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thought-BaSed QueStionS examPLe inteRview anSweRS 3 Better answer:

“Yes, one of my team wanted to take a career break for six months. As a

small business, nobody had requested this before and so we had no systems
and processes in place to deal with it. It was Nigel, who had been with us for
about 7 years and was a well regarded member of the team, so we wanted
to retain him. I say this, because my first thought was he could just resign
and then come back. Then I realised that we might not have any vacancies
when he returned and we’d lose him. So I spoke to our head of HR, and with
him, we drew up a career break policy that would allow people who had been
with us for 5 years or more to be entitled to a maximum 6 months’ break.
Our commitment to them would be that we kept their job open, while their
commitment to us would be to return for a minimum of one year after their
break. The career break was unpaid. We arrived at this policy because I spoke
to some contacts that I have in other organisations to see what they did, and
our head of HR looked at it from the employment legislation perspective.
The result is that we now have a policy that is popular and has been taken

advantage of by a number of staff.”

How well do you think this example answers the question? It is structured
according to CaR:

n Circumstances: the need for a new precedent was described.
n action: the interviewee worked with the head of HR to draft a career break

policy.
n Result: Nigel could take a career break and still be able to return to work

afterwards. This action ensured that the business retained a good member
of the team whilst at the same time meeting the needs of that team
member.

In terms of quality of content, this example shows an ability to problem-solve
at the level of looking outside and exploring. It does not provide evidence of
starting from a completely blank slate, nor does it show originality or ingenuity
in solving a particularly difficult issue, and thus defining precedent on a much
broader level. If the interviewee had wanted to demonstrate originality of
thought or approach, a different example should have been used, perhaps one
where they had researched something for themselves rather than working with
somebody else.

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