How often do you think of innovations that will improve your work performance?
Coming up with ideas to increase productivity and efficiency and save time and energy is a great way to make an impact on your coworkers and the company. The ability to see problems as opportunities is a skill that can make you an essential asset to a company. Give the interviewer a sense of how you approach making changes that improve your work performance or your team's work.
"I would say that at least once a month, I have an idea, big or small, that I present to my manager. My most recent innovation was (give a detailed example)."
"I am always thinking of new ways to increase productivity and improve the methods I use to complete my work. The teams I manage use agile methodologies for product development. It is part of our process to reflect daily and at the end of each iteration. I toss out ideas to help us improve our work often during these sessions.
For example, one of my roles is to remove roadblocks for others. Last week I set up a knowledge-sharing opportunity with friends at another company to help my team gather some expertise we needed to move forward. It is pretty unheard of at my company to talk with this competitor, but we were able to share knowledge that was not proprietary, and everyone got something out of it."
Think of a time you had a chance to make a difference by changing a process or procedure, and share it with the interviewer. This will support your answer to their question.
"One of the product development concepts I learned in college was continual improvement. Processes are fluid and small changes can reduce waste and improve performance. I try to look at anything I do in the workplace through that lens. I reflect weekly to think about what I could improve, or what I have observed others doing well that I could incorporate into my approach.
For example, I asked if I could be included on my team's daily status call when I was an intern. I was not originally invited, but I was often asked to take on tasks that were discussed in the meeting. My teammates would then have to bring me to up speed on what was discussed.
The process was inefficient and attending the meetings sped things up a lot. I was able to stay in the loop and regularly offered to take on tasks that I knew I could handle. I took notes for the team and they found that to be helpful as well."
Community answers are written by other candidates practicing this set. Reading how others frame the same question is one of the fastest ways to sharpen your own.
Anonymous Answer
Frequently – I do like well-oiled machines and well-working systems. But technology is moving so fast, and there are so many opportunities arising from it, it is honestly astonishing! I like to review the way I work from time to time, and I like to analyze it to identify areas for improvement.
Krista's Feedback
This is a great start. Perhaps you could provide an example or two of innovations that improved your work performance.
Anonymous Answer
When working on group projects in university, I have always found that making the time to be in a virtual meeting when writing our project helps to maximize productivity. Because of this, we are all working at the same time which enables us to ask each other questions and have them answered as soon as possible. We can also see what each member is doing and give immediate feedback. By all being on the same call and writing the report at the same time, we also didn’t waste time waiting for other people to finish their sections so we could submit it as soon as possible.
Marcie's Feedback
You have provided a good example of a way that you improved your team's work performance; nice! The interviewer will be impressed by this. Consider starting your answer by directly stating that you are the type of person who is constantly seeking better and quicker ways to do things. At the end of it, remind the interviewer that you can't wait to apply your innovative mindset to this new role in their company. Great job!
Anonymous Answer
I found starting the revision for my A levels a difficult thing but I knew it was important to me to achieve my full potential. To overcome this issue of procrastination I researched ways to improve studying and thought about how best to help myself. I tried different techniques until I found a strategy that worked for me. I found that using the Pomodoro method help me to stay focused on the revision.
Marcie's Feedback
Awesome! Can you talk more about what this method entails and why it worked for you? Finally, give more details about the end result - for example, how quickly did you finish the revisions? How did the Pomodoro method help you get it done quicker?
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