Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

I've got a job interview coming up this week. I consider myself fairly adept at handling interviews, for the most part. The one question I'm never sure how to handle though, is when they ask you about your weaknesses. It's usually something like "what do you think are your weaknesses" or "if we spoke to your last employer, what areas would they say are your weakest".

What do you think is the best way to tackle this question?

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

Something that can be deflected into a positive.

For instance, "I sometimes have trouble working in large group settings because I keep such a high standard of excellence on my work."

Obviously that statement needs a little bit of work, but you get the idea.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

They are looking for you to make an honest assessment. No one is perfect and trying to act like you are will not impress anyone.

I always talk about how the situations where I am learned the most were usually the results of a mistake. Then I give an example or two (not a problem for me:)) from my personal experience.

(I recognize this hedges the weakness thing a little, but does not avoid the question.)

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

[ QUOTE ]
They are looking for you to make an honest assessment. No one is perfect and trying to act like you are will not impress anyone.

I always talk about how the situations where I am learned the most were usually the results of a mistake. Then I give an example or two (not a problem for me:)) from my personal experience.

(I recognize this hedges the weakness thing a little, but does not avoid the question.)

[/ QUOTE ]

This is actually similiar to the angle I was thinking about taking. Instead of talking about a weakness I currently have, talking about a couple mistakes and weaknesses I used to have at another job, and how I learned from them and improved upon them.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

i just say that i am shy , but that i can still get along with anyone. because it is true and i wouldn't want a job where i am expected to deal with a lot of different people anyway.

but i don't really know how to answer those questions to make yourself look good. i think the "sometimes i just work way too hard!" answers are dumb, but i guess it's what you're suppose to say.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

I'm a workaholic, requiring at least 120 hours of work per week!

Joking aside, you're on the right track. Think of a mistake or screw-up in a previous job/position, and talk about how this incident made you more aware of your weakness and how it's not really an area of concern any more.

Swede

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

Tell them that sometimes you are too much of a prefectionist and you end up working too much. This sounds like a negative, but usually is looked at as a positive by employers who are looking for workaholics.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

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i just say that i am shy , but that i can still get along with anyone. because it is true and i wouldn't want a job where i am expected to deal with a lot of different people anyway.

but i don't really know how to answer those questions to make yourself look good. i think the "sometimes i just work way too hard!" answers are dumb, but i guess it's what you're suppose to say.

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Try this:
I need to learn to say no more often. Sometimes I take on too many projects at once and wind up not be able to get each the full attention it deserves.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

That's the worst question ever. It's a stupid question too. There's no way to answer it without coming off like a 1.) arrogant prick, 2.) worthless loser, or 3.) a liar.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

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That's the worst question ever. It's a stupid question too. There's no way to answer it without coming off like a 1.) arrogant prick, 2.) worthless loser, or 3.) a liar.

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That's exactly why it's a great question. If you can't handle questions like this without coming off like a dick you'll have the same problems with awkward situations at work/with clients or coworkers.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

"I'd like to be a little more experienced".

This is the perfect answer, (if you are young). Because it's obvious to the employer that you are probably lacking some experience.

Just say, "I wish I was a bit more experienced in this field. But...I suppose that is just something that will come with time..."

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

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That's the worst question ever. It's a stupid question too. There's no way to answer it without coming off like a 1.) arrogant prick, 2.) worthless loser, or 3.) a liar.

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Anyone with any real life or work experience should be able to handle this question. It shows how you deal with failure, which is something I want to know about the people who work for me.

I dont want someone who 'never' fails to work for me. They are self-deluded at best or huge problems at worst.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

my strategy for this question would be to be honest and tell them something about you that is a genuine weakness.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

[ QUOTE ]
They are looking for you to make an honest assessment. No one is perfect and trying to act like you are will not impress anyone.

I always talk about how the situations where I am learned the most were usually the results of a mistake. Then I give an example or two (not a problem for me:)) from my personal experience.

(I recognize this hedges the weakness thing a little, but does not avoid the question.)

[/ QUOTE ]

I think this is good advice. Everyone has weaknesses, and the purpose of the question isn't to lie and say some BS "positive/negative" type of answer. If your weakness is that you aren't always the most organized person, saying something like this is good: "Sometimes I tend to get overloaded with work and can get disorganized. I've worked hard to stay on top of it, and succeed at that more often than not. However, there at times I still need to work on this."

It's a judgment call overall; some people (lower level HR screeners, or lower level managers that don't seem particularly intelligent) may respond better to the obvious crap like "My weakness is I work too hard and take on too many projects." However, if you are interviewing with an intelligent and strong manager, you are going to need to give a better answer than the above one. It's all about catering to your audience; just be careful about giving answers to this question that are obviously prefabricated and contain limited honesty. Think about the answers YOU want to hear if you are interviewing someone and ask this question.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

I ask this question all the time to potential hires and its unbelievable how many of them use the "Im a perfectionist" answer. I think they teach this answer in college.

I also like to ask a question just to see someones thinking process. A question that doesnt require a "right" answer but will help tell me a lot about that person.

Example-

What would you add to the water supply to improve humans?

Why are manhole covers round?

If you could be any part of a car, which part would you be and why?


MDoranD

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

I interview every applicant for my company and I always ask what their strengths and weaknesses are amongst other things. My goal during the interview process is to assess their critical thinking skills. Almost every skill is transferable and the training is designed to direct those skills so they can be applied to the tasks of particular job duties. It is completely unreasonable to expect them to walk on the job and not require training—every company has its own style, personality, and informal rules.

Answering this question honestly is critical as most interviewers will spot a lie or made up answer in a heart beat. If you give a poor answer, I will ask several follow up questions and force you into a corner until I have the information I want. I will through out hypothetical situations and ask you to resolve them.

We all have weaknesses. The best solution is to pick one that is not related to transferable skills, your ability to work with others, or be a team player.

If you are willing to through out here what you believe are some of your weaknesses are, I’m sure that many of us can offer you good advise on how to spin it so it appears that the weakness can be overcome.

A great example might be where you were on a team and had difficulty with particular personality types and found it difficult to get a group consensus. The team had trouble with conflict resolution due to an overly aggressive member who would not consider other’s ideas, and attempted to bully the tem.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

"I tend to ignore questions that make me uncomfortable."

Then when she asks you to explain what you mean, talk about how nice the weather is today.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

Good points. I agree with your take on the negative/positive response of "I work too hard sometimes". I was thinking about saying something like that (and I have used it in the past at interviews for $7.50/hour part time jobs that I worked while in school with success), but the more I thought about it, the more I feel it just sounds so fake and sounds like such BS. I bet interviewers get that answer all the time.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

12 year old boys

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

Think of some personality characteristic that this job does NOT require. It's now your greatest weakness.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

The last time I interviewed my answer to this question was: "My biggest weakness is not knowing how to answer this question!".

It got a good laugh from my interviewer and we went on to discuss lines that others have mentioned. It was a nice way to break the uncomfortable feeling of being asked that question.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

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"what do you think are your weaknesses"

[/ QUOTE ]

"Large breasted redheads, sir."


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or "if we spoke to your last employer, what areas would they say are your weakest".

[/ QUOTE ]

"Please don't do that."

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

OP,

I've interviewed about five bazillion people. I don't think I've ever used that specific question, but I do ask things like "which of the partnerships deals you did was the least successful?" In any question like this, I'm just looking for your ability to understand the situation and explain something. And probably I'll follow it up with something about what you learned from it, how you would do better, etc. The more real the answer, the better.

In the case of "what's your weakness" you are generally going to be far better off actually explaining a weakness than trying to make up some lame weakness with positive spin answer. Just say what a job-related weakness of yours is and you'll get an opportunity to explain how you compensate for that specific weakness.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

CREAM,

If I asked you what your biggest weakness was and you said "I work too hard sometimes" I would probably say that's great and quickly power through the rest of the interview, probably rejecting you unless you wildly impressed me prior to that point.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

CREAM,

Sometimes I disapear for several weeks at a time with no recolection of what happened. I also need a lot of vacation time for personal reasons. I also don't respond well to orders.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

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Example-

If you could be any part of a car, which part would you be and why?

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Pop that question on me in an interview, if you want me to walk out without another word.

Because clearly, either you're trying to lose me, or you're so whacky that I don't want to work for you.

I'm a poker dealer, a 100% automaton job, and I still get asked for my weaknesses. I explain that would be like asking the mailman for his weakness--the job is just too simple, and not nuanced enough, to have strengths and weaknesses.

"I show up on time. My appearance is neat. I'm very proficient at all phases of my job, including technical performance and customer service. My bosses love me, my co-workers love me, and the customers love me. Now you tell me, what are my weaknesses?"

The interviewers always frown.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

[ QUOTE ]
Tell them that sometimes you are too much of a prefectionist and you end up working too much. This sounds like a negative, but usually is looked at as a positive by employers who are looking for workaholics.

[/ QUOTE ]

Cliché.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

Tell them the truth.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I ask this question all the time to potential hires and its unbelievable how many of them use the "Im a perfectionist" answer. I think they teach this answer in college.

I also like to ask a question just to see someones thinking process. A question that doesnt require a "right" answer but will help tell me a lot about that person.

Example-

What would you add to the water supply to improve humans?

Why are manhole covers round?

If you could be any part of a car, which part would you be and why?


[/ QUOTE ]

1. Flouride or iron, if it's not already in there.
2. So they don't fall in the hole when placed improperly.
3. Steering wheel; I like to know in which direction I'm headed.

How did I do?

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

Tell them you have trouble fielding stupid questions.

Or name an actual weakness that is both common, and is something that won't effect your work. Then talk about how you improve it.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

They've heard all the BS before a thousand times, just tell them the truth. Of course that's easier said than done...first you have to know the truth...

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

The most overused and cliche answer is "I'm a perfectionist." Avoid that one.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

Yeah I'm not going to use one of the cliché answers. But what do you guys think of some light hearted humor thrown into an inteview (that's used sparingly, and not overdone, obviously)? I was thinking of doing something like this:

Interviewer: so what would you say are your weaknesses?
Me: Hmm, I have to go with chocolate. Definitely chocolate. <I'll laugh a little bit here>. Ok ok, I suppose you want to know something relevant to my past work experience. In all seriousness...[and then I talk about my actual weaknesses]

I know it's kind of cheesy, but I was thinking it might get the interviewer to laugh a little bit and shows that I'm comfortable dealing with people. I was also thinking it might make the interviewer more comfortable with me, like we're having a conversation between friends, rather than some high stress job interview.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

If you are going to use humor try to make it funny [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

planning your laughter is a good touch.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

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If you could be any part of a car, which part would you be and why?

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Wow, that's terrible. That's like a parody of a really [censored] interview question it's so bad. Why are people so bad at interviewing?

(No offense to you personally, but I went through a spate of interviews a few months ago, and I'm still a bit pissed about how crappy most of my interviewers were.)

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

"F U, jerk! im perfect!"

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

I think employers would love to know they are signing on someone who can introspectively identify and manage his/her weaknesses. Many (most) people basically ignore any/all weaknesses and never resolve or work on them. One of the most important aspects of becoming a very valuable asset to a company is the ability to continuously improve at what you're doing.

So, if you currently ignore your weaknesses or shovel them into your subconcious, do some hard thinking about them and what you want to do to improve/compensate in specific job situations and in your career path in the future. Whatever you discover thinking about that will be your answer.

Yugoslav

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

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If you are going to use humor try to make it funny [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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Yeah I know, that humor was pretty bad. I think I'm over thinking this too much. I'm just going to go in there, be my natural wonderful, charming self, and get the job.

Re: Interview tomorrow. What\'s your strategy for this question?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I've got a job interview coming up this week. I consider myself fairly adept at handling interviews, for the most part. The one question I'm never sure how to handle though, is when they ask you about your weaknesses. It's usually something like "what do you think are your weaknesses" or "if we spoke to your last employer, what areas would they say are your weakest".

What do you think is the best way to tackle this question?

[/ QUOTE ]

whenever they ask this my most common response is that basically, "I'm known to work too hard and take work too seriously."

Elaborate a little, but even this weakness is definitely a plus employers will eventually see.