5 steps to how to answer what is your weakness? With sample answers
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What is your weakness? This is the most common question interviewer asks you in an interview, maybe here a lot of job seekers or working professionals already face this question in their career. A lot of people think this pointless and worthless question in the interview. It is so much easy to understand there is nobody who wants to reveal their weakness during the interview process, might be people afraid because they don’t want to confess their weakness cause anyone can use their weakness agent them. You maybe don’t know when you’re responding to this question interviewer analyze you and gathered information about you. Basically, they want to know how is the candidate, how they respond and trustworthy or not, and what they measure taking for it. Most companies always going to ask you what your weakness is? Question and there are the majority of job-seekers unable to deliver the right answer for this. Nearly everyone needs helps with the weaknesses questions in this article, I will explain to you how to structure what is your greatest weakness response in a few easy steps and stick with me till the end. Where also I’ll share some new sample answers of weaknesses which going to help you, while coming up with your own response. There is also another way; the interviewer asks you the same question some other way.
Other versions of the “Greatest weaknesses” question:
• If I speak with your manager or colleagues what would they describe your biggest weakness?
• What are your development areas?
• Which duties or task do you think is most struggles with you?
• Tell me about a self-goal of development that you have set
• Do you think, is there a skill set of yours which you want still, needs work?
• If you could change one thing about yourself, what will be that?
Sometimes it might sound like a completely different question, but the idea behind it is the same no one wants to talk about the less impressive parts of their skill set or personality, but never say you don’t have any development areas because such a response immediately translates into lack of your ability to learn and to grow. Most hiring managers are interested in hearing how the candidates analyze their development areas, what they do to continue learning, and to continue improving this is the part of the interview then nobody wants to hear selling yourself. In fact, it’s completely the opposite; it’s about showing how your career even your life has taught you lessons and pushed you to grow. These are five steps you should follow to prepare your honest and authentic response which will hugely increase your chances of getting a job offer.
Step 1: Analyze your development areas
Making a list of things you would like to improve or the list of things you are already working on the weakness should be something related to your professional competencies, and skills answer like “ I don’t exercise” or “I don’t speak English or any other language” well would equal to saying nothing at all, and not saying anything is obviously not a good thing. Such answers would also show your lack of analytical skills.
Step 2: Don’t try to disguise a strength as a weakness
You will find articles which advise you to turn negative into a positive bay shearing a weakness that is actually a desirable quality in an employee, for example, “ I Have really high standards when it comes to working” or “I work hard and everyone says that I’m workaholic” or “I’m a perfectionist” every single interviewer unless it’s someone inexperienced has heard something similar before this approach will make them think that you are hiding something, and the interviewers might label you as someone not trustworthy.
Step 3: Be honest without raising red flags
Be honest, but don’t raise any red flags, being honest is really important but make sure you pick a weakness that is acceptable for the role. You are interviewing for something which won’t hinder your ability to do the job, don’t say you have trouble getting up in the morning or that you are awful with numbers and you are applying for an accounting job, etc.
Step 4: Explain what you do to improve
Explain the measures you took to improve this is probably the most important part when it comes to what your greatest weaknesses question, first the explain, how you detected your weakness but the second part of your answer is discussing how you have been actively working on it. The weakness needs are something that you could improve through a personal effort.
Step 5: Be prepared for the follow-up questions.
Especially if your answer was vague or unconvincing, for example, “how this weakness affected you negatively?” this follow-up question is helpful for strength in disguise weakness. It shows how truthful your answer was or can you shear another weakness or another development area this can of course is a follow-up question. If the interviewer is skeptical about the weakness you mentioned as an answer some interviewers know that candidates usually prepare one weakness, and they want to see what candidate would come up with on the spot.
Follow these steps and you will be able to talk about your weaknesses in an honest but smart way. Keep it short and to the point and if you practice your answer aloud many times, you will come across much more confident, and your response will make a stronger impact and just as I promised here are new sample answers which should be useful to you when working on your on response.
Example 1:
“I have been quite independent at work and I enjoy being quick on the job, so, it has always been difficult for me to ask for help when I needed it, I felt it would be seen as something negative. So, I kept quiet and could commit easily avoidable mistakes. Now I have learned it is a huge benefit for me and for the business to reach out when I do not understand something or when I am overloaded worth work. I now realize there are many experts around me which have that specific knowledge or skills that can improve the quality of many work with one simple piece of advice. I am still working on it, but I have been able to produce more high-quality work as a result of raising a hand and asking for help when necessary.”
Example 2:
“My greatest weakness is, it’s difficult for me to say someone “no” so easily. It happens to my personal life but it has now more visible consequences professionally I end up working on some random tasks and requests from my co-workers, which in the past lead me to stress or burn out. To help myself improve in this area, I have now created a calendar, blocking out times and scheduling tasks as they come. This helps me to prioritize and makes it easier for everyone to see how much workload I have on when I’m free and gives me backup to say ‘no’ to certain extra tasks.”
