Page 16 - How To Answer Interview Questions (II)

I keep the team moving toward the goal

Everyone in an organization needs to be good at both—you report to your manager, who reports
to the Vice-President, who reports to the President, who reports to the CEO, who reports to the Board
of Directors, who report to investors.

You might have direct reports that you need to manage, but even if you don’t, you will have times
when you are leading a project and need to manage that team for that project.

So, say that you are good at both managing up and managing down, and give examples of times
when you have done both of those things.

Your answer should be in the form of a story: This is what the situation was, this is what
happened, this is what I did, this is how it worked out, and this is what the results were.

Use the STAR format:

Situation or Task (Set up the story—what happened? What was your goal?)
Action (What did you choose to do and why?)
Result (What happened as a result of your actions? Quantify this wherever possible.)

See the two examples below.
For managing up:
“My manager’s goal for the year was X, and my job was Y. We met weekly to discuss results and
plan for the next week. At the end of the year, we had achieved our goal, plus 20%, and our
department received recognition from the company.”
For managing down:
“I was handpicked to put together a team tasked to do X. I chose 5 people from a cross-department
pool, set X goals, and met with them daily for a 15-minute meeting to touch base and answer
questions. In 3 months, we met 3 goals and exceeded expectations on the other 2 by X.”