Page 150 - You're Hired! Interview Answers

Dealing with non-competency-based non-ComPetenCY-BaSed QueStionS
questions

Your best weapon in dealing with non-competency-based questions is still to
identify what the question is trying to get at: is it task, thought or people, or a
combination of the three?

n You may be asked questions designed to test your specific knowledge or
understanding of a topic or issue, or aimed at assessing how well you know
a particular field or market.

n You may be asked hypothetical questions – such as what you might do in a
particular situation, or very vague, general questions such as ‘Tell me about
your leadership style’.

n You may be asked self-disclosure or self-evaluation questions such as
‘What is the biggest mistake you have made in the last 3 years, what did
you learn from it?’, or ‘What is your proudest achievement over the last 3
years?’

All the principles we have covered so far still apply to this kind of questioning,
specifically:

n If they don’t ask you for an example, try to illustrate your answer with real-
life instances anyway.

n Use CaR to frame your answers.
n If you are asked a hypothetical question, respond by relating it to a real-life

experience.
n Get at the gist of the question by using ‘task, thought, people’ to analyse

the questioner’s intent.
n Don’t be afraid to clarify and reframe the question if appropriate, but check

that you have understood their meaning. Answer their question, not the
one you would like to answer.

Get at the gist of the question by using ‘task,
thought, people’ to analyse the questioner’s intent.

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