A cross-team disagreement can quickly weaken an HEO Working Together answer if you describe the argument but say little about how you brought people together. The HEO and SEO Civil Service interview guide gives you grade-level questions and sample answers to use before your interview, when there is still time to strengthen the evidence.
Question
“Tell me about a time you resolved a disagreement between teams with different priorities.”
What Is Being Looked For
At HEO level, the panel is looking for active collaboration across team boundaries. You should show that you understood why each group held its position, kept the discussion professional and found a route that supported the wider outcome. Simply arranging a meeting is weak evidence. The score comes from what you did inside and around that meeting.
Use B-STAR to establish your approach before the example. A useful Belief section might explain that disagreements are best resolved by making the shared objective clear and testing assumptions with evidence. Keep the Situation and Task brief, then spend most of the answer on your actions.
Strong actions include speaking to teams separately, identifying the real point of conflict and creating options that acknowledge operational limits. The result should show more than temporary agreement. Look for a change in delivery, a better working arrangement or a decision that held after the immediate issue had passed.
Example Answer
I believe cross-team disagreements are easier to resolve when everyone can see the shared outcome and the evidence behind each concern. I avoid treating one team as the problem because that usually makes people defend their position more strongly.
In an operational improvement project, the policy team wanted a new customer eligibility check introduced immediately. The service team opposed the change because it added work to already busy calls. The disagreement had stopped the release plan, and I was asked to bring both teams to an agreed position.
I met each lead separately and asked them to explain their concerns, the evidence they were using and the outcome they needed to protect. The policy team was focused on reducing incorrect awards. The service team supported that aim but believed the proposed wording would add several minutes to every call.
I reviewed call data with the service team and error data with policy. I found that most incorrect awards came from two specific customer circumstances rather than every application. I prepared two options: the full check for all calls, or a shorter screening question followed by the detailed check only where those circumstances applied.
I brought the teams together, set out the shared objective and presented the likely effect of each option on error reduction and handling time. I invited both leads to challenge the assumptions. We agreed to trial the targeted approach for four weeks, with weekly measures and a clear threshold for review.
The trial reduced incorrect awards while adding less than a minute to the average affected call. Both teams approved the permanent process, and the joint measures gave them a practical way to resolve later changes without returning to the same dispute.
Cross-team questions are easy to waste with too much history. Build your answer now around the disagreement, your personal intervention and the lasting outcome. The HEO and SEO Civil Service interview guide gives you more Working Together questions to practise before the panel asks for a different version.
