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You just finished showing the job interviewer why you are a good fit for this role.
Then comes the curveball: "Describe a situation where you had to work with a difficult team member." Your mind starts to blank. What should you say?
Don’t worry — this question is your chance to showcase your problem-solving, communication, and teamwork skills!
Why Interviewers Ask This Question
This is a very common question interviewers ask to mainly see if you have the right skills to handle tough work situations:
Communication skills
Conflict resolution skills
Adaptability
Self-awareness
Having these skills shows interviewers that you can handle tough situations with professionalism and maturity.
Answering the Question Like a Pro
You want to choose an experience where you can highlight:
Background information: What happened? What was the key challenge? What made the team member difficult?
Actions you took: How did you communicate? What actions did you take to resolve the situation? Why did you think this was the best approach?
The result: What were the results? How did the team members respond? What worked well?
Learning experience: What did you learn from the experience? How will you handle similar situations in the future?
Quiz
You want to choose an experience when you communicated well with difficult team member. What should you highlight? Select all that apply:
Remember, you want to share the brief background, actions you took, the results, and something you learned from the experience. Bashing on team members makes the candidate sound less professional and mature!
Did you know?
This Byte was created by a volunteer professional that wanted to share this insight to help you succeed - no agenda, no cost.
Try It Out
Pretend you're faced with the same interview question: "Describe a situation where you had to work with a difficult team member."
What do you think is the best response?
Option A: Last year, I volunteered to help organize a school event for incoming international students. In our meeting, we had one team member who kept disagreeing with everyone's ideas on the lunch menu. I met with the team member in private and found out that they felt that the menu didn't consider people with underrepresented backgrounds. Thanks to this insight, we had a successful opening event. I also learned the importance of listening to every team member.
Option B: One time, I had a team member who kept criticizing everyone's ideas. They seemed very impatient and sometimes rude. I was shocked. We were supposed to help incoming students but because of the team member, we couldn't get anything done. Everyone disliked the person. So we told the manager and the company got rid of the difficult team member.
Quiz
Which option should you choose?
Option A explains the situation briefly shows their proactive approach to resolving the situation. Option B focused too much on why the difficult team member was harmful to the team rather than highlighting their communication skills or their problem solving skills.
Take Action
Be prepared to share an experience that showcases your ability handle difficult team member!
This Byte has been authored by
Changsoo Park
Learning & Development Professional
M.Ed.