Organisation and time-management skills
Q. How do you stay organised?
Q. How do you manage your time and prioritise tasks?
Q. Tell me about a time when you have had to juggle multiple commitments or demands.
City workers are typically expected to be very well organised, as they’ll often be juggling multiple projects for a number of clients and supervisors, managing various competing deadlines (some of which may be brought forward with little warning), coordinating numerous internal and external teams and advisers, and working on a wide range of unfamiliar documents and processes. Organisation and time-management skills, including the ability to prioritise (and re-prioritise), are therefore fundamental.
How can you demonstrate organisation and time-management skills?
Start by arriving on time for an interview! That aside, think about times where you’ve had to juggle a variety of competing responsibilities. This could include working part-time whilst studying, balancing various positions of responsibility, or committing to time-intensive extra-curricular activities (e.g. ones that involve regular training sessions or performances).
When discussing organisation skills, perhaps highlight the methods you used to stay organised and effectively juggle your responsibilities. For example, did you use calendar appointments and reminders (e.g. to remind yourself of recurring tasks, upcoming calls and meetings, and the need to get back in touch with or chase people), a notebook for detailed notes, a high level to-do list to help you prioritise, or a particular email filing system to keep on top of everything? Did you regularly reflect on what needs to be done, to check you’re on track?
I was once asked to explain in detail how I prioritise my time, and ended up showing the interviewer a copy of my calendar and task list to demonstrate my approach to organisation. You could also discuss a time where you’ve had to adjust your schedule to manage unexpected responsibility, for example if a team member dropped out of their role on short notice and you had to find a way to pick up the slack. On a similar note, if you’re ever asked to discuss how you manage competing responsibilities, keep in mind the considerations outlined in our example of how to use the STAR structure to answer this question.
For more information, see our example answer to a scenario-based case study involving balancing competing responsibilities.