Friday, July 10, 2009

Your Biggest Weakness - How to answer this Interview Question

Over on the Recruiter's Roundtable at Yahoo Hotjobs there was a discussion regarding how to field one of the most commonly asked Interview Questions, "What is your Biggest Weakness?"
You can view the whole discussion here.

I thought the advice from Delynn Senna, Executive Director from Robert Half International, was excellent. She replied:

"There are times when I ask job candidates this question. It's not that I want to nitpick or make people feel uncomfortable, but rather I want to see in which areas they feel they need to improve and what they are doing about it. In order to advance professionally, we all need to be able to honestly identify not just our strengths but also our weaknesses and how we can upgrade in these areas.

I recommend that job candidates be upfront during interviews. Don't say you have "no weaknesses" or "work too hard." Instead, tell hiring managers what you are working on improving and what you've done to build your skills in these areas.

One thing to keep in mind: If one of your weaknesses is directly related to the position and could potentially take you out of the running, the opportunity may not be right for you."

Bottom line - the reality is that you should be honest. If you really have a weakness that would inhibit your ability to do the job....then you really should not be interviewing for it.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

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Best regards
Henry