{"id":45,"date":"2015-10-19T09:10:55","date_gmt":"2015-10-19T08:10:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/?p=45"},"modified":"2025-10-22T15:58:01","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T14:58:01","slug":"strengths-based-interviews-what-are-they","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/2015\/10\/19\/strengths-based-interviews-what-are-they\/","title":{"rendered":"Strengths Based Interviews - what are they?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As you probably know, one of the ways the Careers Service supports students is by offering <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bath.ac.uk\/students\/careers\/one-to-one\/index.html\">Mock Interviews<\/a>. Last week, I was helping a student prepare for an Interview at EY, one of the early adopters of strengths-based recruitment. This is a growing trend; recruiters such as Nestle, Barclays and Standard Chartered have also moved away from competency based interviews. Many of you will be familiar with competency-based questions. These look for evidence of transferable skills (such as team-work, leadership, communication etc) all designed to answer the question <em>\u201cCan you do the job?\u201d<\/em>\u00a0 This style of interviewing is about your ability to do the job and it has its flaws! Just because you can do the job doesn't mean you want to!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2014\/10\/WomanStrong.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-46\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2014\/10\/WomanStrong-231x300.jpg\" alt=\"WomanStrong\" width=\"231\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2014\/10\/WomanStrong-231x300.jpg 231w, https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/82\/2014\/10\/WomanStrong.jpg 309w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 231px) 100vw, 231px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Strengths based approach is different. Whilst it recognises the importance of skills and abilities, it also acknowledges that skills can be learnt. In a strengths-based interview recruiters are not looking for rehearsed answers to competency questions, instead they are looking for animation, energy and passion. It\u2019s a very different approach. This <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ey.com\/UK\/en\/Careers\/Students\/Joining-EY#fragment-1-na\">video<\/a> from EY explains why they\u00a0use strength based approach\u00a0really well.<\/p>\n<p>Below\u00a0are some examples of strength based questions:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Are you a starter of a finisher?<\/li>\n<li>What do you love to do in your spare time?<\/li>\n<li>What do you find quick to learn?<\/li>\n<li>How would a close friend describe you?<\/li>\n<li>What qualities would you bring to this team?<\/li>\n<li>Are you a big picture or a detail person?<\/li>\n<li>What activities give you an energy buzz?<\/li>\n<li>Give me an example of a weakness?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As you can see, the\u00a0interviewer is focusing on the things you\u00a0love\u00a0doing! Therefore being authentic and letting your passion shine through helps! \u00a0The\u00a0questions\u00a0are more\u00a0personal\u00a0and\u00a0interviewers will look\u00a0at\u00a0body language\u00a0and\u00a0listen for\u00a0other\u00a0signals\u00a0like tone of voice\u00a0to identify whether you take\u00a0pride\u00a0in\u00a0what you\u00a0have been\u00a0doing. Our top tip is to think about your interests and what you enjoy doing before the interview! Make sure you consider all aspects of your life - not just your academic studies! Finally and most importantly, be yourself! Allow\u00a0your\u00a0natural\u00a0energy\u00a0and enthusiasm\u00a0to\u00a0permeate\u00a0your answers... Good luck!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As you probably know, one of the ways the Careers Service supports students is by offering Mock Interviews. Last week, I was helping a student prepare for an Interview at EY, one of the early adopters of strengths-based recruitment. This...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":384,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[748],"tags":[142,44,23],"class_list":["post-45","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive","tag-interview-questions","tag-interviews","tag-strength-based-interview"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/384"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}