STAR – Situation Task Action Result

A great storytelling device for answering competency interview questions (and also for how to write CVs, if structured differently for the medium).

But what does it actually mean, and how can you apply it?

Situation: related to the question – what was the situation behind how you answer? The people involved. The problem faced. The nature of the business you were in. Notable systems or frameworks. The context – it sets the scene.

(It was a dark and stormy night)

Task: what were you asked to do to remedy this situation? If you weren’t given direction, what did the situation require you to do? This is the simplest part and is the reflection of the question asked.

(The dark and stormy knight had orders from his CEO to kill the king)

Action: this is key. What did you actually do, separate to what the task required? The task shows your project planning skills. The action shows how you deal with “first contact with the enemy” when any plan goes astray. It shows how you live up to expectation, how you improve the status quo, and the things you can bring to table differently. What did you do?

(He left his toxic boss and married the king instead, preferring a non-violent long-term solution, with an ROI of 199%)

Result: the outcome. Did you achieve what you set out to do? If not, why not? What would you have improved or done differently. It’s not a binary result, it’s one with texture. And if you did fail in this situation, what did you learn and what would you do differently?

(Everyone lived happily ever after and he posted about it on LinkedIn, with a dashing selfie)

The problem with STAR is that it encourages you to practice, practice, practice to the point of coming across as a robot that has answers to every possible question.

Whereas it’s a framework that should be about storytelling in a way that brings the interviewer forward, based on listening closely to their needs and responding naturally.

Can you learn STAR well enough that it allows you to tell a true story that relates to the question?

That is the trick and point of STAR in a conversational interview.

Nail it and you can smash competency interviews.

Nail it and you can form your CV and any correspondence around it too, which helps with your interview in turn.

(Kingdom of LinkedIn 2020 - date.
Knight
I married the king uniting the kingdom resulting in a 199% ROI)

Questions?