Tell me about the last time you experienced a professional failure and how you dealt with it.
Professional setbacks come with the territory. Each failure is a learning opportunity. This question asks what you take from your setbacks and how you take ownership of your failures, exhibiting character and integrity while ensuring you don't repeat them.
On their website, PwC asks, "Do you learn from your experiences and take the time to develop your personal approach to work? Do you lead others to be the best they can be, whether you're part of a team or leading one? Do you act with integrity and uphold professional standards at all times? We need you to lead yourself and others, regardless of your level, by making a real difference in the work you do. This means delivering results in a responsible, authentic, resilient, inclusive, and passionate way."
Align your interests with what this PwC opportunity offers. Answer with sincerity. The assessment vendor is studying your answers for conviction and verbal and non-verbal cues for signs of honesty. Objectify the situation, exhibiting an emotionally mature perspective, and how you navigated this terrain, ultimately leading to a successful resolution. Posture yourself in a relaxed and comfortable position. Focus on the positives and how your decision-making benefitted your career and the success of the team.
"When I was working with my grandfather's market, I was approached by someone who was new to the area and had bought their first farm. This man and his wife were from the city and were reinventing themselves, and they wanted to build a relationship with us by selling their farm goods through us. Since they were just starting out, we stood to make far more of a profit with them than with the other farm we were buying through. But by doing this, it hurt our relationship with our older farmers. These new farmers, it turned out, didn't know what they were doing, and the quality of their product was poor and their yield low. As a result, we tried to recruit our old farmer back, but out of spite, he raised his rates, and the whole thing backfired. I was much younger and reckless at that time. I have since learned from such mistakes and am more conservative when building new relationships."
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