A typical job interview all too often includes those annoying interview questions like “What’s your greatest weakness?” or “What’s your greatest strength?” Odds are some form of the greatest weakness question will be aimed your way as you sit in the interview Q & A hot seat, trying your best not to sweat your greatest weakness answer as much as Albert Brooks sweat in the film Broadcast News.
OK. I admit I also sometimes use the oh-so-annoying greatest weakness question (and others like that) when I do an interview. Not that there’s any one absolutely right answer I’m looking for. Asking about weaknesses in an interview (and the way you answer the question) helps me see how a person will react, even when confronted by the obvious. You can learn a lot about a person as they answer seemingly simple questions.
In fact, I was interviewing someone the other day. After only a few minutes, I knew he was probably going to get a second interview. But it’s my job to dig deeper and also look for things that need to be explored in the next round. In addition, if I pretty much know they’re moving on, I like to give people practice for the next interview. So in this case, I went to some of those standard interview questions, including “What’s your greatest weakness?”
Well, this guy started to answer it without any subterfuge and without the typical “I know this is one of those trick questions” tone of voice. I was pleasantly surprised. (Keeping it as real as possible is always a good idea – although there are times when it’s ok to let the interviewer in on your recognition of an old standard.) But then my interviewee kept going – trying to give me the most thorough and honest answer ever I think – including several examples of how sometimes he gets caught up in the tiny details of a problem…almost to the point of obsessing. I actually got nervous for him. “Don’t tell me too much!” I wanted to coach.
Truth is, he was so sincere and talented he didn’t hurt himself with me by trying so hard to give a thorough answer. But that might not have been the case with all interviewers. So when you get a question like this, just know that it’s ok to stop at the summary of the weakness like “I can get caught up in the details sometimes.” But then your follow-up should be something like you are aware of this and have been learning how to balance being thorough with the other things you have to get done. And have a great real life story from one of your jobs to back up whichever weakness you choose to answer this interview question!
Whatever you do, it’s probably best to keep your answer to this one fairly short. There are some interview questions where it’s good to expand your answer so you can throw in cool stuff about yourself. This is usually not one of those questions – unless, as I mentioned, you have a good story to tell about how you overcame your great weakness…or at least have been making progress.
An example would be if you had a fear of public speaking, worked on that fear, and wound up becoming a lecturer on some topic. Now that’s something an interviewer would like to hear. (Uh…please don’t use this story unless it’s real. Stuff like that can come back to bite you.) But if your story isn’t that strong, probably best to keep it short and sweet when answering the weakness question.
Let’s be honest. Most people just throw in these questions to fill out the interview anyway. You get a good idea within the first few minutes of interviewing a person whether this is someone you want to seriously consider. I doubt any interviewer is really looking to get you to reveal some deep dark weakness like “I steal office supplies” or “I’ve lied all over my resume and hope you don’t find out.” DOH!
But even if you make a great first impression, you can still trip yourself up with a bad answer. While there is no one right way to answer this interview question, it helps to come prepared with something good based on who you really are (some employers are serious about the question and want to see how self-aware you are). And make sure your tale of weakness has a natural positive spin – like the ones above or any good example from real life about how you turned some weakness around.
So to summarize my greatest weakness interview question tips: Keep it short, leave with a positive thought, and then just shut up until you get the next question. If the interviewer pushes the question, try your best to specifically answer what was asked (shows you’re listening) but again keep it short and stay as positive as possible.
Oh…and in case you’re wondering, the guy I interviewed has super skills and gave a good second interview, so he’s moving on to the final interview. But in the interim, an anonymous someone clued him in about how to answer the dreaded weakness interview question – just in case. Shhh! Don’t tell anyone.
More job interview articles I hope will help:
- Job Interviews: What’s Your Greatest Weakness?
- Job Interviews: What’s Your Greatest Strength?
- How to Answer Why You Left Your Last Job When You Actually Quit
- Help! I Get Nervous When I Interview for a Job
- 18 Practical Tips to Help You Ace that Interview
- The Single Most Important Thing in Any Job Interview
- 15 Things I Look for When I Interview People
- 10 Reasons You Didn’t Get the Job
- How Do I Ace My Phone Interview?
- How Do You Interview if Interviewer Doesn’t Know as Much as You Do?
Love your comment, Gina. Right on!
~ Ronnie Ann
I say my weakness is I’m slightly shy and introverted. I’m not the type of guy that would dance in a club or take part in a karaoke for example.
I can turn being introverted “weakness” in to a positive. I have been told I’m a good problem solver. I pause, think and stay calm, not getting worked up when something is wrong. When I have thought it through, I then get to the task. Whereas extroverted people can loose patience and either jump straight in and get it wrong or panic.
I do not word it like that in interviews, or talk about others, but I hope you get the general idea.
Hi Simon!
That’s a great way of handling the question. It feels real for you and at the same time shows how you turn it into a strength. Just one little thing…be careful about how you phrase the extroverted part of your answer. Your interviewer may be an extrovert.
But your manner of handling things adds a lot to any team.
Thanks for sharing!
I see from your comment you are already aware of the way you phrase your answer, but I added that point about not bashing extroverts for others who might try a variation of your approach!
I have a job interview coming up and I’m a bit nervous. I recently got fired from my previous job and I’m not sure how to handle the interview from that perspective. The question, “Why were you fired?” is what frightens me. I don’t want this potential employer to think I am not reliable. The reason is nothing based on performance or anything shaddy. What to do?
Hi Connie!
No need to be so nervous – although I know that alone won’t stop the nerves.
The main idea is to make sure YOU know how good you are and come prepared with workplace stories that show it.
Here are some articles that talk about how to approach the interview. Hope they help.
Good luck!!
How Do I Interview After Being Fired?
How Do I Talk About Being Fired When I Interview?
I Got Fired for Reading Patient Records. What Do I Say in a Job Interview?
Help! I Get Nervous When I Interview for a Job
i say my weakness are iam curious ,emotinal ,quick to judge
Thanks for sharing that, Sara.
Both “emotional” and “quick to judge” might come back to bite you.
One way to handle that, in the example of “quick to judge” for instance, is to say that you have found times when you have been quick to judge, but this is something you’re working on since you know a lot can be learned by giving a person time to explain and giving yourself a chance to learn more before making any judgments. Then you can smile and say something like…not that I sometimes don’t still find myself doing it. But I try. (Helps make you seem real.)
Or something like that.
Shows you don’t just accept your weaknesses, but make an effort to work on them. Good luck!
About curiosity…intellectual curiosity is a strength. Just asking questions to bug people or be nosy is one thing, but in business, being curious enough to seek out solutions to problems or come up with new ways of doing this is a huge plus.
Thanks so much for this advice ,i have an interview in saturday and i am so so worried i got very nervous and sometimes i forget the words what can i do for that
Here is a link with some tips that hopefully will help with your nerves. Please read this article and some of the other ones I mention. Then breathe deeply (in AND out) and practice, practice, practice.
Do You Get Nervous About Being Nervous During an Interview?
Good luck, Sara!
You have a process of THREE formal interviews?
The number of formal interviews can vary. Different companies have different methods, and often the larger ones have a longer process. When I graduated grad school, one company called me in for 4 interviews and still had more for me to go. It was grueling. It was just how they did it. (I took a different job anyway, but not for that reason.)
Some try to get a bunch done in one day and then stop at that, but often even then they’ll call you back for at least one more. Where I worked last we did a phone interview and at least 2 in-person interviews – but maybe more if one or more of the big bosses wanted to meet them or if we wanted to see how they interacted with some of their peers. I was often the phone interviewer and the first person they met.
As much as the hiring process means to the job seeker, it is also a really big deal to the company. Hiring the wrong person can cost a lot of time and money. So some try to build in extra steps to get it right. But understandably that can make a job seeker nuts! All you can do is go with the flow and do your best.
Hello Ronnie,
I have an interview tomorrow (Monday) and I’m really nervous because I haven’t prepared enough and I feel like I’m procrastinating now. I want to say that my weakness is that I get caught up in the details, but I’m not sure exactly how to back it up without hurting myself in the process.
The truth is that I did get caught up in the details in my last internship last summer, and I discontinued my internship due to my course schedule conflicts. I only worked for 2 weeks and I did not even mention it in my resume, but i did work 40 hours at the company so I think it was sort of significant. I was assigned to reconcile two spreadsheets and match the sales numbers using some excel formulas. I found the task very frustrating because I spent the entire two weeks doing this and kept failing to completely match it. I did, however, make progress as I was finding new mismatches and was able to discover some reasons why this may have been happening (this could be my positive spin). But ultimately, I was so frustrated that I decided not to go anymore.
Now, I want to say in my next interview that my weakness is getting caught up with small details and sometimes it’s frustrating to not completely understand the bigger picture. But how do i give it a positive spin while mentioning this experience? And should I even talk about an experience that I didn’t find important enough to put on my resume? By the way, this is a second round interview at an accounting firm.
Thanks,
Alex
Hi Alex,
The positive spin is what you learned from the experience. Maybe you learned that you don’t need to be perfect – that no one is perfect – and it’s OK to ask for help understanding the “big picture” when you are up to your eyeballs in the details. Maybe you learned that Excel formulas can be quirky in very large spreadsheets so you’ve done some studying about Excel (if you have) – about how it treats formulas or that a newer version of Excel doesn’t have the same problem. Demonstrate your problem-solving skills as the positive from this situation demonstrating a weakness.
Given that you are interviewing with an accounting firm – getting caught up in details is probably a good “weakness” to have. Focus on the positive spin. Two Job-Hunt articles can probably help you here:
* Interviewing Expert Laura DeCarlo’s Answering the Greatest Weakness Question article and
* Job Search Mindset Expert Harry Urschel’s How Employers Hear Your Job Stories article.
You have learned something from this experience, and that is your positive spin! Just keep it brief as Laura suggests and remember how employers hear (and interpret what they hear) as Harry recommends.
Good luck with your interview!
Cheers!
Susan
Work Coach Cafe Team Captain
Thank you so much for your quick response Susan. Those two articles greatly helped me and I think I now will be more willing to share and emphasize what I’ve learned from that project and how I should ask clarification questions before jumping straight into the project.
Thanks again,
Alex
I always freeze up when they ask me for my 3 strengths and 3 weaknesses. I’m not the greatest al selling myself. I’m a 19 year old Nurse so the job market is tough to get into anyway and the fact that I have only had one job before graduating Nursing school and that was in a resturant makes professional interviews really hard for me. In fact I have another interview in about an hour and a half and this article really boosted my confidence. Thank you
Hi Kai,
The best way to become unfrozen is to sit down, away from the stress of an interview and write down your 3 strengths and 3 weaknesses, following Ronnie Ann’s advice in this post and the other comments. Writing them down may feel silly, but it will help you think them through, in complete sentences, and make them easier to remember.
Then, practice saying them. Pretend someone has asked you the question, and say your answer. You may be reading the answer the first few times, but gradually you’ll get used to them, and you’ll know what you are going to say next.
As Ronnie Ann advises above, don’t go into too much detail about your weaknesses. And, most of the time you will only need to list one of them. But having more ready is a good idea, just in case you get asked for 3 of them.
The more often you go through the job interview process, the better you will get at it. So, don’t be discouraged. Don’t expect to be perfect at the beginning. Just know that you will get better at it with more experience.
To help with your experience gap, you might want to volunteer at a hospital, helping direct visitors to the appropriate section of the hospital or taking flowers to rooms or something similar. It will get you more comfortable in hospitals, and it will also help you make some contacts, too. Volunteering can be good for your job search, your resume, and your confidence. If you are in a big city where there might be a Veterans Administration hospital, that might be a good place to start.
Good luck!
Susan
I am a bit nervous on how to answer this question. What do you think about saying this…
Some of my previous co-workers thought I was a bit shy…..they later found out that I was just so focused when I’m at work.
Hi Leslie,
That’s a fine answer to the question if it is true. But be prepared to be asked this question as a follow-up: What’s your second greatest weakness?
In my opinion, your answer to the weakness question should be honest but it should also show how you have taken steps to tackle the weakness.
Good luck,
Chandlee
I have an interview tomorrow that I’m not very prepared for. I went over a few different things I could say as my “greatest weakness”, but I’m still unsure of which to say. I’m thinking of saying that I’m not assertive enough or that I tend to get disorganized easily, but I’m not sure that I’ve done enough in trying to change and improve those things about myself. Help?
Hi Nancy,
I don’t know your background or history but one way to answer that question is to say that you tend to focus on doing a job when you are hired — and that you feel one weakness is that you aren’t as strong an interviewer as you are in a job. Another way — which may play naturally is to say that you are very good at following directions but that sometimes you aren’t as assertive as you could be in speaking up when you have a question.
Good luck in your interview tomorrow.
Best,
Chandlee