Interviewing at bp - a guide for candidates

Guidance on competency-based interviewing

What is competency-based interviewing? 
bp uses competency-based interviewing to identify capable individuals who can contribute to bp’s success. These interviews focus on how you have applied your skills and experiences to particular work situations.

Why does bp use a competency-based approach? 
A competency-based interview process provides interviewers with a way to obtain information about skills that are best explored during an in-person discussion. Gathering detailed information about these skills generally helps interviewers identify candidates who are more likely to be high performers.

What can I expect during the interview process?
Trained interviewers will conduct the bp interviews and guide you through the process. Typically, the interview will last approximately ninety minutes and is conducted by individuals from the relevant project or program. The interviewers will ask you a set of questions designed to measure the competencies important to the role for which you are applying.

What should I do during the interview?
You likely will be more successful in the interview if you:  

• Relax and answer the questions honestly.  
• Take time to think about a question before you answer it.  
• Ask the interviewer for clarification if you don’t understand a question.  
• Answer the questions by using examples of your own past experiences within a workplace environment.

How should I prepare for the competency-based interview?
You should try to use the STAR technique when considering your answers to the competency questions. The acronym STAR stands for:  

• Situation
• Task
• Action
• Result

It is a universally recognized communication technique designed to enable you to provide a meaningful and complete answer to questions asking for examples. At the same time, it has the advantage of being simple enough to be applied easily. 

Situation or Task  

Describe the situation that you were confronted with or the task you needed to accomplish. With the STAR approach you need to set the context. Make it concise and informative, concentrating solely on what is useful to the story.  

Action

This is the most important section of the STAR approach as it is where you need to demonstrate and highlight the skills and personal attributes that the question is testing. Now that you have set the context of your story, you need to explain what you did. In doing so, you need to remember the following:

• Be personal, i.e. talk about you, not the rest of the team.  
• Go into some detail. Do not assume that they will guess what you mean.
• Steer clear of technical information, unless it is crucial to your story.
• Explain what you did, how you did it, and why you did it.

What you did and how you did it
The interviewers will want to know how you reacted to the situation. This is where you can start selling some important skills. For example, you may want to describe how you used your communication skills to keep everyone updated on progress.

Why you did it
For instance, when discussing a situation where you had to deal with conflict, some candidates might simply say: “I told my colleague to calm down and explained to him what the problem was.” However, this would not provide a good idea of what drove you to act in this way. By highlighting the reasons behind your action, you would make a greater impact.

For example: “I could sense that my colleague was irritated and I asked him gently to tell me what he felt was the problem. By allowing him to vent his feelings and anger, I gave him the opportunity to calm down. I then explained to him my own point of view on the matter, emphasizing how important it was that we found a solution that suited us both.”

This revised answer helps the interviewers understand the thought process behind your actions. It also reinforces the feeling that you are calculating the consequences of your actions, and retaining full control of the situation. 

Result

Explain what happened eventually. Also, use the opportunity to describe what you accomplished and what you learned in that situation. This helps you make the answer personal and enables you to highlight further skills. This is an important part of your answer. Interviewers want to know that you are using a variety of generic skills to achieve your objectives. Therefore you must be able to demonstrate in your answer that you are taking actions because you are trying to achieve a specific objective – the result is not simply by chance.