Sex and Your Job Search 2013: A Guide to Scoring Your Dream Job (24 page)

OK ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, are you ready to become one of the hottest job applicants of all time? Do you want employers to fall in love with you? Good!

Let’s look at the Seven Universal Skills and Three Universal Values as they relate to popular behavioral based questions and answers. Below, I list eight Success Stories (one for each Skill and a bonus question) that span a broad range of positions and work experiences. The stories cover those from college students to experienced professionals. In each story, I highlight the values demonstrated in parenthesis.

Under each Skill, I list one question. In each case, I give an answer for the question and also list which other of the Seven Skills the story could apply to. I also explain how each person was hired due to their answer.

So, look at your B ME outlines and read through each of the questions and answers below for inspiration. They will help you create, mold, and refine your Seven Go-to Stories.

Seriously, if you get a bump in pay, a better position, a new job, and a solid retirement plan, that could literally mean over a million dollars more when you retire. Reading through the examples below of how people were hired might be one of the
most profitable things
you’ve ever done in your life.

Please note, after the Popular Questions and Great Answers, I have a few valuable paragraphs that include advice for high-school and college-aged readers.

ACCURACY AND ATTENTION TO DETAIL

Question
: Tell me about a time when you identified an error or mistake before it became a major headache. What was it? What did you do? How did it turn out?

Answer from a college student about to graduate (response can apply to any major).

Beginning
: I was taking sixteen credits and auditing four more during fall semester (Excellence). I audited Not-for Profit Accounting, as I saw myself wanting to serve my community after I graduated (Integrity).

Middle
: It was the middle of the semester and I had exams, projects, and papers due. I was closing in on a few of the deadlines, and I realized that I wasn’t going to make one of my regular class homework assignments. So, I emailed the teacher and explained my situation and told him that I wouldn’t be able to finish the assignment. I said that I would do the assignment anyway and could turn it in within forty-eight hours. I closed by mentioning that any credit he would allow me to receive would be generous (Integrity). I reassured him that I would try to do better in the future

End
: It turned out that my teacher gave me half credit for the assignment. It wasn’t a big part of the grade and I still anticipate graduating with a 3.76 GPA. It was a solo assignment, and I actually received an A on the bigger project I was working on with my classmates (Teamwork). I actually have a letter of recommendation from that teacher in my portfolio.

In the working world, there are times when things just can’t get done. What an employer wants to know is if you have the ability to prioritize and adjust in a calm and intelligent manner.

This new grad was hired into an entry-level Accountant position at a charity in Los Angeles and makes around $45,000 a year. Within a year he had passed his CPA exam and got a bump in pay at his yearly evaluation.

In this type of answer, you can substitute the Not-for Profit Accounting class for any class you might have audited, or you might emphasize that you were taking a heavy course load. What’s important is that you willingly took on a big workload, and that you were able to prioritize, communicate, and ultimately get everything done with little repercussion.

The example above could also be used for a question about Adaptability and Flexibility and Organization and Time Management.

ADAPTABILITY AND FLEXIBILITY

Question
: Tell me about a time when things became very busy at work and you had to take on additional duties. What steps did you take to make sure that nothing fell through the cracks? How did everything turn out?

Answer from an administrative assistant with fifteen years of experience.

Beginning
: Before I moved to Southern California, I worked for an insurance company in Salt Lake City. I assisted one of the directors there and I was fielding phone calls during our busiest month of the year, when we had medical plan open enrollment. That means an employee could opt into the plan, change coverage, or add a family member to the plan. It was around 11:30am when I received a call from the CEO.

Middle
: Our CEO explained that the person working the task of sending out the new insurance cards had processed the letters incorrectly and failed to send the new insurance cards with a letter outlining the changes to the plan. He said he needed new letters to go out with temporary cards printed on paper before 12:30pm. I said absolutely, I will forward my phones to my backup and assist (Teamwork).

I started working on the files and set up a mail merge within Word. I double-checked that all the fields were correct and that the names matched the temporary cards (Excellence, Integrity). Then I sent the letters out.

End
: I finished by 12:30pm and our CEO thanked me for dropping everything to help out. He also said that he had heard from others that, “If you need something done without errors, go see Nancy.” I was shocked when I saw a $350 bonus on my next check for helping out with the project. Obviously, I was really happy about that. Oh, I also ate lunch at my desk while the person who covered for me went to lunch (Teamwork) and so I wouldn’t get behind on my tasks.

This applicant was hired into an administrative assistant position at an insurance company in SoCal due to her good stories and her values. After moving to be closer to her aging parents, she was out of work less than one month and received a small bump in pay.

The story above could also be used for a question about Customer Focus, Organization and Time Management, and Technical Ability.

COMMUNICATION

Question
: Tell me about a time when you had to adjust your communication style to help someone understand what you were trying to communicate. What was the situation? What did you do? How did it turn out?

Answer from a college graduate who was applying for a sales representative position.

Beginning
: I was working in Hawaii selling religious and health-related books door-to-door last summer while I was still in college. It had been a good and bad summer. But mostly bad. Some people were warm and welcoming, while almost everyone else yelled at me, chased me off the lawns with hoses, or had their dogs chase me.

Middle
: There was this one house on a hill that I didn’t want to walk up to. I had a bad feeling a big dog would run after me and no one would hear me yelling. In spite of that, I walked up to the front door and knocked (Excellence). After a moment or two I said, “Hello.” Nothing. I waited another thirty seconds and then tapped on the door and again said, “Hello.”

To my surprise a voice responded, “Hello?” I said, “Hi my name is Robert, I was wondering if you had a few minutes to look at a few books you may be interested in.”

Nothing for a minute.

I knocked again and started to sweat. I pointed one foot toward the road, getting ready to run away from a growling dog or garden hose.

So, I said, “Hello” again. I hear, “Hello?” back. What was going on? Something was not right, but I kept my cool (Integrity).

I repeated this a few more times. Maybe it was a kid, I thought. But it sounded more like an older woman.

I was about to leave when I leaned to the side and looked into the window right by the door.

End
: It turned out it was a parakeet! I had been trying to sell books to a parakeet for ten minutes! I didn’t make a sale that day, but I kept calm and stuck to my script.

After hearing this story, the interview panel was in stitches. The manner in which Robert told the story had their stomachs hurting from laughter. They knew Robert would be cool in stressful situations and that they would like to work with someone who had a good sense of humor. He got the sales rep job paying $42,000 a year plus bonuses and two years later moved into a sales supervisor position with an annual salary of $58,000.

This story could also work for a question on Technical Ability (sales).

CREATIVITY

Question
: Tell me about a time you came up with an idea to improve a process or procedure in your department or for your company. What was the idea? What did you do? What were the benefits to the company?

Answer from a business analyst with seven years of work experience.

Beginning
: At my current employer, I work as a business analyst for a parent company that manages thousands of seminars a year. When I took on my job three years ago, I was replacing someone who had been in the position for twenty-five years. As I was getting acclimated, I quickly realized that the norm for the role had been maintaining the status quo. What I mean is that the contract agreement forms we used for our seminar speakers needed updating.

Middle
: I came up with a plan to update the forms and revise the approval process, to ensure checks and balances (Excellence, Integrity). My boss was thrilled when I made my proposal to her. She invited me to a steering committee that I normally do not attend. I made my presentation again, seeking buy-in from the stakeholders (Teamwork). It took two meetings to iron out all the details, including the new format of the document.

End
: It turned out well. We were able to eliminate outdated department names and numbers. We changed the approval process so that our accounting department was the first place that the documents would go (Excellence, Integrity). Our CFO was
so
happy with how the new process would save time and prevent frustration that he gave me authority to reject forms that did not have his signature (Teamwork).