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‘What’s your biggest weakness?’
by Helen Isbister, 10 June 2008
Just as one too many drinks will inevitably come your way at the work Christmas party, and an urgent project will land on you desk at five minutes to five on Friday afternoon, prospective employers will almost always drop the ‘so, what’s your biggest weakness?’ question into the job interview. Chances are this will happen midway through your polished spiel about your impeccable skills, qualifications and character.Questions about your weaknesses are annoying, but as tempting as it is to adopt a sarcastic tone and say ‘I’m a stationery addict and the office is the best place for building up supplies’, if you want to succeed in a job interview, you have to learn how to play the game. And the name of the job interview game is to sell yourself, warts and all.
Unfortunately, not all prospective employees are going to see you through the same rose-coloured glasses as your mother. They want to drill through the polished PR veneer of your cover letter, resume and pre-rehearsed interview performance to see the real you.
It’s dangerous to be brutally honest about your flaws during an interview. Launching into an itemised list of the skeletons you have lurking in your closet will not show you in the most attractive light. You need to learn how to sell your weakness so that it doesn’t appear to be a negative. It’s all about creative expression and a little bit of clever (and shameless) weakness promotion.
A quick word of warning about the corniest ‘weakness’ of all. The ‘I’m a perfectionist’ line has severely passed its used-by date both as an answer and as a joke. It will carry no weight with eye-rolling employers who have heard it all before.
Originality and sincerity to this question is the key. There are some tactical ways to dress up your flaws in order to skilfully navigate this Bermuda Triangle of job interviews and beat the employer at their own game.
The completely irrelevant weakness
This type of weakness has no impact on how you will do your job. It means you can truthfully answer the pesky question, but still leave your employer with no reason not to want you for the job. You have a soft spot for reality television? You sleep in on weekends? You over-cater at dinner parties? You are applying for a job as a swim coach but don’t understand the finer points of accounting? If you have a suitable weakness then this can work a treat, but remember there is a fine line between pulling it off and sounding ridiculous. Your passion for collecting junk mail may not directly influence your work, but it may lead your prospective employer to second-guess your sanity – never a good start.
The weakness that works to your advantage
This approach is too close to the blacklisted ‘I’m a perfectionist’ weakness for comfort, but if used with enough subtlety it can successfully turn the question into a platform from which to continue your shameless pitch for employment. You tend to take on the workload of others? You speak your mind? You have a low tolerance level for lazy colleagues? Another approach you can take here is to relate your weakness to your intense enthusiasm for the job. If you are going for a job in fashion, say you spend too much of you income on clothes. If you are an aspiring journo, confess that you are an incurable news junkie. If you do go down this path, remember it is a minefield, so tread carefully to avoid coming across as arrogant or just downright insincere.
The dangerously close to extinction weakness
This is the weakness that you are working tirelessly to rid yourself of, and predict will be a thing of the past within two weeks of taking up employment. It’s an oldie and goldie, because you can use it simultaneously to rid yourself of any long-term weaknesses, while also illustrating your commitment to perfection. You are taking advanced classes to brush up on your rusty spreadsheet skills? You have purchased an electronic organiser to ensure you are never late to appointments? The upside of this answer is that the interviewer will appreciate your honesty and notice your initiative for solving problems. Well, that’s the plan.
The dead-set avoidance of owning up to a weakness
This is the way out for people who refuse to play the game and prefer to skilfully avoid coming up with a response altogether. You prefer to focus on the positive aspects of a situation, rather than dwelling on negatives? You don’t see them as weaknesses, but rather as challenges and an opportunity to improve? Save this one for when you are completely out of ideas or are having trouble pulling off any of the previous examples without sounding like a lying, egotistical psychopath. Never joke that your psychiatrist doesn’t use the word weakness but prefers to discuss the ‘challenges’ you face.
Learning how to navigate this weakness-ridden danger zone with both your job chances and your self esteem intact comes down to avoiding clichéd responses and coming across sounding sincere, but still employable. Basically, if you can move onto the next question as quickly as possible without exposing unsavoury flaws or showing you are a freak then, as far as the job is concerned, it’s game on!
How have you tackled this tricky question? Tell us your answer at publishing@careerfaqs.com.au.
More tricky interview questions
Where do you see yourself in five years?
Why did you leave your last job?
How do you handle criticism?
Where do you see yourself in five years?
Why did you leave your last job?
How do you handle criticism?
Image of girl: © Magdalena Sobczyk | Dreamstime.com.jpg
Background image: © asifthebe | stockxpert
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