A STAR method interview answer responds to a competency-based question with one real example, told in four parts: the situation, your task, the actions you took and the result. FAO uses it for its competency questions, the UK Civil Service suggests it, and the UN’s own guidance for applicants asks for answers structured as situation, action and result.
A competency-based interview is one where every question asks for evidence of a named behaviour, such as planning or teamwork, from your past work. The panel scores what you did, not what you say you would usually do. The STAR method keeps an answer on that evidence.
What is the STAR method?
FAO’s guide to preparing for a competency-based interview says it uses the STAR model so that questions can be asked and answered in a logical and concise way. It defines the four parts below. The last column is our suggestion for the balance of an answer.
| Part | What to say | Length we suggest |
|---|---|---|
| Situation | What happened, so the panel can picture it | One or two sentences |
| Task | What your role was in that situation | One sentence |
| Action | What you did, why, and how you dealt with any obstacle | Most of the answer |
| Result | The outcome, and the effect of your action | Two or three sentences, with a number or a visible change where you have one |
The UK Civil Service’s brief guide to competencies gives the same balance: keep the situation and task parts brief, and concentrate on the action and the result. The UN’s guidance on competency-based interviews uses three parts, situation, action and result, and asks you to include the positive outcome or the lesson learned from each example. The shapes differ by one letter. The rule is the same.
Why do international organisations use competency-based interviews?
The UN Secretariat’s applicant guide, republished in August 2024, calls the competency-based interview a preferred assessment method for job openings, and says only a select number of applicants are invited to one. Its goal is to gather objective evidence of your competencies through your past behaviour and performance.
What the guide says to expect:
- A panel. It normally has three UN staff members, including the hiring manager.
- Behavioural questions. The panel asks for examples of when you showed each competency, and in particular how you handled a situation or a task. You may be asked for negative examples as well as positive ones.
- Comparison questions. For example, which of your past team experiences stood out from the others, and why.
- Follow-up questions. The panel may keep probing until it has enough evidence.
- A set length. A competency-based interview typically lasts 30 to 60 minutes.
The same format appears elsewhere. The UN’s young professionals programme ends with an oral exam whose questions test the UN’s core values and the competencies of the job family. The UK Civil Service’s candidate overview says its interviews usually last 30 to 60 minutes and may ask you to describe specific times when you showed a skill or behaviour.
How do you build a STAR answer?
Start from the job opening, not from your favourite story. The applicant guide tells you to learn the indicators of each competency in the opening, and to think of past examples where you showed them.
- List the competencies. Copy each one from the opening with its indicators. A post with five competencies needs at least five examples, and a sixth for a negative question.
- Choose a specific event. The UK guide says you must describe a specific event or situation, not a habit. “I always plan ahead” is not an example.
- Write the situation and task in three sentences or fewer. The UK candidate overview warns not to assume the panel knows the situation you faced, so name the place, the team and the stakes.
- Write the action with I, not we. The UK guide says to use “I” rather than “we” for the actions that led to the result. The panel is scoring you.
- End with the result, or the lesson. Give a number, a date or a change someone else could see. For a negative example, say what you learned and what you now do differently.
- Time it. FAO suggests no more than three minutes per answer. Say it aloud and cut what does not serve the competency.
How to read a job posting helps you pull the competencies out of a long opening, and scoring your resume against UN competencies shows how to find the evidence for each one.
A worked example of a STAR answer
The question, in the shape the UN guide uses: “Please describe a situation when you had to deliver results under a tight deadline. How did you go about it?” The answer below is illustrative.
Situation. In my last role I supported a programme with eight partner organisations. Two weeks before a donor report was due, three partners had not sent their data.
Task. I was responsible for compiling the report and submitting it on time.
Action. I called each of the three partners the same day and asked what was holding them up. Two needed a simpler template, so I cut ours from four pages to one and sent it that evening. The third had lost its data officer, so I arranged a video call and filled in the template with their finance lead while they read the figures from their records. I then set a check-in for every Friday until the report went out.
Result. All eight partners’ data was in five days before the deadline, and we submitted on time. The one-page template is still the one the programme uses.
It works because every sentence in the action names something the speaker did, and the result is a fact the panel could check. A follow-up such as “What would you do differently?” is easy to answer, because the details are real.
For a negative example, use the same shape and change the end. Describe the plan that failed, what you did once you saw it failing, and the change you made to how you work.
How do you answer situational and comparison questions?
Not every question asks about the past. The UN’s guidance says you are likely to meet situational questions as well, about what you would do or how you would approach a challenge. The UK Civil Service says it may ask how you would behave in a given situation, through situational judgement tests or situational interview questions.
For a situational question, give your approach in steps, then support it with a short past example if you have one. For a comparison question, say what set one experience apart from the others, and give the evidence. Keep to the point, as the UN guidance puts it, and be as specific as possible.
In a video interview, the UN guidance notes, you will pick up fewer body language cues than in person. Pause briefly at the end of each answer so the panel knows you have finished.
How does Zorlya’s interview prep help?
For a role in your Zorlya feed, interview prep writes eight questions for that role. The first three are behavioural, on topics such as leadership, failure and recovery, conflict and working across teams. The next three are technical and stay within the skills the posting asks for. The last two are about motivation and how you work.
Each question comes with a difficulty, a STAR outline and an “interviewer probe”, which names what the panel is really assessing. The outline draws its situations from the parts of your resume closest to the posting, so the examples are yours. Rewrite each one in your own words and time it, because an answer read from notes does not hold up under follow-up questions. The pricing page lists how many runs each plan includes.
The prep is not built from a UN framework. For a UN interview, add one question of your own for each competency the opening names, and prepare a STAR answer to each.
Questions people ask
Is it STAR or SAR?
Both are in use. FAO and the UK Civil Service use STAR, with a task step. The UN’s guidance for applicants uses situation, action and result. The UK guide also mentions the CAR method. Each asks for one specific example with a result.
How long should a STAR answer be?
FAO suggests no more than three minutes. In an interview of 30 to 60 minutes with several competencies to cover, a longer answer takes time from the others.
Can I say “we” in my answers?
Use “I” for your own actions, as the UK guide advises. Name the team when you describe the situation, then say what you did in it.
Will they ask about a failure?
They may. The UN applicant guide says you may be asked for both positive and negative examples for some competencies. Prepare one, and end it with what you learned.
What we know and what we do not
The guidance above comes from the UN Secretariat’s applicant guide and HR portal, an FAO guide hosted on a UN country team site, and the UK Civil Service’s own pages, read when this post was written. We found no Secretariat document that uses the word STAR, and no published scale for how UN panels score an answer. The worked example is illustrative.
The description of interview prep was checked against Zorlya’s code: the prompt it sends and the route that runs it. Zorlya prepares you, and you take the interview. Write down each interview date and follow-up, as tracking applications describes.