Describe a time you worked as part of a team. What was your role?

Whether you can collaborate. Dental school is four years of forced group work and clinic is a team sport.

How to structure your answer

1The team and goal
2Your specific role
3A moment where you adapted or supported someone
4The outcome

Be specific about your actual role
Include a moment where you deferred to someone else
Give credit generously and genuinely
Name what the team achieved

A strong answer

What lands

I'm a tech in a plant genetics lab. Four of us on a drought-tolerance line, and my piece was the growth chamber runs and keeping the plates alive. Halfway through, an undergrad named Tess said our watering schedule was confounding the results. She was right, and I was the one who'd designed it. So we used hers. My contribution after that was mostly rebuilding trays over a weekend and not making it a thing. The paper's under review now and her name is second on it, which is correct.

Specific role, defers to someone junior, credits her by name, names the outcome.

A weak answer

What most people say

I worked on a four-person research team and honestly I ended up carrying a lot of it. Two people weren't really pulling their weight, so I picked up their sections and made sure we hit the deadline anyway. We got the poster finished on time, and I learned that sometimes you just have to step up.

The hero version, which tells them exactly how he'd behave in a lab group.

The trap

⚠Making yourself the hero who saved a failing group. It's the most common team answer and it tells them you'd be difficult in a lab group.

Reading it isn't the same as saying it.

Most people can explain a good answer and still fall apart saying one out loud. Admitted asks you all 100 questions in a faculty voice, records you, and scores your pace and filler words.

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