Behavioural vs Situational Interview

Behavioural vs Situational Interview. Do you know the difference? What interview type will you be attending? How do you prepare?

I recently wrote a post about attending a Behavioural Interview and how to prepare. The theory of the Behavioural Interview is that past behaviour demonstrates future behaviour. With this interview type, the Interviewer asks candidates questions that will relate past experiences, i.e. “Tell me about a time when …”   In my post, I talked about how you would prepare for that type of interview and how you would use the S-T-A-R principle (Situation, Task, Action, Result) as your guide to your response. This type of interview is used to assess certain competencies, or qualities, in the candidate, and is often used by large organizations, Government Departments and Law Enforcement Agencies, i.e the RCMP uses a Behavioural Interview during the RCMP Regular Member Selection Interview.

Now, I would like to focus on a Situational Interview. This type of interview also assesses certain competencies, but is done using a situational type question. It focuses less on past experience and more on how you would handle a certain situation. You might get a question like, “You are one of the team leads in your unit, responsible for a team of three. One of the team members is not performing his/her duties, and is interfering with the work goals of the unit. How would you handle this situation?” This interview question can assess leadership, team player, and effective interpersonal skills. That one question can tell the interviewer quite a bit about you as the candidate, based on how you answer this question.

So, how do you answer the question? Well, like the Behavioural Interview question, you will answer it as if you are telling a story. Where the Behavioural Interview uses the S-T-A-R principle, the Situational Interview can use the A-R-C principle. A-R-C focuses on three areas:

• Action – What action will you take to address the situation?
• Reasoning – what is the reasoning behind your actions?  How did you arrive at this decision?
• Considerations – What factors did you taking into consideration when making your decision?

If you focus on those three main points, you will be able to answer any question that is asked, ensuring that you give a complete story.

So, how do you prepare for this type of interview?  The same way you would prepare for any interview.  Practice, practice, practice.  You need to have someone ask you these types of questions so you can get used to answering them using the A-R-C principle.  Reach out to someone who is experienced at conducting interviews using this model, or someone who has attended (successfully) interviews in the past.  Don’t be afraid to reach out to a professional recruiter, or even a Certified Professional Career Coach, to help you get ready for an upcoming interview.  How you answer these questions could be the difference between someone else getting the job, or you being the successful candidate.

Do you know someone who is faced with this challenge?  Feel free to share this post by using the share links at the top of this page.  Also, if you’d like more interview tips, feel free to check out the interview resource page.