Tell me about a decision you made based on your instincts.

This question is meant to assess your intuition, decision-making capabilities, and the ability to trust your gut feeling in a professional context. Employers also use this question to evaluate your risk-taking and problem-solving skills. When answering this question, it is important to convey a situation where you were confronted with a problem, you trusted your instincts, and your decision resulted in a successful outcome. Be sure to communicate the situation, your decision-making process, and the result clearly.

In my previous role as a project manager, we were working on a high-stakes project with a strict deadline. Due to unforeseen technical difficulties, we started lagging behind on our project timeline. We had two options - either to continue using the current methodology that was time-consuming but familiar to the team, or to try a new approach which could potentially speed up the project but was still untested by our team. My gut feeling was to go with the new approach despite its unfamiliarity, as sticking to the old methodology would definitely cause project delays. I decided to trust my instinct, and thankfully, the new approach was effective and we were able to deliver the project on time. The success of this decision resulted in our team being more open to exploring new methodologies in future projects.

During my stint as Marketing Manager at XYZ Corp, we were gearing up for a major product launch. As part of the pre-launch activities, we had planned a series of digital marketing campaigns. However, a week before the anticipated launch, I had a gut feeling that our target audience would be better reached with a direct marketing approach. Despite my team's concerns about the short timeframe, I decided to act on my instinct and we redirected our efforts towards a direct marketing campaign. It was a risk, but it proved successful as our product received a great response. We recorded the highest-ever first-week sales for any of our products. This decision demonstrated the value of trusting my instincts under pressure, and the importance of flexibility in our marketing strategies.