What makes you unique

The purpose of any interview is to give the interviewer an accurate picture of you. The interviewer wants to know what makes you unique and where you’ve been on your career path. Using appropriate words and phrases will assist you in getting the necessary information across. This chapter focuses on the topics of you and your knowledge, providing you with words and phrases to help you create an accurate picture for the interviewer

1. What makes you unique?

2. Tell me about a time when you solved a problem in a unique manner.

3. Give me an example of how your uniqueness has helped you in your work.

Uniqueness

1. What makes you unique?

Not only am I a successful manager, but I worked my way up from the bottom position in the company to get there.

If you were to ask any of my colleagues, they would tell you that I am known for my unique ability to get people to do things for me without asking directly.

What makes me unique is that my outside interest is playing the piano and my ‘day job’ is working on the computer all day long. So I am constantly playing with sets of keys.

2. Tell me about a time when you solved a problem in a unique manner.

As a publicist, one of the challenges of my job is to think of unique ideas to promote my client or product. There was one publicity campaign I handled for a product that we called a ‘real knock out.’ I purchased hundreds of key chains with small boxing gloves attached and sent them as part of the press kit to radio and television studios. It was unique, so it drew attention and got great results for my client.

An engineering project I worked on at my last company saved over $1 million in operating costs. I created, published, and implemented a unique plan for underwater storage. I was in charge of implementation, and, because of my planning and coordination of departments, it was a great success.

I was given the challenging task of continuing our community educational programs, but with a more limited budget than in previous years. The first thing I did was to apply for grant money. Then I put together an aggressive volunteer program. Because of my ability to come up with new ideas, we were able to continue our classes, seminars, and workshops in a seamless manner without raising the costs of the classes.

3. Give me an example of how your uniqueness has helped you in your work.

I’m known for my ability to ‘think outside the box.’ I came up with an original idea to raise funds for the police children’s annual toy drive. I contracted with the local movie theatre to give a free movie ticket to every person who brought in a toy over the cost of $5. The results were like none we’ve ever had before. We had a record contribution, and the donors received a gift in return. It was a very successful year.

It was when I was a student. I used a unique way to get around campus and the city; I roller-skate everywhere. Figured I was getting more exercise skating than I would get walking. I didn’t have time to exercise, so I kept fit by using this method to commute. I was also able to listen to my class tapes while I skated. It was a great way to get around and study at the same time.

The unique part of this example is that I was able to lead a cross-functional team in a company that had never used cross-functional teams before. As the lead engineer I decided to try an experiment, and took people from various functions and cross-trained them. We were able to do twice the design, testing, and production in a shorter period and saved the company money in the process. It was received well and is now a common practice at the company.