Sample Interview Questions and Answers: What Would You Do – Fabian’s Answer

(Who is Fabian? Fabian – IT professional with 10 years experience seeking SQL Analyst Programmer job)

Terry: What would you do if you were in a situation where the user came back to you with questions about a report that you had created for them?

Fabian: If the user came back to me about a report about the results he was getting, I’d sit down with him and talk with him about how I was going after the data. I’d reconfirm with him that he actually understood what he was asking for, and I would also backtrack my work.

If he was giving me specific items he’s got questions about, then that would just involve going through the database to the point of the computer coming up with the results, and being able to show the user okay I went through the process again with this problem piece of data that he had, which he thought was problematic.

I went through the process that the report goes through, here’s the answer I got. Then if it matches what’s in the report, at that point, we can say the computer did what we told it to do.  What was your intention?  What were you trying to get out of it?

Then, if he wanted me to go back and redo it, I’d want to be very clear on exactly what kind of results or numbers he’s expecting, even have him give me a range or some number that he would expect back as the kind of normal range, what it would usually look like.

Here’s how I would rate this answer . . .

Q8. What would you do if . . . – FABIAN QUICK RATING – B

Specific and I see you taking specific actions, could you add a story about a time when you had an interaction with the user that demonstrates an accomplishment and your skills at working with people in that scenario?