If you are looking for a new role or thinking of switching your job, you must practice interviewing skills before you take this step. However, don’t expect that you will have to pass through the traditional interview.
Now, recruiters and employers have added behavioral interviews to the hiring process to assess applicants based on their experience. During, this interview, the candidate is asked to support their skills stated in the resume or at the time of interview through the real-life examples. For instance, if one of you mentions that you have strong leadership skills, you must provide evidence through examples from your past job. This blog aims to help you get an answer to how can I be ready for a behavioral interview? Buckle up as we are off on the journey to learn this technique.
What Is Refer By Behavioral Interview?
One of the categories of interview in which the candidate is accessed based on past work experience. With the help of this interview, the hiring team is involved in a session of question and answer, and the candidate has to provide all the details supported by real-life examples. Submit your resume designed under the guidance of services like CV Ireland or Resume Writer in Ireland. They will help in crafting a job-winning resume. For instance, if you are applying for a healthcare position, they will provide you with a situation, and you need to describe your role in the situation.
Tips To Prepare For Such an Interview
When you are collecting information to get a response to the question, how can I be ready for a behavioral interview? There are a few things that you need to keep in mind
Keep your communication concise and specific
This is achievable through the STAR/CAR format. You just don’t need to be concise with your talk, need to work on managing your high level of engagement. This is possible through your tone, eye contact, smile, and posture.
STAR:
- Situation: Create a scenario and add all necessary details of your example.
- Task: Highlight your responsibilities in that situation.
- Action: Disclose the steps you took to handle that situation.
- Result: Share your outcomes achieved.
CAR:
- Context: Pick one of the examples from the experience and narrate it as a valet example.
- Action: Your steps to address and solve that problem or the strategies used to drive the results.
- Results: Discuss the outcome of your actions. You can quote some of the specific facts and results that match with the result of the situation.
These techniques are best to answer the questions of behavioral interviews. You can practice it by jotting down the responses.
Conduct thorough research
You went through the job description at the time of application. There is a chance that you might have missed some important details. Read the job description carefully before the day of the interview. List down the skills that were required for the role and prepare a story to narrate that highlights your knowledge of those skills. Blend the culture and knowledge of the company in your story
Narrate a story from your experience
One of the strategies you need to follow while getting an answer to how can I be ready for a behavioral interview is storytelling. Now, it depends on you how you can use your past job experience and fit it in highlighting your competencies for the applied role. Spend some of your time thinking about some unique situations you were part of while in your career. Translate those and explain how your experience made you a great fit for the company and the role. You can make your answer compelling by focusing on your key strengths. Remember, you need to be specific when you are narrating your story. Details of this can lead to a negative impression.
Demonstrate the results
Towards the end, please share the details of your successful outcomes and quantify the results where you think they are needed. Get yourself ready to explain unsuccessful outcomes as well. Narrate the ways, you handle those situations. How were you different? The hiring team looks for those candidates who do not compromise on their efforts and are ready to handle any situation. You highlight your potential of learning and handling any situation by asking services like professional Bio writers or Biography writers in Ireland to talk about this in the cover letter or on your digital resume site. This helps the hiring team in evaluating if the applicant is a keen learner.
Inquire if any doubts
You are at the end of the behavioral interview. You must know the hiring team. Ask some questions so you can get an understanding of the position according to your needs. Moreover, you will portray your image of being curious about the job. Politely quote your questions with a smile on your face. Try to be yourself.
Behavioral Interview Questions and Their Responses
One of the examples of this interview is:
Give an example of a situation when you were able to complete your task with tight deadline.
Situation: “Well, I never though, I would be able to commit to a deadline, but unexpected things do happen. For instance, working at my last firm, one of the member of my team had to leave early due to some emergency
Task: ”Then came my role. I was asked by my supervisor to take over and complete the pending work. With new project, I was confuse how to handle it. As I had no details and the deadline was just in one week.
Action: ”My first step was to ask them to reduce my daily sales goals. They were sweet enough to act on that. This helped me to pay extra attention to the new project. With running both the projects side by side, I was able to work on my and the new project without neglecting any one of them. Setting a schedule helped me to achieve success.
Results: ”My time management skills saved me. With such a cooperative team, I was able to complete my target before the deadline. When my co-worker was back from the leave, I had ample time to discuss with him before we could submit.
FAQs
What is the best strategy to prepare for a behavioral interview?
You can prepare some questions before you arrive on the day of the interview.
How can our responses impress the interviewer?
Your responses should be based on actual behavior and emotions, describing your role at the past job place, and supporting your statements with real examples. You should highlight your skills that match with the job application.
Do the body language and tone play their role in a behavioral interview?
Yes, the way you sit, your eye contact, and the tone you use to answer the questions are important. Therefore, try keeping a smile on your face and respond to the questions in a professional tone.
Do we need to reread the job description before the day of the interview?
Read thoroughly the job description before you walk into the interview room. This will help you recall all the skills that were asked of you in the description of your role of application.
The Bottom Line
Congratulations! You have completed your behavioral interview session and, through this reading, got your answer to, how can I be ready for a behavioral interview? Walk out professionally. Take some time to reflect on how it went well. You can note down the points where you were confident and those that confused you. These will help you in future interviews.
Wait for some day. If the company does not get back to you, you can email them to let them know the status of your application. For instance, if you have applied at several places and were interviewed, mail each of them. Upon being rejected, you can ask them the reasons in a professional way. All this feedback and responses from the hiring team can help in improving.