Competency-based Interviews and Questions
Competency-based interviews have become the norm in current day hiring processes. These questions are designed to test one or more specific competencies or behaviours. They are based on the belief that how a candidate has responded to certain types of situations in the past is a good predictor of how that person will behave in the future.
In other words, this is an opportunity for the candidate to sell their positives by giving concrete examples of how they behaved in past situations. Competency-based interviews (also referred to as Behavioural Based Interviews) will usually begin with some variation of:
- Give me an example of a time when you...
- Tell me about how you...
This type of interview is more interactive and enjoyable as it is likely that the interviewer will be able to encourage you to be much more open than in a traditional interview. The interviewer will have a number of pre-planned questions to ask you and they will know what the desired behaviours are and will look for positive and negative indicators. You will need to give real-life evidence of where you have demonstrated the behaviour or competency.
It is likely that the interviewer will also ask about a negative situation. This is still an opportunity to sell your positives by demonstrating how you were able to turn the situation around and something positive came out of it. For example; although it was a poor decision, you learned from it and in the next similar situation you put to good use what you learned or, you will know how to handle it differently the next time a similar situation arises.
Key competencies covered include:
- Adaptability
- Compliance
- Communication
- Conflict management
- Creativity and innovation
- Decisiveness
- Delegation
- External awareness
- Flexibility
- Independence
- Influencing
- Integrity
- Leadership
- Leveraging diversity
- Organisational awareness
- Resilience and tenacity
- Risk taking
- Sensitivity to others
- Team work
Please visit this link to see a list of sample questions: Competency-based Interview Questions