Talk about a time you had to overcome a major obstacle on a project or a job you were trying to complete. What caused the roadblock for you and how did you handle that situation?
In Boston Scientific's pursuit of excellence, they believe that sound vision and a commitment to overcome obstacles are critical in the pursuit of excellence. In essence, for the organization to go above and beyond their competition in meeting the needs of their customers, they know that they will face hurdles along the way and the staff at Boston Scientific need to be willing and ready to face those hurdles. For your answer, think of a time when you faced an obstacle on the job and use your own knowledge and other resources to overcome the issue. Your interviewer will be looking to hear that you like to face a challenge and that you are resourceful and efficient in how you go about solving the issue.
"A couple of years ago, I was working with a large local client on a radio advertising campaign when I was the Marketing and Advertising Director of a media company. In the initial meetings with the client, they were hoping to be very edgy in their advertising for their line of automotive dealerships and most of their ideas were too inappropriate for radio. The general manager of the client insisted that his ad ideas were appropriate and even threatened to take his ad business to a competitor if we wouldn't comply. In a great effort to keep their business, I created a presentation with the FCC regulations that would be violated based on his initial ideas and made it clear that no other media company would be willing to run his ads. At the end of my presentation, I came up with three very creative, and what he considered edgy, ad campaigns for his dealership. After a night thinking about it, we reached a great agreement on a campaign that made my organization a lot of money and brought a ton of business to our client."
"In my current role as Supply Chain Director, a few years ago we almost doubled our production due to a few new government contracts that we were awarded. While plans got underway for warehouse expansion quickly, my team was under a very small warehouse space for over a year due to the significant increase in production. This limited space called for a full team effort that I coordinated and this collaborative effort entailed us re-writing our guidelines for minimal inventory and just-in-time inventory. In the end, prior to our new warehouse space being completed, we were really a well-oiled machine working with as little space as possible and the team effort was critical in this."
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Anonymous Answer
When I was working in a restaurant on a quiet day about 40 American tourists came in to get a meal, knowing it was going to take a long time to serve all of them, I took the kitchen porter off the dishes and put him on starters while keeping an eye on him to maintain the standard of the starters. I got to preparing the main courses so they would be ready fast for when they finished their starters.
Stephanie's Feedback
It sounds like you did some quick problem-problem solving to ensure that everyone was cared for and that every aspect of the meal moved along on schedule. I suggest adding a sentence or two to explicitly state how you used quick thinking and problem-solving skills to overcome this roadblock and what the outcome was (hopefully satisfied customers.)
Anonymous Answer
We once installed a gate that we had never done before. We had many problems with the anchoring system of the doors, the weight of the doors, and the finished look of the gate. In the middle of the installation, we had to stop what we were doing, apologize to the client, and together with the whole team, we looked for a solution. In the end, the project did not have such good profitability, however, it was a job from which the whole team learned something and hopefully avoided the same mistake in the future.
Marcie's Feedback
The interviewer will be happy to hear that everyone learned something from this challenging job. What exactly did you learn? And what ended up being the solution? Did you manage to get the gate installed for the customer? The more details you can provide, the more memorable your answer will be to the interviewer. Good job!
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