interview writings (Questions and answers) no topic any of your mind 10 (Q and A)
Answers
Explanation:
1. How do you prioritize projects?
Unless you’re writing your novel full-time, every writer needs to know how to balance multiple projects. Your answer should reflect your organizational and time management skills, your ability to meet deadlines, and your ability to manage stress. Clearly state how you keep track of your various tasks (and their respective deadlines) and how you separate the less-important projects from the urgent ones. It can be helpful to tie your response to a specific work experience. Bonus points for mentioning that you re-assess priorities and needs on the regular!
“I use Asana to track project deadlines, and I work through multiple projects accordingly. It sends me a reminder every morning with all the projects due that week, so I immediately know if I’m falling behind—but I still have plenty of time to reprioritize and get back on track. I create a separate project folder for larger tasks, breaking them into more manageable pieces so that I can track my progress. If I have two urgent tasks at once, I’m a firm believer in transparent communication—I’ll go to my manager to see which is more important.”
2. Do you prefer to work independently or with others?
Every job requires you to play well with others, but as a writer, you’ll be spending a lot of time working solo, followed by a lot of time partnering with other writers, editors, designers, and stakeholders. Your interviewer wants to ensure that you’re focused but versatile, so the best response should incorporate what you enjoy about each style of working:
“As a writer, I spend a lot of time in my head, so I love working independently. I can control the timeline, I can focus, and I can be sure the work is done well. But I also love working in groups because many brains are better than one. We can bounce ideas off each other, creating even better ideas.”
3. Where do you see yourself in five years?
This classic interview question is your interviewer’s way of ensuring you’re there for the right reasons—and for the long haul. Make it known that you have no compunctions and emphasize what drew you to writing and to this specific company. You don’t have to have a detailed five-year plan, but ensure your career goals follow a natural progression from this internship to more senior roles in the industry. A solid response might look like this:
“With this internship’s professional development opportunities, I’m hoping to get a role as a copy editor post-graduation. From there, I’d like to take on more senior roles, working my way up to a position in which I can mentor and manage other writers, such as managing editor or creative director at an agency.”
4. How do you incorporate feedback into your work?
Put another way, this question is asking how you handle criticism. Not everyone can write, but everyone has an opinion. In your career as a writer, you’ll have to learn how to handle constructive, as well as less constructive, feedback. In answering this question, emphasize that you understand that revision is a necessary part of the writing process. Your interviewer wants to know that you are flexible and open to edits—and that you won’t be offended by significant rewrites.
“No one knows everything, and I welcome the opportunity to learn from others and improve my writing. I’m a firm believer in always having a second—or a third—set of eyes on a piece of work before it goes out into the world. While I’ll stand by content choices that I believe in, I’m very receptive to feedback. In fact, I always have a peer copy edit my essays before I turn them in.”