To think there is no good answer to the question " what are your weaknesses?"

[Unreasonablyfedup]

I mean, it's a lose/lose situation. If you say you haven't got any - then you look stupid - and a liar. If you admit to any then it is just something for the interviewer to bash you over the head with later.

Someone suggested the best answer would be "After Eight Mints" but I doubt that would be helpful.

Seriously though - what do you say??

flowery, I see what you're saying but would offer one point in mitigation. I think whether the "weaknesses" question is asked or whether you ask about self development will very much depend on the seniority of the candidate. In my organisation we have to test for self awareness pretty much at all levels so I need to find out the same information but go about it in different ways depending on the candidate, the job and how the interview is going. Original Poster, your post contains great advice.

I tend to do a bit of both approaches, which works well.

Something along the lines of... I am a caffeine addict, [pause for canned laughter] but really I need to develop xyz [insert something from the job description where you don't have that much experience but it would be easily developed with training etc. Normally something process driven]. Shows creativity and self awareness.

I have found this gets a great repsonse, and would NEVER go with a personal weakness or something ridiculous like 'I am a perfectionist'. Having interviewed people who use that line, I know how terribly irritating (and generally untrue) it is.

novice have I got the job, then?

I think there are plenty of good answers to the question - as others have said they just need to be accompagnied by how you'd like to improve them. I'm in a job where we get evaluated every six months minimum, with our strengths and "improvement axes". 6 months later you have to show how you have improved on each point and what your next targets for improvement are.

I have said on a couple of occasion that I am not a morning person. The interviewer has always laughed. Then I have said, more seriously, I am working on my written French, or something like that. Something I need for the job, a hard skill. Powerpoint is another one I used. But always say I am working on it.

Original Poster yup definitely

It's not a rubbish question, nor is it a trick question.

Tell them honestly about one of your weaknesses - that helped you choose what career to do....

eg 'I'm a very impatient person, which is why I prefer to work as an XYZ where impatience is a benefit. But I would be absolutely no good at all working as a ZZZZ because that requires more patience than I have.'

All careers require certain attributes and others aren't helpful.....

noviceoftheday Mon 29-Aug-11 12:20:53
flowery, I see what you're saying but would offer one point in mitigation. I think whether the "weaknesses" question is asked or whether you ask about self development will very much depend on the seniority of the candidate.

I don't think 'what are your weaknesses' is ever a good question tbh. How a replacement question is phrased may (and should) vary hugely depending on the role, I agree. But 'what are your weaknesses' is vague - there's no context or anything. It's lazy imo. It's the sort of questions that's added to a list of questions with no thought at all. Questions should be about getting the information you need to find out in order to decide who is the best person for that particular job.

The key is identifying exactly what information you (one) as the interviewer is looking for from the question, and phrasing it accordingly. If you're looking for self-awareness in terms of personal development, ask that. If you're looking for what skills listed in the person spec for this job that person feels they are slightly lacking in, or would need extra help with, ask that.

If you're looking for historic weaknesses in terms of what jobs the person did that weren't for them and why, ask that. If you're looking for character traits or attributes that might be considered by the average person to be weaknesses, by all means ask that, but be certain you can identify why you need to know about character traits in order to help you decide who is best for that particular job.

It's an awful question as who in their right mind would ever answer it honestly!!

Best answer I heard (question was not asked by me btw) the guy said he wasn't a very confident public speaker and had taken steps to improve this by getting practice etc. That's now the answer I use if asked.

I agree with Monkey and Flowery, shit question from a shit interviewer. We use competence based interviewing, which works for us.

pedantry
perfectionism

What if it is your weakness, though? It's definitely mine

The appraisal system in my organisation is a 360 degree feedback system and an important part of that is the self assessment. Everyone from the chairman down to the most junior secretary is expected to assess how their year has gone and what their strengths are and development areas (we don't use the word weaknesses anymore). To be successful one has to be self aware enough to pinpoint these areas because the feedback is pretty frank so others will tell you if you don't know yourself. The most successful people in our organisation are the ones who are self aware enough and have sufficient emotional intelligence to know what they're really good at, what they are not so good at and what impact this has on others around them both good and bad. Really, in this context, I don't see what is so wrong with asking the same question at interview. My only caveats are that we don't actually say "what are your weakness" we tend to say "what are your development areas" but as we use behavioural interview style, we use the information to then ask the candidate to give us examples and effectively to self assess. This is no different to what's asked at appraisal time.

The appraisal system in my organisation is a 360 degree feedback system and an important part of that is the self assessment. Everyone from the chairman down to the most junior secretary is expected to assess how their year has gone and what their strengths are and development areas (we don't use the word weaknesses anymore). To be successful one has to be self aware enough to pinpoint these areas because the feedback is pretty frank so others will tell you if you don't know yourself. The most successful people in our organisation are the ones who are self aware enough and have sufficient emotional intelligence to know what they're really good at, what they are not so good at and what impact this has on others around them both good and bad. Really, in this context, I don't see what is so wrong with asking the same question at interview. My only caveats are that we don't actually say "what are your weakness" we tend to say "what are your development areas" but as we use behavioural interview style, we use the information to then ask the candidate to give us examples and effectively to self assess. This is no different to what's asked at appraisal time.