![Your Guide to Answering “What Is Your Greatest Accomplishment?” Your Guide to Answering “What Is Your Greatest Accomplishment?”](https://trangangolf.storage.googleapis.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/23150242/412962084_779100577563268_3371857793184435682_n.jpg)
For this question, you’ll want to talk about an accomplishment that’s targeted to the company and its needs as well as the position you’re interviewing for. So do your homework: Review the job description, the company’s website, and its social media presence if you haven’t already. Be sure to check out any recent press or employee reviews, too. If you received notes from a recruiter or have a connection within the company who referred you for the job, these will also help you understand the company better.
Then think about which of your past accomplishments is most relevant. For example, if you’ve read that one of the company’s core values is about having “a sense of ownership,” you’ll want to choose a time when you took on a project because you saw it needed to be done, or stepped up to fill in the gaps on your team when someone left for another job. Bonus points if the project you took on or gaps you filled were directly relevant to the work you’d be doing in this job.
You also want to choose a professional accomplishment unless a personal accomplishment is especially relevant to the role. So as impressive as the time you binged Game of Thrones in one weekend or scored those Taylor Swift tickets was, they don’t really belong in this answer.
If you’re having trouble coming up with accomplishments you might talk about, here are are a few questions to ask yourself:
- How did you contribute to company goals in previous roles? Maybe you had a big impact on a key performance indicator like increased revenue or spearheaded the development of a new product feature.
- What impact did you have on a team as a mentor, manager, or team player? Perhaps you helped onboard an intern and set them up for success, which benefited the entire organization.
- How did you help an organization become more efficient? Maybe you led process improvements by enhancing communication channels.
- What did you do to enhance the customer or client experience? Maybe you helped innovate toward a new user-centric solution.
- If you’re new to the workforce: Did you ever take the lead on anything in a student organization or during volunteer work? Maybe you organized an event, won a competition, or raised money for a good cause.
- If your interviewer asks specifically for a non-work example: Beyond the office, what personal goals have you met? Maybe you ran a marathon or hit a major goal in one of your hobbies, or maybe you overcame a personal challenge of some kind.
If it’s hard to choose just one achievement that feels like the “greatest” accomplishment, then go back to your research and think about which achievement would feel most relevant to the hiring manager you’re trying to impress and the job you’re trying to land.