Page 42 - You're Hired! Interview Answers

puts you in a much better position to understand the questions you are being PRePaRing FoR the inteRview
asked and, as a result, to frame better answers.

Understanding their competencies/
criteria: what are they looking for?

In Chapter 1 we looked at a model for understanding and simplifying any
organisation’s competencies – the ‘task, thought, people’ model. We can now
apply this in order to prepare for different kinds of interview approach and
different kinds of questions.

‘task, thought, people’

You will encounter some interviews that are less structured and where the
criteria are much less clear. With preparation, you can be in the best possible
position to get your strengths across even when the interview process is less
than ideal. Your homework in terms of ‘what are they looking for’ is even more
important in this situation, as you may not be able to rely on being questioned
in the relevant areas. The ‘task, thought, people’ model is particularly powerful
here. Even if the organisation does not have (or is not willing to share) its
competencies/criteria, it will be looking for attributes that cluster under these
headings. Using the ‘task, thought, people’ model as part of your preparation,
you can present information in a way that they will find easy to identify and
digest. By using the model, you will give more rounded, more complete
answers, even when questions are not particularly well framed. For more on
this, see Chapter 7, on ‘non-competency-based questions’.

Remember:
n task competencies: typically about operational delivery, results,

implementation, plans, targets, getting things done.
n thought competencies: typically about direction, strategy, creativity,

problem solving, change, innovation, judgement, decision making.
n People competencies: typically about teams, collaboration, empathy,

interpersonal skills, influencing, communication, personal development,
motivation, coaching.

Here is a typical list of competencies used by an organisation as part of its
selection process. The organisation has not clustered them in terms of task,
thought, people but, as you can see, it is quite simple to do this:

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