[2023] Pass the Shell Interview | Shell Video Interview

let's talk about how to pass the video interview for Shell what's up guys it's Mike from job read English here with another video to help you get hired today we're going to be talking about the oil and gas giant

shell popularity of this video in 2022 and 2023 really shocked me I must admit we don't really cover a lot of oil and gas companies uh we covered shell we

covered BP and of course you'd have other massive companies like Exxon or Co but it's not really in our wheelhouse having said that sh has consistently been one of our most popular videos

around the world so we thought it was time for an upgrade and of course we always want to deliver content that you want as our audience So today we're going to be talking about the first

round video interview process for Shell I'm going to start off by telling you five fast facts about shell then I'm going to talk to you about the process that you can expect as a graduate to go through for first round video interview

and then we're going to cover of the most common questions that came up based upon our research and how to think about answering these questions in a no BS and

direct way so let's get started here are five fast facts about shell fact number one shell is investing 10 to5 billion in

low carbon utilization Solutions fact number two shell has built the UK's first electric vehicle only charging Hub

based in Fulham in London and it currently has a utilization rate of 44% fact number three shell Is On Target

to be carbon neutral by 2050 going through a fre stage process fact number

four shell operates in 99 countries has 44,000 petrol stations and produces

3.7 million barrels of oil per day and finally fact number five shell breaks even when crude oil is priced at $30 a

barrel and anything above that sh is in profit so let's talk about the format of the video interview that you can expect and there were a couple of interesting

things about this this is a new process sometimes when I make Pary interview videos the companies most of the time won't really change um the reason being is companies have to spend a lot of

money investing into uh a new technology a new process and then rolling this out across you know lots of different countes so

most companies will change their process at best every 2 to 3 years uh that's a little tip if you're kind of wondering well is it the same as last year the

answer is probably of course we've being quite General across the time top 100 graduate companies now shell has changed their process in what they call the

virtual job triy out which is split into three parts and we're going to call this the first part the second part the first part has two discrete sections which is

a personality test and ranking sjt questions I highly recommend that you use job test prep and we're going to put links to Shell's online tests which you

can practice through job test prep down in the description below the second part is an OnDemand video interview where you can expect as was self-reported free

questions but I would prepare for more now the really cool thing about Shell's process for 2023 and probably for 2024 see as have just changed it is that you

can re-record your answers as many times as possible would this count against you is this something that they'll measure and analyze we don't know but what I would say is you really want to go in

and be prepared rather than go in see the question and then spend an hour trying to prepare and re-record it again I think that is something that would be measured in terms of how much time it

took you to complete the whole test and that is an assumption based upon previous experience let's go through the six most common questions that you can

expect to find in the Shell video interview question number one tell me about a time when you had a different opinion to somebody else now a lot of candidates reported that the breakdown

of questions was like two competency questions and one motivation question something to always bear in mind is that processes can change you could get more

questions it does differentiate between roles very often a lot of the comments that I don't post and I don't respond to are people saying yeah but what about a

software engineer in Botswana I don't know I'm trying to make a general video for a multinational company to help as many people as possible but you're probably going to need to do a little

bit of homework yourself in order for you to be successful seeing as it is your job that you're applying to it's not my job right so with this question

and behavioral questions in general you want to think about the hierarchy of experience and I explain this you know much better in the courses contained in our shell past the interview pack which

is in the description down below the hierarchy of experience goes work extracurricular activities and volunteering

academic personal why because you're applying for a job so the most applicable experience is work experience then the most applicable experience is

experience outside of studies and personal life you may not have gotten paid for it but also it's not something that you have to do to get your degree for example then it's academics then

personal now pretty much everybody watching this video will have some form of academic experience so you can use that and you would only use personal experience if

you had no academic experience so what about a time when you had a different opinion to somebody else when using star to answer these types of questions

situation task action result you want to think that the majority of your answers should be in the action so let's talk about having a difference of opinion well there's nothing wrong it's just a different way of doing something so you

have a project a task something that needs to get done and you have somebody who has a difference of opinion so what do you do next um well first of all it's not about winning it's about being

successful at the matter of hand so you would try and understand their point of view where they're coming from what is the basis for the difference of opinion is it personal is it professional is it

based on data is it just anex anecdotal are you just based upon a story or their own experience and also if you're trying to get somebody to come around to your opinion or perhaps you change your

opinion to suit the other person then you want to explain that process that you go through by clearly matching that up with the result that you're looking to achieve at the end of this

process question number two tell me about a time when you received feedback from someone to your benefit this is super interesting and a lot of people

will have received you know feedback for academic work um ideally this would be for you know General work and something to think about is to your benefit can

actually be just constructive feedback it could be like hey Mike this is really good this report that you put in but actually there's a couple of things I want to go through with you because I

know that you're new and I just want to break down the way that we do things here this is a process that I'm quite familiar with not just through ones to ones but also through hiring people

through our businesses and what will generally happen is when I I try to take the time uh if a manager is not available to sit down with somebody and

give somebody feedback and the way that I would do that is by clearly outlining the task that needed to be done the way that we do things I.E the culture the

system the processes and just outlining the things that they would need to change and also giving a really realistic expectation because it takes people about 3 months to get used to a

new role so something that I'm you know you're not going to do when you're giving feedback is be really harsh or really critical you're always a good manager or a good leader will always bring the responsibility back to

themselves and think well have I communicated effectively is it clear what you needed to do could we improve our systems and process it's only much later down the line you might think well

is this person clearly not fit for purpose have we made a mistake question number three why do you want to work for Shell so I already went through these five fast facts uh and interestingly

I've been doing a lot of onetoone consultations where you know uh somebody will book us a half an hour or 60 Minute session with me generally through um watching a video of mine on YouTube and

then clicking one of the links down in the description and this has been a question that a lot of people really struggle to answer and I'm going to be really honest with you as to why they

struggle laziness it takes 10 15 minutes to pick out facts about a company now if it's a publicly traded company like shell you can just go and look at their

investor relations and then look at their Media or press packs shell also does something called an investor day every year where they share news about the business and what they're doing it's

so easy to find five unique facts if you want to make it a little bit better then you can find one of the facts that relates to you personally so you can inject a little bit of personality into

what is essentially a list question number four what do you do when you receive negative feedback now negative feedback is really when somebody says this could have been better you know it

could be something where you know somebody is really upset or they're having a bad day or they're like oh my God this is awful but I think for most people negative feedback is just look

this needs to be improved perhaps you need to go away and do this again or you just completely didn't understand the task that was at hand and what you

needed to do now understanding negative feedback is first of all I always say when I have received negative feedback or I give this to somebody else the most

important thing to communicate is number one what's wrong number two how do you fix it so if you've received negative feedback what you're going to be

thinking is okay I know what I did wrong and then I'm going to ask that person well how can I fix fix this how can I make this better now maybe that person gives you that answer or maybe they

don't you know I've Heard lots of feedback given to other people where someone has just pointed out what they've done wrong and given them no kind of way to fix that they're just

problem orientated and not solution orientated so maybe you go away you talk to your colleagues you use the internet you go to uh forums where other people

like you are talking about the feedback that was given and the nature of the problem of the task that you're doing and then you figure out a way to get

better at this thing and then you finish off your answer by explaining and the next time I did this thing I did much better cuz I'd Incorporated ABC from the

feedback to improve my result question number six explain a time when you have faced challenges now I would actually slightly modify this

question so that it's easier to to understand is explain a time when you faced your biggest challenge now a big challenge is a big challenge sometimes when I hear people answer this question

they'll kind of say like well you know I was a little bit late to work or I had a deadline and I also had to submit an essay and I'm like is that the biggest

challenge you faced in your life not being funny but your life's all right big challenges for me tend to be multiple things that have to be done in

conjunction a good example of this is I'm studying for my exams I have a part-time job and I also needed to do something else they tend to be two or

three pronged potentially more hopefully not more in which case maybe you're just doing too much what's really important when answering this question is clearly outline what the challenges are and how

you sequentially fix this problem a concept that's come up quite a lot from my consultations in October is getting people to understand that

they are not talking they are teaching and by teaching I mean for example with a question like this you're teaching somebody how to face that challenge when

you're thinking like a teacher you're much more likely to break stuff down into individual steps to make sure that it's sequential and logical you're not going to go oh I had this problem and

then I fixed it and now it's all better well that's not helpful that's not helpful for the inter interviewer for the video interview and also that wouldn't be helpful if you were teaching someone be like here's a mass problem

and I solved it right get on with it you wouldn't do that would you you'd be like right okay so this is how we think about this problem and this is the framework that we would use Let's do an example

together blah blah blah so think about that with competency questions if you're struggling to add more to the action part of star it's because you're talking

you're not teaching question number six explain a time when you've had to overcome cultural diversity now this is an interesting question I liked it because actually it's it's pretty

relevant and it's quite true in the workplace so what does cultural diversity mean it just means geographically or psychographically actually dealing with people who have a

different way of doing things you know culturally as a Brit I have a different way of doing things to my friend who is from Kenya to another friend who is from

Belgium to another friend who is from the United States and this can be observed through the way that we communicate the way that we hear things

the language that we use and the way that we may get things done over time I think a really important way of overcoming cultural diversity in the

sense of making sure that we work together well is having a really clear plan initially making sure that once you're you know kicking something off or

getting something start it's like okay guys um this is the project that we've got to do it's got to be during 3 months these are the stages of the project these are the rough timings this is what

everyone's going to be doing explaining to those people what they would do and being very clear in your Communication in your strategy in checking up on

people in the sense of saying hey how's it going are you all right do you need any help is there anything that you do don't understand I find one of the biggest mistakes that people make is

that they assume because they understand other people understand now most people don't like to say that they do not understand because they don't want to

look stupid I know that's stupid but we need to be realistic in that approach so very often I will consistently ask people lots of questions and be like is

that all right do you want me to explain that again is there anything that you want me to go through um do you remember that you know while I'm say if I'm in a

meeting and I'm talking to somebody or a group of people I'll send them messages at the same time and I always check that people understand I'll be like is that okay do you do you understand what I'm

saying to you uh do I need to give you any more detail questions are so important to just capture understanding and also to read people's body language because

sometimes I'll ask people if they understand stuff and I just know they don't um this happens quite a lot when I have new people join the team because of

you know status and hierarchy even though we're fairly um flat company which the people have been with me you know for years already know but if I'm talking to somebody and they're new

they're a bit like oh my God he's the boss I have to look uh intelligent and one thing that I kind of really emphasize when when I first meet

somebody or after I've had you know been been a part of their final interview if I'm even involved in that process just say dude look if you don't understand something just say if you can't do

something just say cuz it's just quicker like no one's going to punish you no one's going to shame you no one's going to say oh my God I can't believe you don't know that it's just going to allow us to have a much more accurate

understanding of where you're at so that we can provide you the resources that you need to be successful to help us guys I hope that you enjoyed this video please if you did uh consider liking

this video dropping us a comment down below let me know uh how's your interview um have you got an interview coming up and how did you get on and join the many many hundreds if not

thousands of people I think now who we have helped get hired over the years good luck