Behaviours Flashcards
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
ACTIONS: how did you…
Communicate in a straightforward manner?
By breaking complex processes down into simple bullet points to make them more digestible
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
ACTIONS: how did you…
Maximise understanding and impact?
By using mixed media (verbal, written content, infographics, videos) to target different learning styles
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
ACTIONS: how did you…
Encourage the use of different comms methods, especially digital resources?
By including links to my team’s social media, ICL’s website and relevant external sources (e.g. SLC website).
Because young people prefer digital content and personal research would help to further their learning.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
ACTIONS: how did you…
Ensure comms had a clear purpose?
By meeting with my manager beforehand to discuss the objective and which info was relevant to furthering it.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
ACTIONS: how did you…
Check understanding?
By leaving time for questions at the end
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
ACTIONS: how did you…
Show enthusiasm?
By emphasising that ICL has the most generous UG funding package of any UK university throughout
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
What was the situation?
In a previous role, I worked in the Student Financial Support Team at Imperial College London.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
What was the task?
At Open Days, I gave presentations about student finance to prospective students and their parents to convince them to choose ICL over other universities.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: presenting at ICL
What was the result?
Refer to the outcome and impact.
Outcome: I successfully presented complex material to mixed ability, non-specialist audiences of up to 100 people.
Impact: I persuaded 100s of new UGs to come to ICL:
- Benefitted their education
- Secured fresh talent/funding for the College
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
What was the situation?
I recently completed a ‘Python Programming for Data Science’ course during lockdown.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
What was the task?
For the final team project, we had to write a machine learning algorithm for cancer detection and pitch it to a client.
The client was mixed business and technical personnel - needed to address diverse interests/expertise.
We had to persuade them to choose our product over competitors.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
ACTIONS: how did you…
Communicate in an honest manner?
By being upfront about the limitations of the model, but framing it as a positive; we had a clear vision of how to improve it, and with their investment would be able to make the necessary changes.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
ACTIONS: how did you…
Maximise understanding and impact?
By displaying both a PowerPoint with bullet points (business people) and a Jupyter notebook with code (data scientists).
This targeted both groups simultaneously without using alienating jargon.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
ACTIONS: how did you…
Ensure communications had a clear purpose?
By discussing the brief with my team and making a list of everything we needed to include prior to commencement.
Ensured we covered all points.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
ACTIONS: how did you…
Take into account the client’s needs?
By creating a PowerPoint with bullet points for the business people and displaying our Jupyter notebook with code for the data scientists.
Took into account their diverse needs and expertise simultaneously.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
ACTIONS: how did you…
Check understanding?
By leaving time for questions at the end.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
ACTIONS: how did you…
Show enthusiasm?
By highlighting our USP throughout: we were the only group to try ensemble learning, making our model more robust than some of our competitors’.
Our model was more likely to reduce the financial and human costs (hospital beds/staff) of cancer treatment (patient trauma/mortality).
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Python presentation
What was the result?
Refer to the outcome, impact and any improvements.
Outcome: we came second in the competition
Impact: the client gave us good feedback because they liked that we had used mixed media to explain ourselves
Improve: in-person would have been better as a large proportion of communication is non-verbal e.g. eye contact can be persuasive
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
What was the situation?
In a previous role, I worked in the Student Financial Support Team at Imperial College London.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
What was the task?
I managed the Student Support Fund, an emergency fund for struggling students.
A student applied who had a serious health condition and dangerous living arrangement. However, she already owed the College money and was considered a risky investment.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTIONS: how did you…
Communicate in a straightforward manner to your colleagues?
By using simple language and bullet points to get straight to the point:
SITUATION
COSTS
BENEFITS
My RECCOMMENDATION
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTIONS: how did you…
Maximise understanding and impact?
With both Rosie and my colleagues
Met in person:
- Large proportion of comms is non-verbal
- Could better understand their feelings/attitudes
- Could better express mine (body language, tone etc.)
- Could answer any questions they had
Followed up with an email to clearly summarise the take-home points in simple bullet points
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTIONS: how did you…
Ensure comms had a clear purpose?
With emails, put a clear subject line and marked the message as high importance
In person, organised meetings purely to discuss the situation and nothing else
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTIONS: how did you…
Check understanding?
By leaving time for them to ask questions in meetings
By asking them questions as well, e.g. ‘what do you think will happen if we don’t assist?’
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTIONS: how did you…
Show enthusiasm?
By stressing that the benefit of helping her far outweighed the financial cost to the College.
By reminding my colleagues we had a shared duty of care for the student.
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTIONS: how did you…
Use different communications methods? Give 3.
Emailed the doc to get a written confirmation, could add to my body of evidence
Called distant colleagues for their convenience
Met with key colleagues as was fastest, could show body of evidence and capitalise on existing rapport between us/use non-verbal communication
Behaviour: Communicating and Influencing
Example: Rosie Foster
What was the result? Refer to the outcome, impact and any improvements.
Outcome: I communicated the severity of the issues, my colleagues cooperated and we secured her an emergency room/funding.
Impact: she finished her degree, but more importantly she was safe.
Improvements: none - if I hadn’t acted as I did, the situation would have deteriorated.
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
What was the situation?
In a previous role, I worked in the Student Financial Support Team at Imperial College London.
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
What was the task?
I managed the Student Support Fund, an emergency fund for struggling students.
A student applied who had a serious health condition and dangerous living arrangement. However, she already owed the College money and was considered a risky investment.
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTION: how did you…
Understand your own level of responsibility?
As I was the lead administrator, I took the initiative to gather further evidence
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTION: how did you…
Use a range of credible information to support decision making?
By seeking information from internal (colleagues who knew her well, e.g. academic tutor, campus doctor, Welfare team) and external sources (e.g. GOV.UK website for info on PIP)
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTION: how did you…
Involve others in the decision making?
By showing the growing body of evidence to my teammate and asking for his perspective
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTION: how did you…
Display confidence when making an unpopular decision?
By showing my colleagues the evidence I had accumulated
By explaining that the benefit of helping her far outweighed the financial cost to the College as her safety was at risk
By reminding my colleagues we had a shared duty of care for the student
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTION: how did you…
Consult with others to ensure the potential impacts on end users had been considered?
By meeting with the Disability Service and Welfare team to discuss how the outcome of my decision would affect her health conditions.
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
ACTION: how did you…
Present recommendations in a timely manner?
By adhering to the 10-day turnaround time
By showing my colleagues the body of evidence I had accumulated and outlining the costs, benefits and risks in person
In person: was able to better communicate the severity of the situation
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Rosie Foster
What was the result? Refer to outcome, impact and improvements.
Outcome: after doing a cost-benefit analysis of all available evidence, I chose to provide a grant and secure emergency accommodation for the student.
Impact: had I made my decision without investigating further, her precarious situation would have deteriorated with devastating consequences.
Improvements: none - if I hadn’t acted as I did, the situation would have deteriorated.
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Python project
What was the situation?
I recently completed a ‘Python Programming for Data Science’ course during lockdown.
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Python project
What was the task?
To write a machine learning algorithm for cancer detection that would improve the health service.
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Python project
ACTION: how did you…
Analyse and use a range of relevant, credible information sources?
Why did you do this?
By seeking information from -
Internal sources:
Course materials
Advice from our mentor
External sources:
Academic papers
Blogs
YT videos
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Python project
ACTION: why did you…
Analyse and use a range of relevant, credible information sources?
Because my teammates wanted to use PCA
I did research and found this reduces the descriptive power of the model.
This would mean we would lose key insight into the disease pathology.
I recommended we use a correlation matrix instead
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Python project
ACTION: how did you…
Invite challenge and involve others in decision-making?
By organising regular Zoom meetings to discuss progress so everyone could share their ideas
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Python project
ACTION: how did you…
Display confidence in making an unpopular decision?
By showing my teammates the body of evidence I had found against using PCA/for correlation matrices
By stressing that making these changes would improve our model and benefit the end users
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Python project
ACTION: how did you…
Consult others to ensure the potential impacts on end users had been considered?
By discussing the model’s intended applications in our initial team meeting and working backwards - who was going to be using it? What did they need?
Behaviour: Making Effective Decisions
Example: Python project
ACTION: how did you…
Present strong recommendations in a timely manner?
By adhering to the 2-week project deadline and presenting our model in the final competition
We justified what we did by referring to the costs and benefits of each technique and why we had chosen it