Need some help with interview questions

20260622

Hi folks,

Can anybody give me some advice on how best to answer the following interview questions:

1. Tell me about a time you had to quickly learn about a product/company/industry

2. Tell me about a time when a personal relationship with a customer paid off

Any advice would be greatly appreciated

Irish_Elect_Eng

20260622 wrote: »

Hi folks,

Can anybody give me some advice on how best to answer the following interview questions:

1. Tell me about a time you had to quickly learn about a product/company/industry

2. Tell me about a time when a personal relationship with a customer paid off

Any advice would be greatly appreciated

(1)

The goal of this is to determine your "Learning Agility", are you quick on the uptake, they want to know if you can get up to speed quickly or will they have to hold your hand to get you going on new projects. Good examples to use are (a) How you got up to speed on your last job (b) How you covered an co-worker tasks when they left or got sick (c) How you informed yourself on a new industry product/trend. Key points to touch are (a) Planning your learning (b) using available information (c) Using available people / networking.


For Example: My department was scheduled to support marketing at the XYZ conference in Paris, but at the last minute my colleague dropped out of the conference team due to illness. Although I was not familiar with the products that she supported I volunteered to go in her place to support the business. I gatherer together all the technical and promotional information on the product and spent my evening in the week before the conference becoming familiar with the material. I spoke with the original designers to ensure that my understanding was correct and I brought all the material with me on my lap-top to allow me to research any customer question that I was not familiar with. The conference went very well, I was able to address most issues on the spot and committed to follow up with those customers that had questions that needed further research.


(2)

The goal of this question it to determine your ability to build and use "Interpersonal Relationships", can you fit in with the existing colleagues and customer relationships and them build on them and use them to your advantage. Good examples to use are (a) How you used a existing relationship to close a deal/make money for the company (b) How you used a relationship to open a door to a possible deal. (c) How you used a relationship to reduce the impact of a negative customer experience, saving the company reputation. (d) OR possibly best of all an example where your used one relationship to help another colleague.

For example; My colleague was struggling to find a designer to finish the GUI design, so I used my contacts in the design industry on LinkedIn to get recommendations and contact details for a creative designer to complete the GUI design.

20260622

Thanks so much

Irish_Elect_Eng

You're welcome.

Good Luck.