Achievement Orientation
Focusing efforts on achieving high-quality results consistent with the organization’s standards.
Level 1 Meets pre-determined standards
BEHAVIORS
- Describes pre-determined standards.
- Completes work assignments on time.
- Continually compares own work performance against standards.
QUESTIONS
- Describe a time when you reviewed the quality of your work to ensure that it met specified standards.
Probing Questions
* What work did you review?
* What did you determine?
* What process did you follow to rectify any sub-standard work?
- Please describe a time when, despite obstacles, you completed a work assignment on time and efficiently.
Probing Questions
* What was the work assignment?
* How much time did you have to complete the task?
* How did you ensure that you completed the task promptly?
* How did you ensure you met performance standards?
* What obstacles did you encounter?
Level 2 Exceeds standards
BEHAVIORS
- Defines ambitious, but realistic, personal goals and standards.
- Evaluates personal progress against standards.
- Undertakes significant challenges.
- Adjusts actions to meet and exceed expectations.
- Tries new ways to get things done, while taking steps to reduce the risks.
QUESTIONS
- Please talk about a situation that demonstrates your ability and motivation to ensure your performance meets established expectations.
Probing Questions
* How were you aware of what the established expectations were?
* How did your performance measure up to those expectations?
* How did you consistently meet those expectations?
* Do you feel you had a personal commitment to meeting such expectations?
- Please describe a situation when you pursued a challenge willingly and enthusiastically.
Probing Questions
* What was the challenge?
* How did you come to take on this challenge?
* How did you pursue this challenge?
* What was the outcome?
- Please provide an example of a time when you set an ambitious, but realistic, goal for yourself and then tried to reach it.
Probing Questions
* What goal did you set?
* What made the goal ambitious, but realistic?
* How did you go about trying to meet the goal?
* What was the outcome?
Level 3 Helps others meet and exceed standards
BEHAVIORS
- Assists others to improve efficiency.
- Coaches others to follow their own example of excellence.
- Contributes ideas for improvements in work methods and outcomes.
QUESTIONS
- Tell me about a time when you motivated or coached others in an effort to improve efficiency.
Probing Questions
* Describe the situation.
* What did you do to motivate or coach others?
* How were your efforts received?
* What was the outcome?
- One way to help get high-quality results is to serve as a role model for producing such results. Tell us about a time when the example you set in producing results contributed to helping others to meet or exceed the standard of work required.
Probing Questions
* What were you working on?
* How did your work meet the standard?
* How were others aware of your work?
* In what way did the example you set help others to meet the standard?
- Tell me about a time when you contributed ideas that helped to improve the work that was being done.
Probing Questions
* What work was involved?
* What were your ideas?
* How did they improve work methods and outcome?
* How did others receive your ideas?
Level 4 Improves organizational performance
BEHAVIORS
- Sets highly challenging, but attainable, goals for own organizational area.
- Assesses group performance against goals to identify areas for improvement.
- Improves inefficient/ineffective work processes.
- Uses positive motivational approaches, tailored to diverse individuals and groups, to help staff improve performance and maximize results achieved.
- Encourages responsible risk-taking to achieve high-quality results.
QUESTIONS
- The capacity to inspire a desire to succeed among team members is an important aspect of this work. How in the past have you achieved this goal?
Probing Questions
* Describe a specific situation.
* What approach did you employ to get team members to commit to success?
* What behaviors did you look for in order to determine whether your team had a strong desire to succeed?
* Has this approach been successful for you? Why?
- Could you describe a time where you made improvements to inefficient/ineffective work processes?
Probing Questions
* What were the inefficient/ineffective work processes?
* What steps did you take to analyze the inefficient/ineffective work processes?
* What improvements did you make to inefficient/ineffective work processes?
* How did your improvement affect overall work processes?
Level 5 Sets performance standards
BEHAVIORS
- Facilitates the development and implementation of objective criteria to measure and improve critical organizational processes and outputs.
- Builds a culture that encourages ideas for improving outcomes and containing costs.
- Clarifies the boundaries of acceptable risk, congruent with achieving high-quality results.
QUESTIONS
- Describe a critical organizational process or output/product and talk about how you developed and used criteria to measure it and improve it.
Probing Questions
* What was the process or output/product?
* What criteria did you use to measure its performance?
* How did you develop these criteria?
* Were your measures effective and did they contribute to improvements?
- Could you tell us about a time where you established clear boundaries of acceptable risk, congruent with achieving high-quality results?
Probing Questions
* Describe the boundaries you established?
* What steps did you take to develop clear boundaries?
* How did this help achieve high-quality results?