People have been sharing their ‘best’ answers to the commonly asked interview questions, ‘What’s your biggest weakness’, and there seems to be a clear winner amongst them
An interview pro has shared the ‘best’ answer to the question ‘what’s your biggest weakness’ – and it has saved job seekers a lot of embarrassment. Sharing the “life pro tip” on social media, a career savvy user explained exactly how to answer this question to impress the interviewer and put yourself in the best position to secure the job.
They said: “When a job interviewer asks, ‘What’s your biggest weakness?’, interpret the question in practical terms rather than in terms of personality faults.” Explaining how to make this mental flip, they added: “Sometimes I let people take advantage of me’, or ‘I take criticism personally’ are bad answers. ‘I’m too honest’ or ‘I work too hard’ even if they believe you, make you sound like you’ll be irritating to be around or you’ll burn out.
Instead, say something like, ‘My biggest weakness with regards to this job is, I have no experience with [company’s database platform]’ or ‘I don’t have much knowledge about [single specific aspect of job] yet, so it would take me some time to learn.’.”
Although his highlights a true weakness to the job, it’s an ‘understandable’ weakness that makes you appear open, honest and open to improvement.
The interview expert added: “These are real weaknesses that are relevant to the job, but they’re also fixable things that you’ll correct soon after being hired. Personality flaws are not (and they’re also none of the interviewer’s business).”
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Sharing how they’ve previously answered this question, one user said: “I once said ‘food’ sort of jokingly and saw him write it down as my official answer…
“I was a teenager and got the job! It was in a Debenhams and they put me in homeware.”
Another user said: “During an interview once, they asked me, ‘How would your coworkers describe you?’ I said, ‘probably tall’ and saw the lady write tall on the paper. Like smile a bit damn.”
A third user said: “In a recent job interview, I responded to a version of this question with multiple genuine weaknesses related to the job – then realised what I’d done and finished it up with ‘And I just spent several minutes of my job interview thinking of as many weaknesses as I can, so maybe put poor decision-making down too.’
“I got an offer later the same day. I think people appreciate someone who’s willing to genuinely reflect on their shortcomings and take criticism.”