How to Answer: Describe a difficult moment in your career. How did you handle it?
Advice and answer examples written specifically for a NASA job interview.
4. Describe a difficult moment in your career. How did you handle it?
Why the Interviewer Asks This Question
NASA employees regularly face challenges. Some are mission-critical, and the way the members of the team at NASA handle themselves can literally be the difference between life and death. Your interviewer wants to know how well you handle yourself in the face of a challenge, a difficult situation, or under pressure.
Written by Karrie Day on October 28th, 2023
How to Answer
Think about several difficult moments you have faced throughout your career and select one that aligns well with the role you're interviewing for. Describe the situation, the specific steps you took to resolve the situation, and anything you did behaviorally to remain calm. End your response by noting any lessons you learned that you feel will help you in your potential future role at NASA.
Written by Karrie Day on October 28th, 2023
1st Answer Example
"My team and I worked on a project for six months and ran numerous tests prior to launch. The new system was critical to operations and required us to migrate overnight to minimize the downtime impact. Things started well, but we began running into issues midway through the migration scripts. We had reached a point where it was really too late to roll everything back and several processes began running without a fully functional environment.
As the technical lead, I knew I needed to take quick action. I asked the two engineers working with me to investigate various aspects of the issues and I called two others and asked them to jump in as well. I also worked with our product manager to analyze the effect on the data and devise a plan to address all of the errant updates that were happening as well as the necessary communication updates.
We partnered with our change management group and identified several configuration issues. It took almost the entire night, but we were able to develop fixes and get everything up and running properly before daybreak. As a leader, I knew it was important for me to remain calm and offer support to my team members who were feeling stressed. I reminded everyone to take small breaks here and there and worked out a plan with our management team to ensure everyone had plenty of downtime after the migration to rest.
I scheduled meetings afterward to discuss what went wrong and put a plan in place to prevent similar issues from occurring in the future. Generally speaking, I stay calm in the face of difficulty. I know I would provide similar leadership during challenging times here at NASA if offered the position."
Written by Samantha Brown on December 16th, 2023
2nd Answer Example
"A junior electrical engineer I was mentoring was struggling with attention to detail issues that affected the quality of his work. In our line of work, a missed connection, or a loose wire could mean the difference between life and death. There is no room for quality control problems.
When I initially spoke with him about the problems he was defensive and mentioned that mistakes happen to everyone and it is the responsibility of the quality assurance team to ensure that mistakes are caught and addressed. I know it can be uncomfortable for some to receive negative feedback, so I did my best not to react poorly to his perspective. Instead, I invited him to lunch and discussed the importance of getting as much as possible every time. I discussed the cost of reworking issues that could have been avoided if he had slowed down and taken his time to make sure his work was correct. I also discussed the potential cost of those same issues if they were not caught and launch systems with defects were put into production.
I offered to work with him directly on several assignments and walked him through my own processes to help him develop his own quality control measures. Ultimately, the engineer I mentored thanked me for working with him to improve the quality of his work. While it was initially a difficult situation, I am glad I approached it directly and honestly before a mistake caused an injury, or worse. I am confident I will be able to provide the same level of guidance and leadership here at NASA if hired."
Written by Samantha Brown on December 16th, 2023