help, confused with this eassy.

Describe a failure you encountered and how you handled it professionally and personally.

Does it mean:  describe a failure yo encountered in your professional life or personal life and how you handled it?   

don't know what it is meant by handling sth professionally or personally.

Is it ok if i describe a failure in my extra-curricula activity?

thanks.

I think 'professionally' and 'personally' here refer to the aspect in which you handle this problem. When faced with the failure, you need to do some thing professionally. That's obvious. What is more, as you are always referred to as a PERSON, so there must be many feelings or emotions or relationships you need to handle in a personal aspect in these cases. That's why you are asked to also include your action in a personal aspect. Extra-curri activity is ok as long as you can figure out both professinoal and personal aspect of the experience you can discuss on.

my 2 cent

thanks, linus.  

I wrote a potential failure  happened in my team in an extra-curricula activity.  How i tried to motivate other team members and finally solved this problem.  

In my understanding, as long as the story shows some valuable traits of the applicants,  for example, leadership, communication skills, sense of responsibility or some others, it works. but i am still puzzled by this question, who knows whether a solution is in a professional way or not.

这位兄弟，我看了你的一些发言，觉得你还要加紧努力啊。写失败就老老实实地写失败，不要试图通过一个暂时的失败来获得最后的成功。

另外，这种重大的失败最好写工作中，别老提学校或者课外活动。毕竟你是个职业人士。

很多职业上的问题，用纯职业的手段有时候可能不一定能很好解决，所以关键时需要通过人性化的手段（Personally)来处理。本essay应该是想了解申请者这方面的能力。因为任何一个领导者必然具有人格魅力，否则难以成为一个杰出的领导，充其量也就一“头”而已。

thanks you all for advice and help.

One problem is the essay has a limit of 300 words. i found it hard to put all those things in an eassy of 300 words, the failure, the lesson i have learned, and my solutions in similar situations in my later life.  

any suggestion?