Microsoft Flashcards
Why you?
There are some compelling advantages for Microsoft in hiring me.
- Seamless Transition (Training/Consultation experience, Existing Network of Contacts, GM SME)
- Known quantity vs external applicants - track record of high volume caseload and balancing ad hoc projects.
- Skillset is broad - particular talent for problem solving, analysis, organizing information.
Tell me about a time you had to deal with a difficult client.
Microsoft is not a difficult client, but it is a large operation where communication and change management can be a challenge.
CIE (Change in Employment Letters) example of how challenging change management can be, and how we can end up in a reactive situation where training needs to be delivered retroactively.
Describe your system for keeping track of multiple projects. How do you stay focused?
OneNote - Build section for ongoing projects. Keep all relevant details in one place (e.g. email action items that are not yet resolved, rather than in Outlook).
Stay focused by setting realistic goals, blocking out time for specific tasks, delegating when necessary.
Most difficult experiences
- Background Check Fail - found out from van line, had to call up and verify the news. Avoided making any definitive statements, wished him good luck.
- Relocating Employee who Passed Away - Provided support to move family back.
- Jade - new hire who was missing a core skill that was integral to the job. It was an exercise in patience, but also exposed the gap of access to information (i.e. integration of OneNote). Documentation of continued issues for management, culminated in her termination.
How did you turn a problem into a success?
- Surveys - under goal initial two years, now a success and a probability model that we can use to understand where we are at any given moment
- No single view of relocation available - created more detailed spreadsheet
Talk about a project of yours.
Capacity Utilization Project.
What recent news have you heard about Microsoft?
Windows 11SE - new line of laptops at a lower price point aimed at students K-8.
Tell me about a time when you had to persuade senior management or a direct manager for a project?
Start Date Analysis
Situation: In my first year in the Glomocoe role, there were strategical decisions being made based on the start dates submitted in the relocation authorizations.
Task: I suspected that we were putting too much faith into the information provided, so I did a comparison of original start date vs actual start date to demonstrate the issue.
Solution: Through the data, I showed submitted start dates were off by at least 28% for most policies and as much as 60% for US Inbound relocations. With this information, our management was able shift strategically to place less weight on the initial dates provided. This data was later presented in partnership with HRS and led to better understanding of their submission process and limitations.
Talk about a situation where you provided some type of data or fact to steer the project how you wanted versus how they told you to.
Current survey results. Our corporate measures are too focused on looking backwards and our leadership team did not see that we are struggling in a significant way leading to the end of the year.
The issue is a disproportionate amount of surveys have gone out in the past three months, representing more than half the total sample, and we are getting a substandard return that could potentially sink our overall return rate.
I’ve recommend several recovery efforts to try and get ahead of this, and we also identified a potential defect that was raised this week.
What type of role would you take on in a group project if you had a choice and why?
Business Analyst - While I don’t mind managing projects, I like to dig in to concepts and data, analyze, and provide feedback/suggestions.
3 Leadership Principles at MSFT
- Create Clarity
- Generate Energy
- Deliver Success
Tell me about when you came up with a new approach to a problem.
Consultant Dashboard
Situation: No single view of caseload.
Task: Develop an organizational method.
Action: Build an excel dashboard
Result: Adopting by entire team, used by all consultants.
What did you do when you needed to motivate a group of individuals?
Surveys
Situation: Consultants already had financial motive, but we wanted to achieve better overall results.
Action: Decided to motivate them be creating a strong support structure. (1) Targeted misfires proactively; (2) Adjusted the system reminders; (3) Began monthly outreach to recover non-responders.
Result: Achieved 47.5% (2019) and 44.25% (2020), record number of consultants received the bonus.
What is the best invention or idea you had in the past two years?
SendBack Benchmarks?
Situation: GM has no hard data on defect %.
Action: Requested data from BE Team, combined with the authorization received data, completed analysis.
Result: Ongoing - initial findings shared with HR Managers, future strategy is to use these benchmarks as an opportunity to identify defect patterns and set team targets/goals.
Tell me about a time when you missed an obvious solution to a problem.
Quarterly Feedback Report
Situation: I have a quarterly report that is really time consuming and painful to complete, because it includes around 100 survey comments from employees and I have to manually look up each file to determine the policy type.
Action: I’ve been compiling this report for a year or so, but since it comes up quarterly I keep forgetting about this extra work that is required.
Result: The fix is really easy, and is something I should have thought of during the design phase, but one simple email to our reporting contact was all it took to add the data point going forward, and save me future work hours. This case reminds me to not hesitate to ask - others are happy to help and I had a very quick response and resolution.
Tell me about a time when you were not able to meet a time commitment. What prevented you from meeting it? What was the outcome and what did you learn from it?
Automated Start Date Project
Situation: Our accounting team has complications related to inaccurate start dates in Cartus system. It creates additional manual work for the team as they approach each billing cycle. We partnered on a project to us MSFT start date data to automate updates and fix the issue.
What Prevented Me: I gave other projects priority, had an extended vacation, and it fell off my radar entirely.
Outcome: Accounting struggled with the issue for at least 4 additional months, and had to expend time in raising the issue again to revive the project.
Learned: 1. Even when a project is lower priority, have a specific plan to keep it moving forward. Use calendar reminders, schedule syncs. 2. I underestimated the complexity of the design work, which caused further delay and we are only now nearly ready to roll out the new process.
Describe a long term project that you managed. How did you keep everything moving along in a timely manner?
Capacity Utilization Project
Situation: Project currently entering the final development phase - around five months total to date.a
Task: To support our VP by designing a measure for overall team capacity across directors.
Challenges: This was a challenging project because it required feedback and participation from five different Directors in our org. We needed to keep the approach as simple as possible, but also to respect client variation and nuance.
Strategy: The project strategy was for me to lead the design and development, keeping our VP informed along the way. At significant decision points we scheduled group meetings to revisit the project and find consensus on strategic decisions.
Examples: (1) Overall Concept (measure active work, forecast, maximum capacity); (2) Accounting for Client Nuance - agreed to hold for now; (3) How to Measure Work - Move Type vs Policy Type, complications with Finance model, meeting pending.
Tell me about a time you had a conflict at work
Conflict with QC over Insurance Claim
Situation: Employee had an insurance claim with the van line that should have gone to UNIRISC. It was very unusual because the van line took it past the point of no return and was now in a standoff with the employee over several thousand in damaged items and damage that had occured at destination, due to storing a container with leaking liquid inside a cabinet.
Task: I engaged with our Quality Control team to determine why the two parties could not compromise.
Action: I reviewed the lengthy thread, identified discrepancies between the VL offer and what they stated in the thread, and listed the open items for QC to review. On the EE side, I had a direct conversation about which items mattered most.
Resolution: QC became personally frustrated with me, as they were under pressure to close out the claim and did not want to engage any further. I had to push on multiple items, but ultimately brokered a compromise by highlighting which items were important to the EE and which ones he was willing to let go.
Tell me about a time when you worked with a difficult team member
Julie Situation: We have a team member in a different department who has been a challenging partner on multiple occasions.
Example: The pattern of behavior with this colleague is that we would have an email exchange where I would pose a question, and would not get direct or structured answers. In lieu of addressing the specific scenario, the colleague would often take the approach of exploring all the possible paths that similar scenarios might take. At one point, they made an observation about my performance that I both didn’t agree with and thought was premature (e.g. that I struggle with seeing the big picture).
Outcome: In the end, we were both great at our jobs, but we had very different communication styles, something I’ve seen covered in DISC trainings. I’ve adjusted my approach to begin with a direct, simple email and then pivot to a scheduled call.
Tell me about a time you failed and what you learned from it.
Peter
Situation: Assigned as supervisor for a colleague in a similar role, to gain leadership experience and insight into managing others.
Task: Goal was to support him in daily operations but also to provide some mentorship and growth opportunities.
Action: Set up weekly 1:1’s, gave growth assignments, delegated several small tasks/projects.
Result: The experience to date feels like a failure because my colleague has struggled with the data tasks I’ve assigned, lots of clear mistakes and missteps, and I haven’t been able to dedicate the time to give him attention and resources to improve. I’ve also been less willing to delegate to him, fearing errors.
From the experience, I’ve learned that it takes a significant time commitment to teach and mentor others. To really help my colleague grow, I need to dedicate blocks of time to planning educational sessions, sharing videos, giving assignments, and most importantly, holding him accountable. When I do give deadlines, they are nearly always missed, and it is definitely up to me to find a constructive way to change behavior.
Everyone starts somewhere. Talk about a time when you were new on the job and had a lot to learn. How did you manage then?
Global Mobility at Cartus, 5.5 years ago:
I was completely new to the industry, had limited customer service experience, but I attacked the new job the way I jump into most things in life. I organized.
The situation was that all the team guidance was packed as physical media into a huge binder. We had our Cartus systems, each relocation had a file, and we had a recommended script to familiarize ourselves with.
My strategy to deal to make this work for me was to (1) break the script down to bullets and re-arrange into a flow that felt natural to me; (2) Jump in to the work and take on customers. I realized immediately I needed a spreadsheet where I could track key actions. Within several months I’d expanded to include key dates for packing/travel/housing/etc. I ended up with a core tool to see exactly what was going on with my caseload; (3) Build cheat sheets for quick reference, note my learnings in OneNote; (4) Write down my questions/blockers each day and have a short Q&A with my manager that was more efficient for both of us.
Tell me about a time when you took the lead on a difficult project.
Capacity Utilization Project
Situation: Project currently entering the final development phase - around five months total to date.
Task: To support our VP by designing a measure for overall team capacity across directors.
Challenges: This was a challenging project because it required feedback and participation from five different Directors in our org. We needed to keep the approach as simple as possible, but also to respect client variation and nuance.
Strategy: The project strategy was for me to lead the design and development, keeping our VP informed along the way. At significant decision points we scheduled group meetings to revisit the project and find consensus on strategic decisions.
Examples: (1) Overall Concept (measure active work, forecast, maximum capacity); (2) Accounting for Client Nuance - agreed to hold for now; (3) How to Measure Work - Move Type vs Policy Type, complications with Finance model, meeting pending.
Describe a time when you found it difficult to work with someone from a different background.
At Cartus I worked with another employee who had come from a strict religious household in a country where their religion was persecuted. We partnered on some common tasks, and I struggled to communicate with her at times because she could become argumentative and defensive, particularly when questioned about her processes - I believe this could be related to PTSD and past trauma from her family’s experiences. I scheduled a 1:1 with her to share more about my role and goals, and to emphasize that I wasn’t trying to take anything away from her or change her way of doing things. This allowed us to reset, and from that point she was more open in sharing information, and we were able to make informed and mutual decisions to adjust processes and be more efficient.
Tell me about a time you recovered from a difficult situation.
Controller encounter
Situation: Glomocoe had an inquiry about relocation options for a US Inbound employee, and I missed that the person inquiring was a business administrator rather than GTA.
Task: They asked about cost for full relo vs lump sum, and I shared the cost for each. The team had limited budget and asked about flexibility, guidance was the only option would be lump sum and they could go as low as half the recommended amount without any additional approvals. The Manager misinterpreted this to mean they could also get half a supported relo package at half cost.
Action: I clarified in the chat, the manager was aggressive in feeling misinformed, we scheduled a chat. The thread clearly stated that the flexibility only applied to the lump sum, but they still resisted, so I had to draw a line and offer to pull up the email and read through it together. Otherwise I would need to loop in Global Mobility to review and comment further. They finally relented.
Solution: The employee ended up getting a reduced lump sum, as recommended. But it wasn’t easy.
