Example of how to implement the STAR for your job interview questions and answers follows below.
Answer using the STAR formula:
S – Situation
“I was working on an American Project for Company XYZ to implement a new finance system.”
T – Task
“I was responsible to prepare requirements plan for the entire project and had to ensure all stakeholder groups across America were included.”
A – Actions
“The way I went about preparing this plan was to start with understanding the number of stakeholders who would be involved in each country and
the timeframes I needed to work within.
This enabled me to define requirements gathering approach based on a geographically dispersed stakeholder group.
Requirements gathering were done via requirements validation sessions via country-by-country conference calls. Other parts of my plan included roles & responsibilities and̂ requirements documentation approach.”
R – Results
“I presented the requirements management plan to the project
management board and obtained sign off right away. My requirements management plan has since been re-used as a framework on other American initiatives.”
Note how brief I was in answering the first two aspects of the question, situation, and task.
This information is very important to set the scene but essentially not what the interviewer is after.
The actions part of the question is framed in terms of what I did specifically. Although it gives some detail, I am focusing on answering the most important aspects of this part of the question.
I am saying enough to cover off the answer well without going on and on about it. Finally, in the results part of the answer I focus on the main outcome of my actions, which is the re-use of my requirements management plan.
There may have been other outcomes too, but this is the most important.
Tip: Don’t give too much or too little detail during the job interview questions and answers, try and strike that good balance.
In general, spend about 2-3 minutes on answering any question unless it is a big question that the expectation is to elaborate. Remember that the interviewer can ask further questions if they want more detail about a particular aspect of your answer.
