Sample Interview Questions and Answers: Tell Me About A Time – Amy’s Answer

(Who is Amy? Amy – Administrative Assistant seeking Project Manager position in Marketing Services)

Terry: Tell me about a time when you absolutely yourself managed the project.

Amy: A great example of that most recently was with XXX.  I was their office manager and administrative assistant for a very small team.

I joined the team 10 weeks before their office move so I was able to utilize all of my project management skills.  Coming in and being a new person, quickly identifying who the stakeholders would be and establishing a rapport.

There was an internal XXX team and then I had vendors of all types to seek out whether it was for our phones, telecommunications and also the electricians and getting the wiring done.  It was a whole new world for me.  Like I said, I’ve been able to jump into project – I had no construction experience and was able to read floor and construction plans.

We also had a budget and that was a great time to work with this budget.  I didn’t make the budget, but I was responsible for sticking to the budget.

For example, when they estimated the project the team left out this local wiring fee for pulling the wires through the building and it was a significant fee.  It was a great exercise in learning.

If I need to add this to the budget, where are places where I can pull back from in order to stay on track on the overall budget?  I was exposed to more vendor contracts than I had been previously exposed to before.

When somebody sent you a contract with the small print, I assumed you had to follow that so I learned more about vendor negotiation on the contract and the terms.  We asked for addendums to suit our specific billing needs or the needs of the move project regarding timing.

I was a key stakeholder in the vendor selection for a variety of things down to the appliances for the kitchen and picking out the color for the kitchen to also like I mentioned the telecommunications.

Throughout the whole project, I was the project manager for XXX so I always had my team’s goals focused, but I had to open up and ask a lot of questions.  I developed an understanding of tech specs to the point that I ended up having to create drawings for the construction team, an electrician and a telecommunication team.

Understanding how the pieces fit together and how to keep the project flowing toward the timing deadline.  First the project was the construction part, then we had the actual move and closed the project with processing and paying the vendor invoices.  Also part of the project was the post move.

The move and construction was complete, but as we mostly know there is usually stuff to be done after the close of what you didn’t originally scope out.  That included getting the team functioning in the new space, getting training on the equipment that we had delivered and creating training documents, getting everybody all up and running.

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

Q7. Tell me about a time when you . . . – AMY QUICK RATING – D

Would be better if you follow story structure, set up of situation, lots of I did this, this, this,in the middle and tell the end of the story in result or accomplishment in terms of value to employer.