Question

Describe how the five problem-solving barriers might or might not affect your ability to solve this problem. “Imagine that you are running late for a job interview and you spill coffee on the front of your only clean shirt just before you walk out the door. It is important to make a good first impression with the panel who will be interviewing you. What should you do?”

Answer 1

Answer:

If you are already running late for a job interview, are in a rush to leave, and you end up spilling coffee on your only clean shirt, then this is going to be a very stressful situation for you. That is obvious because the job interview is important for you. The five problem-solving barriers, may, to some extent, deter you from solving the issue promptly. The usual solution to a spoilt shirt before an interview would be to change your shirt. But since you don't have another one, then the next best solution is to call the office where you are going for the interview and request them to reschedule the interview for a later time. Here comes in the barriers, the first one being the expressive barrier, as you may not be good at expressing yourself freely in a situation laced with anxiety as this one. Another barrier could be perceptual, as you may perceive this as a violation of norms of the interviewing process if you were to ask for rescheduling the interview. If your mindset is rigid and you are not willing to take any risks, then delaying the interview may not be acceptable to you. Confirmation bias is a block that may refrain from rescheduling your interview as you are certain you won't be selected for the job if you ask for a change in the interview timings. If no such problem-solving barriers exist in your case, you could very well go with a stained shirt and tell the interviewer confidently that you spilled coffee over your shirt accidentally, just at the time of your scheduled interview. You didn't want to be late, so you walked in with the stained shirt instead of making the interviewers wait. You could apologize for this and confidently tackle the interview.