BEHAVIORAL INTERVIEW STORIES

Theme: Team leadership, Technical coordination, Project management

Situation: Leading a final year navigational robot project, we faced a critical decision: ultrasonic sensors (safe, reliable) vs computer vision (innovative, risky).

Task: Make a data-driven decision with incomplete information while maintaining team consensus and project timeline.

Action: Organized team meeting to list pros/cons, conducted small-scale testing with computer vision, and held anonymous vote after establishing common ground.

Result: Team unanimously chose computer vision. Despite implementation challenges, we delivered one of the most successful projects in the program with improved model performance by nearly 50%.

Theme: Leadership under pressure, Team building, Competition

Situation: Medical hackathon with 4-day deadline to pitch assistive communication app for children with speech barriers to potential investors.

Task: Build team trust, coordinate diverse skills, and deliver competitive solution under extreme time pressure.

Action: Recorded team skills/interests for optimal task assignment, maintained open communication channels, and scheduled regular check-ins with professors/hosts for timeline management.

Result: Achieved 2nd place finish and gained opportunity to present to potential investors, demonstrating effective leadership and team coordination under pressure.

Theme: Resilience, Problem-solving, Adaptability

Situation: During autonomous robot project, deadline was moved up and a key team member became sick, leaving critical tasks unassigned.

Task: Reorganize team structure, reassign responsibilities, and deliver quality work under compressed timeline.

Action: Immediately organized team meeting, re-evaluated timeline, identified critical path tasks, reassigned roles based on strengths, and increased progress review frequency.

Result: Team delivered project on time without sacrificing quality. Received commendations from professors for exceptional leadership and teamwork under pressure.

Theme: Strategic thinking, Risk assessment, Data-driven decisions

Situation: Robotics project required object detection choice: proven ultrasonic sensors vs emerging computer vision with limited implementation data.

Task: Make critical technical decision with incomplete data, balancing innovation potential against project risk and timeline constraints.

Action: Created decision framework: formal pros/cons analysis, small-scale prototype testing, and structured team evaluation to assess feasibility with available data.

Result: Computer vision approach selected through data-driven process, leading to 50% performance improvement and project recognition for technical innovation.

Theme: Product development, User-centric design, Full-stack capabilities

Situation: Identified gap in Australian market: fragmented bin collection info across hundreds of LGAs, with rural areas lacking digital tools.

Task: Develop and launch comprehensive iOS app for national bin collection scheduling, learning Swift programming from scratch.

Action: Conducted market research, designed clean UI with Apple-style icons, implemented dual address input methods, used AI-assisted development ("vibe coding"), and built backend on GCP with OpenSSH.

Result: Successfully launched on Apple App Store with location-aware features, providing unified solution for Australian residents nationwide.

Theme: Self-directed learning, Technical exploration, Initiative

Situation: During a robotics project, I needed to learn Raspberry Pi operating system quickly for autonomous navigation functionality.

Task: Master Raspberry Pi OS and integrate it with our robot's hardware within a tight project deadline.

Action: I gathered comprehensive information from documentation, created a structured learning plan, and practiced hands-on implementation to master the system efficiently.

Result: Successfully integrated Raspberry Pi into our robot, contributing to one of my most successful university projects with commendations for technical leadership.

Theme: Conflict resolution, Communication, Collaboration

Situation: During final year robotics project, team had conflicting views on algorithm direction: traditional vs innovative computer vision approach.

Task: Resolve technical disagreement democratically while maintaining team cohesion and project timeline.

Action: Facilitated structured decision-making process: formal pros/cons analysis, prototype testing, and anonymous voting to establish common ground.

Result: Unanimous team consensus achieved. Project became one of most successful university units, building not just technical success but lasting friendships through collaborative approach.

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