“Provide an example of a time when you have used communication effectively”

EVERY DAY. I use communication to achieve professional and personal goals EVERY DAY.

As you might guess I am completing a (very drawn out) job application at the moment, which has 12 questions to answer. One of them is the title one…I’ve had this a couple times in interviews and applications and I always struggle with it.

does anyone have any tips on answering this kind of question beyond “something at work went wrong, and I had to make a few phone calls to sort it out”?

Told someone to “fk off”. And they did.

easy this – just change the setting of “Don’t Look Up” to something you can BS about and then you’re mostly the way there..  though i do like daveyboys one, it’s succinct, to the point without any flowering..

Well without knowing the job it’s going to be difficult to answer.  If you answer phones for the ambulance service communication is a key skill; if you work for the Tory party HQ communication is a key skill but rather different!  So id be trying to work out the sort of communication they want to see, then find my best example of it.

i don’t do these things often but read the rest of the questions – you don’t want to use the same scenarios on each.  Eg communication/leadership/teamwork.

for communication I would expect you to be saying something more than shit went wrong and I had to make some phone calls.  Perhaps it was about thinking through or designing messaging to remove ambiguity?  Perhaps it was about distilling a really long complex idea to something brief and simple?  Perhaps it was about intervening to say hold on is everyone hearing the same thing…

” Communication…, don’t talk to me about communication”

When something went sideways and you had a discussion with folk, preferably senior in role or even better with working knowledge of the thing (two way communication) then had to communicate the way out of the shit, clearly to the team. Preferably with a successful outcome.

“I’ll let you kow on my first day….”

Or alternatively tell them about a time when you tried to post on the STW forum and the formatting got randomly **** up, or you got a bad gateway error or it timed out or decided not to post because you had more than 5 photos but it didn’t actually tell you you can’t post more than 5 photos etc

Have you got an example of a multi-discipline team (ideally where people use different terminology/approaches), where you ensured everyone achieved the desired outcome?

The last time I told an interviewer to stick their stupid interview question

Last Saturday morning. I was driving along and had to come to a complete stop, head-on, to a white van that was wandering across the road at me because the driver was on his phone. As he had to reverse away from me to get back on his side of the road, I was able to wind my window down. His was already down. One word very effectively communicated 100% of what I needed to say. Sometimes only one word is enough. Sometimes only ‘that’ word will do.

This kind of question is ideal for the STAR approach. Though my SO rolls their eyes whenever I come up with this kind of thing.

situation

task

action

result

one sentence for each step. When you think about it you will have many [edit] examples. Write them down. Sort them in order of level of skill/achievement. Use the one you think appropriate for the job you are targeting. Remember them for whenever this comes up.

indeed and other recruiters have some examples.

edit. What @poly said

Stupid question, but I would use examples of when I have had to tailor messages to different audiences, people, and how I achieved this.

The STAR method can help frame these examples.

Good luck with the job 🙂

Situation. Everyone was predicting an autumn general election for a flailing government

task. I wanted to get out a bit sooner

action. I made a surprise announcement of a July election in the pouring rain while someone played ‘things can only get better’ by D’ream in the background.

result. Too early to tell, but the responses have certainly been going my way: I’ll be in California before the summer is out.

YMMV

I’ve had this a couple times in interviews and applications and I always struggle with it.

Maybe you are not very good at communicating effectively.

Half-past two

I’d be thinking of situations where I’ve communicated and caused a change in behaviour, action and something has happened which wouldn’t have happened without my communication.  Have you negotiated something at some point and achieved an outcome which seemed unrealistic / unexpected/ beyond expectations.

OP

You need to use a ‘real life’ story 😉🙃

Just last week I was flying my hot air balloon and got a bit lost .

I reduced height and saw a bikepacker down below. I lowered the balloon further and shouted to get some directions.

Me : “Excuse me, can you tell me where I am?”

The bikepacker replied “Yes,you’re in a hot air balloon, hovering 30 feet above this field.”

“You must work in Information Technology,” says I.

“I do” replies the bikepacker. “How did you know?”

Me: “Well,everything you have told me is technically correct, but It’s of no use to anyone.”

The bikepacker replied, “You must work in management.”

Me: “I do,but how’d you know?”*

“Well”, said the bikepacker, “you don’t know where you are or where you’re going, but you expect me to be able to help. You’re in the same position you were before we met, but now it’s my fault.”

Me: ” I hope you get covered in slurry”

😊

I’d see it as a soft skills thing.

As someone suggested, describe a situation where things were going tits up because of a questionable decision – but you had a quiet word and helped common sense to prevail.

So for me I would choose something like:

managing upwards (telling a senior member of staff that what they said was innapropriate/unprofessional/wrong)

dealing with staff (communicating corporate redundancies to a group, dealing with poor performance, sacking someone)

explaining a cock up on our part to a customer

giving a presentation with little/no notice, or when the time was cut in half

You could also use written communication as well – an example that covers both would be good

…and I would use hte STAR method as above for these.

good luck

does anyone have any tips on answering this kind of question beyond “something at work went wrong, and I had to make a few phone calls to sort it out”?

the important thing I consider when recruiting and interviewing is how specific the example is.  What you describe is a general event. What went wrong? What exactly did you do? Who did you call? What did you ask of them? What happened at the end?

Then, possibly, what did you learn? How have you applied it since?

one reason this kind of experience-based approach is used is because it can provide some insight into what you have done and how you have done it. And different companies expect different approaches. Are there particular skills, like influencing through rational persuasion for example, that you can squeeze into your concise answer?

You can add a letter to the end of star to make the results bit a bit more measurable or reflective. I forget which.

Do you have to deliver at pace too?

https://media.zenfs.com/en/the_huffington_post_584/ba59b20788facd59906e0723b9f25eda

“Right now, when I tell you this is a bullshit question.”

I swear, the people who dream up this crap have nothing better to do than find reasons to spin out ten minute interviews to half an hour because the alternative is doing some actual work.

S – This morning I needed to attend this waste of time interview

T – So I caught the bus

A- I had to communicate with the driver to exchange my money for his services

R – I saved a fortune compared to having to drive here, yet still feel like I’m loosing out.

I raised my arm to indicate I wished to cross the road. The driver stopped. As I crossed I nodded to the driver as a thank you and he smiled.

You do get bullshit questions at interviews but IMO this is not one.  Its a effective tool and a standard question

I was drinking in a tough flat roofed pub. An intoxicated gentleman started an argument with me, he offered to step outside to the car park. I suggested we just get it on in the pub instead… result was a full on brawl. I feel I had an overall net positive outcome on the situation and changed his way of thinking.

Do you have to deliver at pace too?

Oh yes, and do it in an agile way which leverages stakeholder channels.

Ideally I’d be looking for where you needed to deliver the same information to different groups, recognised that they have different requirements and used different approaches to most effectively deliver your message to achieve your desired outcome.

It’s really not a daft question.

If my local Tory candidate pops around for a chat, that will give me a perfect example to use.

Its a effective tool and a standard question

I’d disagree.  Any “standard question” isn’t an effective tool beyond demonstrating a candidate’s nous to google “common interview questions” and then prepare stock answers.  It’s an exercise in box-ticking.

Unusual questions on the other hand…  I reckon I’d get more mileage from asking “what’s your favourite goat?” or “what does blue smell like?” and seeing what they did with it.  Thinking on the fly when wrong-footed is a real skill (as is calling out bollocks questions😁).

A Glaswegian kiss is pretty effective communication, perhaps ask them if they’d like to participate in a demonstration.

Any “standard question” isn’t an effective tool beyond demonstrating a candidate’s nous to google “common interview questions” and then prepare stock answers.

Surely this is why it’s “an example of a time when you have used” rather than just “make up an example of…”?

In answer to Cougar’s questions

Mountain goats because of their agility on terrain most humans flounder on

Blue evokes smelly cheese or blue bell woods

Pygmy, cos they’re cute and fun, not evil bastards like the big nannies.

Blue smells cold like fresh air with a hint of sea, without the salt or seaweed, if that makes any sense.

i’ve had this a couple times in interviews and applications and I always struggle with it.

“Provide an example of a time when you have used communication effectively”

“Well an example right now is I can tell you how bored I am and that is  that I’m very, very bored. And to save us all time, if the next question is ‘sum yourself up in three words’ I’ve just answered that too.”

On the railways, just completed my COSS refresher and it was stressed that we should stick to agreed communication methods,

up on the wick line I had to call the signaller in Inverness

Me: this is JamieMcF of STW,  can I confirm I’m speaking to the signaller.

Signaller: I’d bloody hope so, you called the signal box

That was my effective communication and his effective put down

You do get bullshit questions at interviews but IMO this is not one. Its a effective tool and a standard question

I disagree, it’s like IQ tests, it’s a test of how good you are at behavioural interviews, not how good you are at actually doing a job. If you’ve not come across them before, you’re pretty much guaranteed to fail, as interviewers can’t parse answers that aren’t phrased in a standard format.

On communication,

this is JamieMcF

That’s the first time I’ve read your username as Jamie Mc F rather than Jamie M C F.