#Q A Project Management Careers Competency Based Interview

I have an interview coming up for a project manager position and I ve been informed that it will be competency based, how can I prepare for this?

Competency based interviews use questions which have been chosen to find out your competence levels in project management. The questions are situational rather than asking directly about your career history. To prepare you need to understand what the key competencies are for the role you are going to be interviewed for. The key competencies may be already listed clearly in the job description. If not, you can go back to basics and refresh your memory by reviewing a competency framework for project management.

Competency based questions are specifically chosen so the interviewer can ask the same question to all the interviewees. It gives the interviewer the opportunity to directly compare each response.

When preparing for a competency based interview, think about each area of project management competence thinking about how you demonstrate your abilities, skills, personality, style and approach in each of the key areas.

Let’s take two competencies as an example, one which covers technical project management and one which covers the behavioural aspects.

Describe the steps you take when starting to plan a project for the first time?

There is a simple tried and tested technique which allows you to prepare in advance to sample questions; the STAR technique. STAR stands for S ituation or T ask, A ction and R esults. So you’ve been given the Situation or Task in the question, now think about the Actions you took in a similar situation and the Results that happened as a result of your direct actions.

With this question on planning it should be easy to think about such an occasion from your career. You may want to choose a particular project where the planning phase was particularly challenging or complex. The answer to the question would begin with a brief overview of the example you have chosen, In a previous project I was responsible for delivering X, the planning phase started with A, B, C . Your answer would cover actions taken that focused on areas such as definition; scope; schedule and planning best practices etc. You would also need to clearly convey that the actions you took gave a favourable outcome or results.

Tell me about a time when you have had to manage a conflict situation within your team?

Where questions are designed to probe your softer skills in project management like handling conflict or leading a team the same technique can apply. State the situation at the beginning of your answer, I was leading a team of 20 software developers and there was what seemed to be a personality clash between two members of the team… Your answer should then continue with specific actions you took to resolve this conflict situation and conclude with the positive outcome.

Give the interviewer what they want; that you can demonstrate the real practical experience required to manage these kinds of situations.