By: Dan Simmons

After 35 years in recruiting, one interview question still stands out to me. It comes from Lou Adler, author of Hire With Your Head and a leading voice in performance-based hiring:

“Please think about your most significant accomplishment. Now, could you tell me all about it?”

There is nothing complicated about the wording. Its value comes from what the candidate has to do next.

Most interview questions allow people to describe themselves. Candidates can say they are strategic, technical, collaborative, driven, customer-focused, or strong communicators. Those descriptions may be accurate, but the interviewer still has to determine what sits behind them.

An accomplishment gives us evidence to examine. When someone describes meaningful work they actually completed, the conversation can move into the circumstances, decisions, obstacles, people involved, and results. We get a much clearer picture of how that person operates.

Listen for What the Candidate Remembers

Ask a fisherman about the biggest fish he ever caught and the details usually come quickly. He remembers where he was, what bait he used, the weather, how long the fight lasted, and who was there.

The fish may have gained two inches with every retelling, but the experience itself has detail because he lived it.

hat does not mean every strong candidate will tell a perfect story. Many excellent professionals are not polished interviewers. Some need a few follow-up questions before the important details emerge. The interviewer’s job is to find those details.

Follow the Accomplishment

The first answer should open the conversation rather than end it. Once a candidate identifies an accomplishment, I want to understand what made it significant.

Questions might include:

• What was the situation when you became involved?
• What was your specific responsibility?
• Why were you selected for the work?
• Who else contributed?
• Where did you encounter difficulty?
• What happened that you did not expect?
• How did you respond?
• What changed as a result?
• What would you do differently if you faced the same situation today?

These questions help separate participation from ownership.

A résumé might tell us that someone managed a territory, supervised a production team, worked on a product launch, or supported major customers. The accomplishment discussion helps us understand what the person actually contributed.

We also learn something about judgment. A candidate who can explain why a decision was made, what information was available at the time, and how they adjusted when circumstances changed gives the interviewer much more to evaluate than someone repeating a list of responsibilities.

Animal Science Careers Offer Plenty of Evidence

This approach is especially useful across animal health, animal nutrition, feed, live production, and agribusiness because so much of the work involves solving practical problems.

A live production leader could discuss mortality improvement, labor problems, team performance, operational changes, or a difficult production issue that required several adjustments before the operation improved.

Those accomplishments give the interviewer specific ground to explore. What was happening before the candidate became involved? Which decisions belonged to that person? What changed? How was the result measured? How did the producer, customer, company, or team benefit? A job title alone cannot answer those questions.

Candidates Should Prepare the Evidence

Candidates benefit from thinking through this question before an interview. That does not mean memorizing a polished speech. It means knowing your own work.

The strongest answers usually contain enough detail for the interviewer to understand the difficulty of the work and enough self-awareness for the candidate to explain what they learned from it.

Give the Interview Room to Become a Conversation

An interview should help both sides determine whether someone’s previous work prepares them for the work ahead. That requires more than checking qualifications against a résumé.

Lou Adler’s accomplishment question gives interviewers a way to explore the substance behind a candidate’s experience while giving candidates room to discuss work they genuinely know.

It also reduces the influence of interview polish. Someone may be nervous. Another candidate may be exceptionally charming. Neither characteristic tells us much about how that person will solve a difficult customer problem, manage a production issue, develop a territory, or lead a team. Accomplishments get us closer.

One question will never remove all uncertainty from a hiring decision. This one has lasted because it gives us something valuable to evaluate: what the candidate actually did.

A résumé tells us what someone was around. The accomplishment tells us what they contributed. That distinction can change the quality of an interview.

Credit: The significant-accomplishment question and performance-based interviewing approach discussed here are credited to Lou Adler, author of Hire With Your Head.