: Career Planning, Employee Development, Hiring, Job Search, Job Transitions, Managing the Boss, Mentoring, Personal Growth, Winning on the Job

Before Jumping Ship, Consider This

July 7, 2017 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Don't Jump Ship in Frustration

Dissatisfied with your job? Considering jumping ship? There’s no guarantee your next job will be any better. Many people who jump ship in frustration run into the same problems that were an obstacle with previous employers.

Consider working on a solution before trying to jump ship. Try to discuss your future with your boss.

  • Examine your motivations. Insist on realism. Do you have clear goals and priorities? Step back and assess what’s happening in your career journey. Don’t have unrealistic assumptions.
  • Start with a plan. What specifically are you seeking to make your job better? How can you get it? If you feel your career has become stagnant, realize that people who stay in one function or one industry may move up quickly in the beginning of their careers but often reach a ceiling later when they become too specialized.
  • Be brutally candid with yourself. Make sure you’re capable of handling the roles and responsibilities you’re seeking. Determine if they’re available.
  • Meet formally with your boss to discuss your plan. Take the initiative to lead the discussion; unlike at a performance review, here you drive the discussion.
  • During the meeting, ask your boss to evaluate your skills and your potential. Hear him out. Use active listening—repeat what he said to make sure you understand each other.
  • Give the boss your perspectives after hearing his. Don’t be confrontational. Try to cooperate. Think before you respond: reacting too quickly will set your boss on the defensive and guarantee an argument.
  • Once you’ve agreed upon a solution, do everything to progress it. Example: One woman wanted to be reassigned to her company’s trade sales unit. At her own initiative, she attended her industry’s trade shows, developed contacts, and learned what was necessary to succeed in sales and marketing.
  • Don’t expect quick action: changes take a little time. Perhaps you may be happier with a lateral move: many people think that careers should follow an upward trajectory. In fact, most jobs transitions don’t entail a promotion. Most successful careers involve a mix of lateral and upward movement.

Idea for Impact: Try to ask for honest feedback about what’s holding you back from a promotion. You’ll find it easier to tackle career frustrations in a familiar environment at your current employer rather than at a new company where you’ll be under pressure to learn the ropes and produce results quickly.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Don’t Use Personality Assessments to Sort the Talented from the Less Talented
  2. Some Lessons Can Only Be Learned in the School of Life
  3. What Every Manager Should Know Why Generation Y Quits
  4. How to Improve Your Career Prospects During the COVID-19 Crisis
  5. Who’s Responsible for Your Career

Filed Under: Career Development, Sharpening Your Skills Tagged With: Career Planning, Employee Development, Job Search, Job Transitions, Managing the Boss, Mentoring, Personal Growth, Winning on the Job

Job-Hunting While Still Employed

June 30, 2017 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Job-Hunting While Still Employed Searching for a new job without revealing that you aren’t very pleased at your current job or getting fired can be a challenge. Here are four ways to job-hunt with caution.

  • Examine your motivations before job-hunting. Many people who jump ship in frustration run into the same problems that were an obstacle with previous employers. Try to ask for honest feedback about how you’re perceived by your managers and what’s holding you back from a promotion. You’ll find it easier to tackle career progression frustrations in a familiar environment at your current employer rather than at a new company where you’ll be under pressure to learn the ropes and produce results quickly.
  • Respect your employer’s time and resources. Don’t job-search on company time—your current job responsibilities are your priority. Looking for another position typically involves having to be away from your office for interviews; use your vacation days—not sick days—for job-searching and interviewing. Be careful about using your work computer to look up jobs, contact recruiters, or update your social-media presence.
  • Be tactful about whom you tell that you’re looking for another job. Even if you trust your coworkers, you can’t limit what they may share with others. Some of your coworkers may be ethically obligated to keep your boss and your company informed about any prospective changes in staffing or anything that might affect the organization’s goals. Be cautious about how you promote yourself on LinkedIn and job-search websites.
  • If you are offered a new job, be straight with everyone. Inform your boss immediately. Give as much notice as required, plan to tie up loose ends, and offer to help transition your responsibilities to a successor. Don’t be unreasonable in leveraging your new job offer to negotiate a counteroffer from your employer. Do your best to leave on the right note. Be consistent in what you tell different people about why you’re leaving. Do not burn bridges in the job-transition process.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Job Interviewing #2: Interviewing with a Competitor of your Current Employer
  2. I’m Not Impressed with Your Self-Elevating Job Title
  3. Not Everyone is Chill About Tattoos and Body Art // Workplace Norms
  4. Before Jumping Ship, Consider This
  5. Don’t Use Personality Assessments to Sort the Talented from the Less Talented

Filed Under: Career Development Tagged With: Career Planning, Ethics, Human Resources, Job Search, Job Transitions, Winning on the Job

What’s Behind Your Desire to Job-Hunt and Jump Ship?

February 16, 2016 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

What's Behind Your Desire to Job-Hunt and Jump Ship

The primary motivations for seeking a new job are a more enjoyable job, better compensation, and opportunities for career progression. Talent management firm Caliper’s analysis of exit interviews from 180 companies confirmed that the principal reason employees quit their jobs is a lack of personal fulfillment and the feeling of not being well matched to their jobs. 40% of exit interviews complained about poor advancement potential, insufficient recognition, and not being challenged on the job. Just 26% mentioned wages and 11% mentioned workplace conflict.

Examine Your Motivations Before Job-Hunting

Many people who jump ship in frustration run into the same problems that were an obstacle with their previous employers. So, if you’re considering a change and seeking a new job because you’re not moving forward at your current job, first get honest feedback about how you’re perceived by your managers: what do they think your strengths are, where you need to develop, and what’s holding you back? Without such feedback on your career challenges, you may run into the same problems at your new employer.

You’ll find it easier to tackle career progression frustrations at your current employer in a familiar environment rather than at a new company where you’ll be under pressure to learn the ropes, form new relationships, produce results quickly, and work with superiors who may be less forgiving. Indeed, many people who change jobs fail or flame out at their new employers and don’t meet their job-change objectives after two years. Their premature departures and undue job-hopping reflects negatively on their career progress.

When You Must Seek a New Job

By all means, explore the job market in pursuit of career advancement if,

  • you’ve been passed over many times and haven’t been told how you need to develop to move ahead, or
  • you’ve been locked into your current job because of a long-tenured manager and can’t find another position within the same employer.

Be discreet about whom you tell that you’re looking for another job. When you find a new job, inform your boss immediately, give as much notice as required, and offer to help transition your duties to a replacement. Don’t use your new job offer to try to negotiate a counteroffer from your employer.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Job Interviewing #2: Interviewing with a Competitor of your Current Employer
  2. Job-Hunting While Still Employed
  3. Before Jumping Ship, Consider This
  4. Don’t Use Personality Assessments to Sort the Talented from the Less Talented
  5. How to … Know When it’s Time to Quit Your Job

Filed Under: Career Development Tagged With: Career Planning, Job Search, Job Transitions

Use The STAR Technique to Ace Your Behavioral Interview

July 15, 2008 By Nagesh Belludi 32 Comments

Introduction

Behavioral interviewing is a popular approach to assess a candidate’s past experiences and judge his/her response to similar situations on a future job. This variety of interviewing is based on the premise that past performance in comparable circumstances is the best predictor of future performance.

Rather than ask hypothetical questions (E.g., “How will you handle…,”) interviewers ask more specific, focused questions (E.g., “Describe a time when you had to…”) to elicit concrete examples of desired behaviors from the past. For example, instead of asking an interviewee, “How will you deal with a team member who is not pulling his weight on a project?” as in a traditional interview, an interviewer using the behavioral technique may ask, “Describe a project where one of your teammates was not pulling his weight. What did you do?” For further details and sample questions, see my earlier article on behavioral interviewing.

The 'STAR' Technique to Answer Behavioral Interview Questions

Prior to the interview, an interviewer identifies a set of behavioral traits he/she believes is essential for professional success on a particular job assignment. He/she then selects a series of questions:

  • “Describe a time when you had to …. What did you do?”
  • “Give me an example of a time when you had to …”
  • “Tell me about a situation in the past …”

Next, the interviewer may question the interviewee further:

  • “What was the outcome?”
  • “Did you consider …?”
  • “How did the other person react?”

Instead of allowing the interviewee to theorize or generalize about events, the interviewer expects the interviewee to narrate four details for each experience: (1) what the situation was, (2) what the challenges were, (3) how the interviewee dealt with the situation, and (3) what the outcome was.

6 Steps to Answer Behavioral Interview Questions

  1. Listen to the question carefully. Commonly, behavioral interview questions tend be long-winded and may sound vague (blame an overuse of adjectives, adverbs and trendy language.) Here is an example: “Good problem-solving often includes a careful review of the substantial facts and weighing of options before making a decision. Give me an instance when you reached a practical business decision by assessing the facts and weighing the options.”
  2. Interviewing Maintain Rapport Make sure you understand the question before you start to answer. You may paraphrase the question and ask the interviewer if you understand it correctly. If necessary, ask the interviewer to repeat the question. Do not, however, ask the interviewer to repeat every question—the interviewer may doubt your ability to listen.
  3. Organize your answer. Allow yourself five to eight seconds to collect your thoughts and structure your response. Interviewers appreciate this break and could use the time to drink some water, review their notes, or rest their hands from note taking.
  4. State your answer. Try to limit your answer to about three minutes. Three minutes is long enough to relate a story completely and short enough to hold the interviewer’s attention.
  5. Do not digress from your plan. Resist the temptation to think of new details as you state the answer. By sticking to your planned details and structure, you can provide a consistent, concise, and well-reasoned answer.
  6. Answer follow-up questions. In response to your three-minute answer, the interviewer may pose additional questions. These questions may require simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers or brief elaboration.

The 'STAR' Technique to Answer Behavioral Interview Questions

Answering a Question: Use the STAR Technique to Narrate an Experience

In behavioral interviewing, every answer should specifically address the skill in question. Your response should relate an experience from a previous job assignment, project, academic study, or community work.

Present a diverse set of experiences. Suppose you are asked six behavioral questions during a thirty-minute interview. Supplementing each question with a distinct experience will help you portray a wide range of skills and interests.

First, examine the question: what is its purpose; what specific skill is the question addressing? Next, choose an applicable experience. In your mind, recollect and reflect on specifics of that experience. You can structure your answer a using the four steps of the ‘STAR’ technique:

  • ‘S’ for Situation: Start your answer by providing the background of your experience. Describe the circumstances of your involvement. Provide enough detail to preface the rest of your narration.
  • ‘T’ for Task: Describe the challenge at hand and what needed to be done. Give the expected outcome and any conditions that needed to be satisfied.
  • ‘A’ for Action: Elaborate your specific action in response to the challenge. Specify analytical work, team effort or project coordination. Use ‘I’ and ‘we’ statements as appropriate.
  • ‘R’ for Results: Explain the results of your efforts: what you accomplished, what you learned, how your managers and team responded, and how your organization recognized you. Wherever possible, quantify your achievements and improvements—e. g., “20% improvement in …” or “reduced manufacturing costs by 1.5 million dollars per year …”

The 'STAR' Technique to Answer Behavioral Interview Questions

An Example: Using the STAR Technique to Narrate an Experience

Consider a question posed by authors Jack and Suzy Welch in a 2008 BusinessWeek article on recruiting for leadership positions: “Have you ever had to define yourself in the midst of criticism, and did you succeed?”

Below is a ‘STAR’ answer to this interview question. The interviewee’s response illustrates their ability to listen to feedback, adapt as a manager, and lead teams well.

  • ‘S’ for Situation: “My first job after business school was to lead a product development team at Acme Corporation. One of my responsibilities involved weekly product planning meetings that chose product features. After the meeting, I would meet with my staff and delegate programming tasks. Since I am an experienced programmer, I would explain the approach to each feature to be programmed. I expected my staff to write the programs in C++, then test and debug them. We seemed to work very well as a team.”
  • ‘T’ for Task: “Three months later, my manager collected feedback from my staff. In my performance review, my manager noted that I could improve my delegation skills. His comment surprised me. I thought I was good at delegating, as I would explain my expectations and all necessary steps to each staff member. I felt my staff was productive and consistently benefitted from my coaching. I thanked my manager for the feedback and promised to reflect on my delegating style and consider a change.”
  • ‘A’ for Action: “Upon reflection, I noticed two issues with my delegation approach. Firstly, in assigning tasks to my staff I only described the steps they needed to take. I had habitually failed to describe the background of product features we wanted to develop and explain how their work would contribute to and improve the overall product. My staff would just do what I had asked of them without understanding the context of their efforts. Secondly, while explaining how to complete each assignment, I was micromanaging. This may have limited my staff’s initiative and reduced opportunities to advance their programming skills. During the next staff meeting, I thanked them for the feedback and acknowledged I would change. from that point forward, Then, each week, I explained each product feature’s unique context, described the task in terms of outcomes and asked my staff how we could approach each task.”
  • ‘R’ for Results: “My staff was very excited by the opportunity to propose ideas, brainstorm, and choose their own preferred method of going about their work. They were no longer working on my idea alone: they shared in its conception and approached it their own way. They were more enthusiastic about their work and realized they were an integral part of something bigger than they were. During the next quarterly meeting, my manager praised me for empowering my team.”

The Significant Accomplishment Question

Interviewing Skills: Avoiding Second-Person Answers The single most important question that you will answer in every interview is the significant accomplishment question: “Tell me about the most significant accomplishment in your life. What challenges did you face? What did you do? How did it impact your organization?” An interviewer may pose this question as one of these variations: “Tell me something you are most proud of,” “Share the one thing you want me to know,” or, “Tell me something from your past that you are really excited about.”

If there’s one question that you should prepare for, it’s this significant accomplishment question. Here is a sample answer:

“The accomplishment that I am most proud of was being named ‘Consultant of the Year’ by Acme Medical Systems in 2002. When I worked as a product development consultant at Indigo, a team of Acme Medical Systems designers hired me to develop the plastic prototype of a new Computed Tomography (CT) scanner. Acme wanted to display their new cardiac scanner to their vice president who was visiting the following week. In preparation, I was asked to help develop the prototype of the CT-scanner’s new keyboard.

“The keyboard is a large, intricate device with plenty of keys, knobs, and styluses. One of the primary challenges with prototyping this keyboard was that it was too large to fit into any standard manufacturing machine. In addition, based on the design’s complexity, I originally estimated that developing the prototype would take at least two weeks. We had just eight days, including the weekend. For the next week, I worked from 10:00 AM until midnight every day and over the weekend. On the first day, after studying the design, I proposed a modified, simpler version, which my clients accepted. The next day, I used my advanced CAD skills to digitally split the complex design into smaller components that could be manufactured individually and then assembled. The new modular design, in fact, facilitated the assembly plan.

“Initially, my clients were concerned about the assembly process. I used a finite element model to reassure them and confirm that the assembly would be sufficiently robust. Since my clients were busy working on the rest of the CT-scanner, I offered to work with the suppliers. I visited five suppliers and prepared a manufacturing budget. After my budget was approved, I chose two suppliers and spent three days supervising the manufacturing process. Then, I worked with a third supplier to have the prototype carefully assembled, painted, and delivered the day before the vice president’s visit.

“The end-result was that the prototype was prepared in half the lead-time and 40% under budget, even after paying the suppliers overtime. In addition, my modular design lowered manufacturing costs by 20% when the CT-scanner went into production. In recognition of my hard work and cost savings, Acme honored me among sixteen contenders with the ‘Consultant of the Year’ award.

Behavioral Interview Questions for Practice

Consider the following questions. Practice your answers using the four-step ‘STAR’ technique. For more questions to practice with, see my compilation of job interview questions categorized by personal attributes, career performance, communication skills, team skills, managerial skills, and leadership skills.

  • Question on team work: “Describe a situation when your team members disagreed with your ideas or proposal on a project. What did you do?”
  • Question on analytical problem-solving: “Tell me about a time when you discovered a problem before anybody else on your team. What was the nature of the problem? How did you handle it? Did you ask for help?”
  • Question on assertiveness: “Give me an example of when you had difficulty getting along with a team member. What made this person difficult to work with? How did you handle the situation?”
  • Question on customer orientation and commitment to task: “Tell me about a time when you had to reject a customer’s request. What reasons did you give? How did you communicate?”
  • Question on creativity: “What is your most creative solution to a problem?”
  • Question on working effectively with others: “What was a constructive criticism you received recently? How did you respond to it? Did your relationship with this person change?”

Concluding Thoughts

In answering interview questions, the best way to impress an interviewer is to discuss your credentials and accomplishments in terms of personal success stories. The ‘STAR’ technique is probably the best method to structure answers to interview questions. By following this simple technique, you can narrate direct, meaningful, personalized experiences that best demonstrate your qualifications.

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Filed Under: Career Development, Effective Communication Tagged With: Career Planning, Getting Ahead, Interviewing, Job Search

Job Interviewing #2: Interviewing with a Competitor of your Current Employer

May 18, 2007 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Blog reader Ranganathan from Toronto, Canada asks, “I am interviewing with a competitor of my current employer. Most of my work at my current employer is confidential. How do I describe these projects in the upcoming interview?”

Ethics and Responsibilities

Interviewing with a Competitor of Current Employer: Ethics, Responsibilities Your employers, both current and former, expect you to treat sensitive and confidential information ethically. Accordingly, you must not disclose such information outside the company—in an interview, trade show or party at home.

During an interview with a competitor of your current or former employer, describe your past projects and accomplishments in terms of concepts and particulars that are public knowledge. If the interviewer presses for additional information, be diplomatic and decline to present confidential information. Interviewers will appreciate your reluctance.

Beware of a Trap: Test for Integrity

Interviewing with a Competitor of Current Employer: Test for Integrity Public trust and ethical behavior are vital to organizational and individual success. Recent corporate scandals have underscored the need for organizations to build and foster ethical business environments. Organizations are therefore inclined to select employees who share such moral values.

Good corporate ethics policies prohibit current employees from disclosing proprietary information from/about their former employers. In asking you for sensitive information, the interviewer is probably setting up a trap for you—the interviewer may be checking if you demonstrate a high degree of integrity and professional conduct.

Declining to provide proprietary information will demonstrate your consideration of the ethical consequences of your actions. Consequently, you will earn the respect of the interviewer.

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Filed Under: Career Development, Sharpening Your Skills Tagged With: Career Planning, Ethics, Interviewing, Job Search, Job Transitions

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About: Nagesh Belludi [hire] is a St. Petersburg, Florida-based freethinker, investor, and leadership coach. He specializes in helping executives and companies ensure that the overall quality of their decision-making benefits isn’t compromised by a lack of a big-picture understanding.

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Doing Business In China

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The Economist's Beijing-correspondent Ted Plafker on the challenges of entering the Chinese market, conducting business in China, and not falling flat on your face.

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