College job seekers often ask me questions about interviews without leading groups. Today, I will give you a very powerful article, which is taken from the book "Interview Raiders for Product Managers". This is the most comprehensive dry goods article that I have ever seen introducing the interview of the leaderless group, hoping to bring inspiration to everyone.
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An leaderless group interview, also known as a group interview, refers to a group of candidates (usually about 8 people) discussing the same topic together, and the interviewer observes and records the results.
Group interview is a common interview form in enterprises. Every interviewer in the group is equal. We need to strive for the recognition of the group through our own efforts, contribute our own strength to the group, and finally gather into the discussion results of the group. On the other hand, the interviewer evaluates the content of the candidate's speech in the discussion and his ability to promote the situation.
In this process, what you show the interviewer is your ability and quality in problem analysis, communication and expression, teamwork, emotional control, professional knowledge application, leadership and so on.
The main types of common group interviews:
According to the content, it can be divided into case analysis, problem solving and skill investigation:
Case analysis: discuss the actual business cases in groups. For example, "Mengniu's milk sales decreased this month 10%. What is the reason? As the person in charge of the market, what should you do? "
B. problem solving: communicate and solve a simulated problem in the group. For example, at the end of the year, the company holds an annual meeting, and you are a member of the organizing Committee. Please hold a meeting to discuss the arrangements and matters needing attention of the annual meeting. Or "how to solve the rebate problem in the sales process", and so on.
C, activity planning type: complete a creative activity planning and execution plan in groups. Generally, limited resources or funds are given, hoping to give full play to the creativity of members.
D. Skills inspection: This kind of question is usually an open question, which examines whether the job seeker's thinking about the problem is comprehensive, pertinent and clear, and whether he has novel views and opinions. For example, "What abilities do you think a business leader should have?" ? Candidates may also be asked to have an internal debate on a topic, such as "Should college students take postgraduate entrance examination or work after graduation".
The process of group interview:
Group meetings are usually 1 hour, and the typical time ratio is 10 minutes for opening remarks and self-introduction+10 minutes for reading questions and independent thinking +30 minutes for discussion+10 minutes for summary and oral report; The typical staffing ratio is 6~ 10 job seekers+1 business department interviewers+1hr. The topic is a big topic, and there may be many small problems in the big topic.
Group interview is a highly skilled interview link, which needs specific practice. After you start looking for a job, you must attend a mock interview or try the water with an Offer that you don't value very much, otherwise you will feel very uncomfortable.
Steps of group interview:
The steps of grouping test are generally:
First of all, take questions, and the members prepare their own speech outlines;
Secondly, the group members take turns to speak and explain their views;
Third, members cross-discuss and summarize the best scheme;
Finally, the solution summarizes and reports the discussion results.
But the whole process is not fixed, as long as it can be fully discussed and the results can be formed, so there are many places to play.
Role-playing in group interview;
Because the group interview examines everyone's cooperation ability, in the initial part, individuals need to quickly find their role in the whole interview. The standard of group interview is that your role is clear and you have made enough contribution to the selected role. If you don't perform well in your own role direction on the one hand, and participate in other roles at will on the other hand, it proves that teamwork ability is poor and you will lose in the group.
How to choose your role direction is to prepare in advance and choose on the spot. On the one hand, we should make a preset according to the role that we are better at in our daily life and work. For example, a leader who inspires others to think, a recorder who summarizes statements, a global timekeeper, a problem solver or a member of an active atmosphere. Only when the role positioning is suitable for your usual performance can you make greater contributions in this direction more naturally and better.
On the other hand, when you are at the scene, you should also examine the ability, personality and professional composition of the players. For example, if you choose the original direction, others will take the lead in the interview. I suggest you don't compete too much, choose other similar directions or play a supporting role in this direction. You must remember that the most important thing is the integrity and harmony of the team.
Roles are generally divided into team leader, deputy team leader, timekeeper, record collector (suitable for girls), ordinary members and so on. Each role needs to undertake different tasks.
In the establishment of the atmosphere of another dimension team, there are generally peacemakers (team lubricants), idea kings (who are in the majority in the group, are familiar with a certain knowledge field, are inspired, give more suggestions and are good at solving specific problems), and Tartars (who contribute opinions to the team but keep their own special understanding). These need to be considered according to your understanding of the team and team goals.
The same role, played by different people, will have many different performances. Let's briefly talk about how each role can gain greater recognition.
1. Leader
Leader has more scenes, more performance time and opportunities, and is a member who is relatively easy to pass the customs. However, everything has two sides and the risk is the highest. If there is a thorn in the team, there is no consensus in the end, usually because the leader's guidance is dereliction of duty, which eventually leads to the failure of the interview. At the same time, leaders with too strong personality are not very good, so team members should be given the opportunity to express their opinions. So if you are determined to play this role well, you must practice a certain amount to grasp the overall situation.
So how to become an excellent group leader?
1) Before the interview, learn as much as possible about the names, schools and professional backgrounds of the students attending the interview, and at least communicate with most people; Understand everyone's specialties and specialties, give reasonable guidance, and give appropriate opportunities for presentations and summaries at all stages to the right students. Try to break the ice before the interview so that everyone can recognize and trust you. As a leader, it is particularly important to get familiar with everyone before the interview.
2) In the interview, there are many ways for leaders to lead the team, and thinking guidance is the first choice, generally speaking first. Only when all team members contribute their strength within the framework of ideas can the integration of collective strength be realized. Generally, the leader puts forward the direction and guides and summarizes the ideas of other students.
For example, at the beginning of breaking the ice: "What we encounter is a problem, and the purpose of this problem is to achieve it. When discussing specific solutions, we first determine the overall solution. " "I'll talk about my ideas first, and then look at the places to supplement and improve, ok? My idea is this: "Under normal circumstances, after the students who broke the ice finished speaking, the students generally agreed that the students who broke the ice became the leading leaders.
3) After the general idea is determined, discuss the specific implementation methods and steps. At this time, the leader's biggest task is not to put forward some ideas, but to encourage team members to discuss together and effectively control the discussion process in this process. Let the discussion revolve around the main idea, interact with team members and give feedback, and move forward step by step towards the goal.
For example, "Are you talking about reducing costs?" "How can we reduce the cost?" "Do you mean paying attention to staff training and improving production efficiency?" "What about the opinions of other students?" Wait a minute. Ask more questions, summarize the opinions of the comprehensive team members in time, and let them give you positive feedback.
4) Pay attention to the distribution of opportunities. It is necessary to combine personal professional advantages, appropriately guide team members to give full play to their own advantages, and put forward professional opinions for the solution.
For example, "What do you think should be done from a marketing perspective?" Wait a minute. If a classmate doesn't talk much, or doesn't get a chance to speak, the leader can say, "Do you have any other opinions? Why don't you listen to your classmates? " In short, giving full play to the ability and knowledge advantages of each team member and integrating a perfect solution within the specified time is the biggest contribution direction of the leader.
The role of a leader is the one that requires the highest quality. Need to have the ability to communicate, tolerate, empathize and summarize. At the same time, we must have the wit to guide the direction at the critical moment and a solid product foundation to make the final decision.
To sum up, leaders need to use their enthusiasm to drive the whole team forward, ensure the team plan with good arrangements, and promote the effective discussion of the team with their own knowledge and sufficient analysis.
Therefore, there are two suggestions for this role that is easy to be contested by everyone: first, don't try to be brave if you are not the leader's material, otherwise you will easily harm others and yourself; Second, leaders should aim at solving problems and taking care of all members. They can talk less about their own ideas and opinions.
2. Time items
The timekeeper is simply a time controller, which will help you divide the time and remind you to control the rhythm at the right time. Don't underestimate the timekeeper, its passing rate is relatively high, because it is the embodiment of project management ability. But in this role, it is easy to be robbed by the leading role, even part-time. On the other hand, punctuality can also help the leader in the name of reminding the time.
The first task of timekeeper is time management. Therefore, after the timekeeper gets the case title and time limit, he needs to quickly understand the case and discuss it with you, and quickly form a time schedule to match the overall progress of the idea.
For example, "I suggest dividing the interview time according to the topic before discussion." What do you think? " Okay？ ""Let's spend three minutes thinking alone and write down the general plan, and then we will take turns to talk about our ideas, each for one and a half minutes, and one * * * is 12 minutes. Then discuss it for 20 minutes, get the plan, and summarize the statement in the last 5 minutes. In this way, we can still have a few minutes of maneuvering time in the 45-minute interview. Do you think this time is feasible? "
During the discussion, the timekeeper should manage the time strictly according to the discussion time plan, and appropriately interrupt the students who speak overtime: "Time is up, sorry, let's go to the next classmate." We should also properly guide everyone to be concise: "Can you summarize what you just said in a few words? Note that the time keeper sometimes plays the bad COP and decisively interrupts the grasshopper? Badger milk is rich? Is manganese the reason for school trips? What happened to my daughter-in-law P mode? Gray? Woven it? X guest? Good at Rui? The more ridiculous, the more ridiculous. /p & gt；
If we expect to do better, we should pay attention to helping leaders to promote team rhythm and effectively avoid silence. For example: "There are still 4 minutes, let's discuss how to avoid the same production problems in the future!"
In a word, the timekeeper is an important member of the team, which is not only related to whether the team can fully discuss problems and get perfect solutions within the specified time (in terms of time division and assisting leaders), but also related to equal opportunities for team members and giving full play to their respective abilities to optimize the solutions (in terms of time management and guiding speeches).
3. Record Summary Generator
When the team members are noisy, there is another person who is carefully recording everyone's speeches and summing them up at an appropriate time. This person is also a role that can easily shine in the group-record summarizer.
The recorder's main job is to help the team record and refine the discussion results and form the final team answer. As a recorder, there are several points to pay attention to.
1) The record should be clear: according to the arrangement of team time division, divide a piece of paper into several parts, and at the beginning of each part, write clearly the problems and goals to be solved in this time period. During the discussion, write down each student's speech quickly and accurately (the name and content of the speech are not necessarily recorded verbatim, but the complete meaning must be recorded, including good ideas and bad ideas). In combination with the overall solution of the team, mark the relevant speaking points.
2) Cooperate with leaders, solve blind spots and promote discussion: point out or convey the main points and ideas related to solving important problems to leaders in a timely and clear manner.
If you find that an important issue has not been discussed, remind your teammates to discuss it at an appropriate time. When the team members discuss aimlessly, they should stand up and make it clear which step we have just discussed and which step to discuss next.
3) Summarize the speech properly and try to be the representative's concluding speech: At the end of the discussion, pick up the notebook and say to each group member, "I have recorded all your speeches in this notebook. Below, let me tell you about the key points I recorded! " When everyone is watching you, you must clearly, emphatically and item by item state the main points of your plan, and praise a classmate's idea by name in the process. Finally, he said, "This is the result of our discussion, and it is recorded here. I will give this book to the following classmate who will make a representative speech. " Usually this role will belong to you.
The above three roles are all roles with relatively extra work in the group, and if they are won, they will help individuals to play; If you don't get it, as an ordinary team member, you can clearly contribute your ideas and show your ideas. Because although there are relatively more opportunities for special roles, it is also easier to do more and make more mistakes. Sometimes, just take a chance to talk, pull the team back to the right track from the deviated discussion, and then even if you don't say a word, you can impress the interviewer and pass the interview.
Finally, I would like to give a special hint about the handling of opposing opinions. Group discussion is actually a process of seeking common ground while reserving differences, and it is normal to have differences of opinion in the process of reaching some knowledge. But don't try to overwhelm other members, it will be considered as lacking team spirit and will basically be eliminated.
A better way is to guide the discussion direction, unite other students and show leadership. Even if the final opinion is not adopted, you can't participate in the remaining links with emotion. You must take the overall situation into consideration and complete the discussion task with other members of the team. The most important thing is to see what role you play in the discussion, and learn to compromise when necessary. It is also an excellent ability to put team interests first. The last thing you need is personal heroism.