This post provides valuable tips you can use to effectively prepare for the Amazon bar raiser interview, including practice questions and answers to help you come out successful at the interview.
It also provides good sample questions you can ask the interviewer after the bar raiser interview session.
Please, read on:
What is Bar Raiser?
The bar raiser plays a great role in determining whether a candidate is hired or not in an Amazon interview.
This individual is a neutral third party in the hiring process, whose job is to ensure that the hiring team is duly focused on hiring candidates that will raise the bar in the organization.
Amazon places great value on hiring the right people, this is why the bar raiser is important in the interview process.
20 Best Amazon Bar Raiser Interview Tips
Here are tips to help you with your bar raiser interview:
- You wouldn’t get an introduction
No one is going to say to you, “Hi, am the bar raiser”. They don’t wear badges or have a certain physical appearance.
You may not be able to immediately tell who the bar raiser is in your in-person interview but you might be able to guess who it is because they may not exactly fit into the “team”.
They are focused on behavioral and leadership questions whilst other interviewers may be focused on the functional parts of your role.
- Spot the bar raiser
Ensure that you spot who the bar raiser is during your interview, so you can impress them.
They usually make an appearance during the loop. It is often obvious that they are not from the team conducting your interview.
- You don’t get asked technical questions
The bar raiser is not focused on your technical expertise. They focus on knowing your leadership principles and how you can apply them to your role.
- Focus on the follow-up questions
Every question is important but the bar raiser throws a follow-up question to you in a way that allows your answer to show your natural abilities and propensities.
- Know the leadership principles
The leadership principle is overly important to the people of Amazon.
Candidates are evaluated with these principles. Know and practice them.
- Have evidence
Knowing the leadership principles is one thing, applying them in your current job and having evidence to show is another.
The bar raiser wants to see how you apply and display these leadership principles.
Have real examples and be ready to share.
- Prepare to answer behavioral questions
Amazon believes that how a candidate has behaved in the past is a strong determinant of what they would do in the future.
Their hire is usually based on who you are now rather than your potential.
Come prepared to share what you have done in your current job or previous job that would prove useful in the role.
- Try to understand the question before giving an answer
Listen attentively to the questions asked and ensure you understand, before providing a corresponding answer.
- Ask for clarity
If you don’t understand the questions asked don’t be afraid to say so. Ask for clarity.
- Don’t be evasive
The bar raiser is skilled at interviews and wants to know how well you would fit into Amazon and raise the bar, therefore you have to be conscious of the fact that every question asked is for a reason.
Don’t dodge questions or be evasive.
- Always connect your answers to the customer
Amazon thrives on amazing customer service. Ensure that whenever you answer behavioral or leadership questions, you always come back to how it benefits the customer and how it solves a particular problem.
- Use the STAR method
Familiarize yourself with the STAR method and use it to answer questions.
- Give structured responses
Let your answers be well structured. Let them be logical and show your reasoning.
- Give details
Your answers must be detailed. Note that you don’t just jump into giving details. Create a foundation with your answers that leads up to the detail, so that it is easy for the bar raiser to follow.
Your answers should be straightforward.
- Check-in with the interviewer
This is necessary, to prevent you from rambling on and losing the interviewer in the process.
Pause during your speech to be sure the interviewer is following. When In doubt ask the interviewer whether they are following.
- You can summarize
After answering a question, especially one with great detail, you can end your response with a summary of what you have said, highlighting key points.
- Don’t lie
It is good to want to impress the interviewer but lying to do so may not end well, especially when you’re caught in the lie.
If you don’t have a certain experience the interviewer asks about let them know.
- Use numbers
When sharing an experience or giving details, use numbers. Let your numbers back up your claims.
- Be prepared
Research before going to an Amazon interview. Research helps you prepare.
- Be confident
It is easy to not properly answer something you know because you lack confidence.
Work up your confidence.
20 Top Amazon Bar Raiser Interview Practice Questions and Answers
Here are our top 20 questions to help you prepare for your bar raiser interview with Amazon with sample answers:
- Tell us about a time when you struggled to communicate something to your customer. How did you finally get it out?
“This is my job employment, so I have never experienced a comparable circumstance in work.
Be that as it may, I comprehend it is significant to get the message over.
Customers need to comprehend why we do what we do, why we propose something or make certain moves.
Also, the equivalent is valid about different partners in the organization.
I intend to utilize examinations and show while conversing with them, or useful models, to guarantee they would comprehend my message.
To customize the message is the key, and I will consistently change my language to the information and insight of my crowd.
I’m patient in correspondence, and I trust I can deal with this part of the work.”
- Have you experience pressure at work? Describe such situation
“For me, the truth is that I usually perform better when under pressure. I confronted numerous cutoff times in my last job in statistical surveying.
They assisted me with keeping on track, coordinating my day appropriately, and figuring out how to focus on my work, guaranteeing that I’d fulfil the time constraints.
The key is to not allow the strain to triumph over you, and I accept to have this capacity.
Furthermore, you need to acknowledge that occasionally you will not fulfil the time constraint, since you don’t have everything levelled out.
For instance, when you need a report from another representative and they don’t send it to you on schedule you can’t do much about it.
You can send them an update or call them, however, ultimately you need to pause. “
- Describe a time when you showed initiative
“I’m someone who believes in being proactive in dealing with work issues. For instance, in my last job in marketing, I thought that it was weird that we didn’t have a current information base of leads accessible.
The variance was extremely high in the outreach group, however, whoever left the organization took their leads with them, and new salesmen lost a great deal of time doing their exploration web-based, searching for leads.
I recommended that every salesperson ought to enter their prompts for the interior data set, along with any data they have about the possibilities.
However long they stay with the organization, this is their private resource and no one else can see the data set.
Yet, when they leave, their boss ought to get an entrance, and can offer it to new salesmen, to help them launch the deals.
My bosses didn’t care for the thought—and I don’t know why. In any case, I stepped up and tested how they got things done in the organization. However, I was another individual from the group.”
- Have you experienced achieving a goal? Describe the situation and tell us what you did to reach the goal
“Some time ago, working on a customer’s site, my goal was to make a significant improvement on its change rate.
I truly preferred their item and trusted in the worth it brought to the clients. Doing a great deal of split testing, changing greeting pages, and streamlining publicizing efforts, we figured out how to expand their return on initial capital investment by 100%.
The customer was cheerful, my supervisor was glad—the customer delayed the agreement with us, and I was additionally cheerful, with a great job I had done.
This was an aftereffect of a great deal of testing, and of being fearless, and attempting new things. Since the customer considered their unique change rate adequate when contrasting it with industry normal.
Yet, I needed to try it out, I figured it very well may be improved altogether, and that is by and large what I at last accomplished.”
- Have you coached someone before? Tell me about it
“In my previous job, I had the responsibilities to guide new salespeople on their assignments. I generally attempted to be pleasant to them, and clarify everything in detail.
Not just how the work functions, and the cycles we have set up, yet additionally where is the container, what is the busy time, where they can look for help if they deal with either issue, etc.
I generally asked them to follow up inquiries, to guarantee that they comprehended my guidelines effectively.
As I would like to think, it’s never simple to begin in a new position, when you don’t know anybody in the organization.
It’s extraordinary to feel that a partner is keen on showing you around, maybe likewise acquainting you with certain different associates, and clarifying you the essentials of the work, some regular difficulties and traps.
You can likewise support the individual, and that is the thing that I generally attempted to do.”
- Tell us about a crisis of motivation you faced. How did you overcome it?
“I worked as a clerk during my studies and it was terribly boring. Even though I some of the time discovered my day exhausting, I don’t imagine that the clients saw that.
I realized what was normal for me, and I comprehended why I woke up each day to labor for a couple of hours before I went to class.
I required cash to pay my school costs. Most positions are dreary, however, I accept that individuals who have a few objectives don’t battle with their inspiration.
In any event that is my experience.”
- How do you imagine a typical day at work?
“I picture having a lot to do daily. Working with existing representatives and taking an interest in direction with new ones, clarifying the principle arrangements and guidelines and guaranteeing that they get them, will be only one of my center obligations as a consistent staff.”
- Tell us about a time when you missed a deadline or productivity target?
“In my last job in sales, I once missed the profitability target awfully, arriving at only half of the ideal deals volume for the given month.
It was an extreme period for me. I battled a piece with inspiration and encountered some disarray in my own life.
What’s more, however, I didn’t understand it for quite a while; possibilities could feel it in my manner of speaking, in my words on the call.
I didn’t have my typical energy, the excitement for the item has disappeared, and my drive wasn’t there any longer.
Therefore, although I made the very number of calls that month, and followed the demonstrated sales procedures, I missed my objectives frightfully.
I assumed liability for the outcomes; didn’t get any rewards that month, and I likewise scholarly a significant exercise.
It is critical to isolate our work and our own life, and on the off chance that you’re not intellectually prepared to make a deal, you will not make it.
Since clients see substantially more than simply your words on the call”
- What would you do if you found out your closest friend at work was stealing?
“Though this is a difficult situation to be in, I however dislike dishonesty. Also, theft is against the company’s policy, regardless of how immaterial the theft may appear.
I would go to my manager and report the theft or utilize the organization’s suggested revealing strategy for such conduct. “
- Describe your most difficult customer and how you handled it
“I once dealt with a situation where a loyal customer was unhappy because an item he ordered was deferred.
It was booked to show up within five days of him requesting it, yet because of overabundance issues with the provider, the conveyance time was acclimated to be 20 days out.
The thing was a commemoration present for his significant other, and the commemoration was under about fourteen days away.
The 20 days would not work for him, and he was near furious about the circumstance.
I expected to sort out an approach to assist him with accepting the commemoration blessing on schedule.
I previously reached the provider to check whether there was any approach to facilitate the request, however, everything they could manage was to get the thing to two or three days sooner than the reexamined booked appearance date.
In this way, I at that point worked with the client to distinguish an alternate provider that sold a practically indistinguishable thing.
I offered him speed up transportation at no charge, so he would get the thing inside three days, and that planning worked for his commemoration date.
I likewise offered him a 15 per cent coupon towards his next buy.
He was satisfied with the result, and he stayed a dedicated client.”
Here are other questions you can prepare for:
- Have you had a time when you left a task undone? Describe the situation.
- Has there been a time you gave a simple solution to a complex problem? Give an example and describe the circumstance.
- Talk about a time when you influenced to change by asking the right question.
- Tell a story of a time you were in the wrong.
- How do you prioritize your customers’ needs?
- What do you think about taking risk? Share with us a time you took a calculated risk if any.
- Share with me something you learnt recently in a role.
- Talk about a time when you were given limited resources to complete a job.
- Talk about the most challenging situation you have faced in your life. How did you handle it?
- Describe an unpopular decision of yours.
10 Good Questions you can ask the Interviewer in an Amazon Bar Raiser Interview
It is always a good idea to ask the interviewer questions. Here are some good questions to ask your interviewer at the end of a bar raiser interview at Amazon:
- What are the metrics for measuring success in this position?
- What are the challenges that would likely surface in this role?
- Can you describe what a typical workday is like?
- What has the turnover in this role been like?
- What are you hoping that the person in this role would achieve in the first few months and the long run?
- Why do you want to work here and what do you like most here?
- Can you give me examples of projects I would be working on if I am hired?
- What are the three most important leadership principles for this role?
- What is the standard career path for someone in this role?
- What is the performance review process like?
Conclusion
It is the job of the bar raiser to keep the Amazon hiring standards and also improve them, and it is your job as a candidate to impress the bar raiser.
You can impress the bar raiser if you’re adequately prepared for the interview; and the information shared on this page helps you to get in top shape for the interview.
>> Learn how to make a great score in Any Amazon Assessment Test; prepare effectively for the test with Practice Tests consisting of detailed explanations of answers.