A 5th year graduate student asks—

I'm preparing for job interviews, and I heard you have to answer “behavioral questions.” I looked them up and they’re questions like “Tell me about a time when you made a mistake.” What makes a good answer to a question like that? How do you make yourself sound like a good candidate while talking about a time you messed up?

Sounds like you’re off to a good start with your interview prep – behavioral questions are very common and great to prepare for in advance. We recommend having a few stories in mind that you could talk about in response to a number of different behavioral questions, and it’s common to need to speak about a time when you didn’t shine or something went wrong. With these questions, the employer is usually more interested in how you recovered from the mistake than the mistake itself. They want to know what they can expect you to do if/when you make a mistake in their organization, because they understand that mistakes happen! So when you’re telling your story, give them the context they need to understand the mistake, and then focus on how you recovered:

• How did you realize you made a mistake?
• Who did you tell, and when and how did you tell them?
• What were you able to do (or offer to do) to minimize the impact of your mistake?
• Was there any change you made to your process to make it less likely that such a mistake would happen again?

Keep in mind they’ll be much more interested in what you did than what other people did, so be sure to keep the focus on yourself.

It can be especially helpful to practice telling these types of stories so you can figure out an approach that is comfortable for you!

-Ray Care, Program Director, Career Development Team for Researchers