Twenty seconds flat

I'm surprised at how few candidates (especially active ones) who don't fully grasp the importance of delivering a good answer in an interview, AND delivering it WELL(!!!). Consider the following analogies: A surgeon who uses dull or under-maintained instruments; a chef who uses dull knives; an actor with laryngitis; a musician with a poorly tuned instrument. All of these people depend on their tools to do their job. If any one tool (instrument, etc...) isn't working properly, they will have to compensate in some other way in order to be successful - or they can expect to be unsuccessful. As an interviewer, whether you need a new job or want a new job, one of your primary tools is your - perhaps your most important tool, is your ability to communicate (convey) your value. How vague is that? What if you spoke only German and the person interviewing you only spoke English? That interview wouldn't go very far. You wouldn't have very much at your disposal to convey your value. Sure, you could draw pictures on a piece of paper, or do some gesturing. But, pretty soon, that interview would end and if you're lucky you might find a ding-letter in your mailbox. But, the good news is, you're probably going to have a common language in an interview and by God, you have better take full advantage of it.
Here's where this post meets the post's title: you had better be able to deliver your answer to any of their questions in twenty seconds or less. But that's not all. You had better have some kind of relevant anecdote that demonstrates your proficiency and be able to build it in to your answer...in only twenty seconds. I'll give you five seconds to think about it, so you've actually got about twenty five seconds, total. But, it's a tight rope. You've got very little room for error.

Here's a formula:
They ask a question, you answer the question (directly) and then you say, "Let me give you an example..." Then, you're down to fifteen seconds, and that's when you say, "When I was working at XYZ, Inc. we did a project in July of 2005 (specific date is critical). The challenge was (fill in with challenge) and if we didn't succeed, we might have (consequence of failure). So, I (did the following) and low-an-behold, we figured it out." See how easy that was? It's a variation of the STAR Method. And, you don't need to do very much to get it right. And, you can do it in about twenty seconds. Try it and see for yourself. Don't wait until the next interview. Wait until someone asks you a qualifying question about past experience - it happens all the time.