PwC Employability E-learn Interview script - Sonia

Video – Team working:

Candidate: Sonia

Watch option B: 

Interviewer: So describe a time when you have worked in a team to deliver a piece of work

Okay, it was, it was my 1st year on my Geography course…. we were assigned into groups before we went out to Iceland on a field trip. This was part of the Climate Change module I was taking… I was really looking forward to going out there – to Iceland I mean -  as I’d never been. Yeah we did really well in our project, ended up with a mark of 65% so we were yeah, really pleased with it.

Interviewer: OK, what was the piece of work?

Umm…well we were working on a project on glacial movements and were going to Iceland to get data. I didn’t know the others in my group so I felt we needed to plan in some time before we went out to find out how we could structure the project…. to make sure we’d hand it in on time and meet each other. We were going to be assessed as a group so it was really important that we worked efficiently together. Plus we had loads of assignments on around the time of the final deadline so; I didn’t want to get behind on, on anything.

I erm set up a meeting before we went out to Iceland; I asked everyone when they would be free and then just everyone had an invitation; we just met up in the union, easy place for everyone to get to….. didn’t want anyone travelling too much.  [Looking concerned] Is that okay?

Interviewer: Yes….so, what was your role in the team?

Well, I’m always really good at organising things so I ended up just setting up a what’s app group so we could message each other if we had any questions and organised most of the meetings……I also suggested talking about which areas we wanted to do……I created a check list to make sure we covered each section of the assignment. I think this you know helped us as you’re better at some things than others.

I guess it was a bit awkward in our first meeting as we didn’t really know each other that well so we spent a few minutes finding out about each other. I wanted to make sure we were prepared so suggested talking about splitting up the work so we each had a section…..Everyone was contributing individually in some ways, you know we were going to be assessed on this and share the grade so it was really important that we shared the responsibility and I suggested that we took responsibility for a section rather than all of us doing you know the whole thing. I asked if anyone was interested in one of the subsections in particular, or if they felt they were particularly good at something. And yeah it turned out everyone was interested in different parts of the project so it worked out well…..so,

Oh and I also ended up volunteering to pull together the final report, (laughs) I liked formatting documents to make things look neat and I could make sure I was completely happy with it and how it looked and how it read. (Hesitantly) Does, sorry, does that answer the question?

Interviewer: yes, thank you…… how did you work with the other team members?

Sorry….Well, I mentioned that I organised some meetings and was going to pull the final report together. Sorry I’m not sure (hesitant- fade out)…….

Interviewer: Specifically, what did you do when working with your group?

Oh erm okay well…When we got back from Iceland, I set up another meeting by sending out a facebook message…..everyone always checks Facebook before their emails! So we got together at the student union and this is where we all decided to complete the first draft by the following week….we just wanted to get the project out the way, we all had loads of other deadlines………we all agreed to this apart from Meilin…. (gets side-tracked) she was from Hong Kong….I’ve always wanted to go there and spent loads of time  speaking to her about what it’s like to live there and where she’d recommend visiting when we were away…. …(remembers her point and gets back on track) but…sorry….she wasn’t sure she was going to be able to meet the deadline……she was putting on an event for the Chinese New Year celebrations with her society……we actually went to that event together a few weeks later, it was great…so erm…..you could tell Meilin had put a lot of effort into it.

Interviewer: What did you do when Meilin wasn’t sure about the deadline?

Well we asked her why she couldn’t make the new deadline and that’s when she explained about her event…she was really busy so decided that we could extend her deadline with us for a few days, I think it was only about another 10 in total, you know that gave her time to get everything sorted for the event and do the work for her section. It wasn’t a big issue, we already ahead of schedule because we’d been so efficient with the planning and making sure we had collected all the right research.

Sorry!....erm…. just going back to you last question…….generally, I guess, I was really good at the planning side of things and making sure we were focused on the task. I mean…We spent loads of time together in Iceland, so it was nice getting to know my group….and I’m glad I took the time to get to know them made it a lot easier to work with them.

Interviewer: To what extent was the team successful in delivering this work?

Yes, really successful, I think I mentioned that we got 65% in our project as a group……so yeah really proud of how efficient we were when working together and I think it helped that I sort of organised everyone, not to say that they weren’t themselves but, I was just quite active in setting up meetings and keeping everyone focused on submitting the report and I think that’s kind of why we got such a good mark.