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As a candidate, you may have many opportunities for improvement. While admitting your weaknesses seems scary, faking them can do more harm than good. So, we recommend choosing a real weakness, which, however, is not related to the requirements of the job description. If you mention a weakness that is essential to the role, you
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give a reason to the recruiter to choose someone else. On the other hand, providing the right answer helps you portray yourself as a good fit for the role and boosts your chances of advancing to the next stage. To find your key weaknesses, exercising self-awareness is imperative. To do this, we suggest creating a list of your areas for enhancement.
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Below are some of the questions you may consider asking yourself. The answers that come up more frequently will be your main weaknesses. – Is there a task or skill related to work that I do not like to do or that I am not good at? – Was there ever a time when I failed at work and fixed it? – Did my supervisor mention we need to improve on
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something and then praise me when I fixed it? – Has anyone criticized me for working a certain way? – Am I required to improve something, and how do I approach it? – How did I fail to complete a task, and what did I do for improvement? – What I don’t like about the job?
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At this point, you can steer the conversation by choosing a skill-based or a character-based answer. We strongly recommend not using cliche answers like “I am a perfectionist” or “I don’t have any weaknesses”. This is a red flag for recruiters that may create a perception that you are not truthful, you are not self-aware, or you are arrogant.
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Moreover, choosing a skill-based answer can be a sensible choice because you can take solid steps to develop that particular skill by learning a new skill or tool. However, be aware of the context of the interviewer’s inquiry as they may be expecting a character-based answer. You don’t want to appear as if you’re deflecting
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the question. For instance, if you find yourself in an interview for a position in the tech industry, you can answer the question by presenting a weakness in a tool, assuming it’s not required, as in the example below. Example with a hard skill: “Excel is always useful. The younger me realized the possibilities of managing
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myself and tracking important data for my activities very early. But I always knew the basic stuff, and that became a hindrance later. As I was developing my career in the industry, I wanted to be able to use it more efficiently and creatively. That is why I took online courses and that helped me realize that I am a visual learner. Now I try to use visual graphs all the time.”
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The attitude of realizing your weak areas and taking the initiative to develop yourself further is a universally engaging quality for all enterprises and organizations. Thus, making yourself more wanted. In order to demonstrate these qualities, you should mention previous successful efforts for improvement. For example,
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how you developed great project management skills by doing a specific activity. Another way is to explain that you are in the process of improving and have seen some positive early results. For instance, reading a book about project management and implementing specific techniques you learned give you better results. Some
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useful tips as proof of improvement could be the following: – Took a paid or free course online – Read a book – Attended seminars/courses on events related to your weakness – Joined groups and workshops – Did volunteer work – Asked and received help
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from a friend, mentor, or colleague – Found new ways and tools to improve
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1) Don’t Like Repetitive Tasks “I find myself not giving my 100% when I’m working on repetitive tasks. My results were dwindling, and that hurt my creativity. I analyzed the tasks and realized that although we do the same thing in general, every situation is different. And under close inspection, I realized hidden details. If they were improved,
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the process would be more efficient, and my department would save time. So before going to my supervisor, I joined a management class online to be able to present them better, and my supervisor was amazed! I was able to raise productivity by 12%.”
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2) Delegation “Sometimes, it’s hard for me to delegate responsibilities when I feel I can handle a job on my own. Usually, I can manage multiple aspects of the projects I participate in. But when I was promoted to Manager in my last role, I had to learn to delegate tasks. To help me with that, I established a new process
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that uses a project management system with constant communication from the respective teams. This way, we have real-time expected deliveries, and this system has allowed me to improve my ability to delegate effectively.”
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3) Public speaking “I get nervous when I speak in public. Even though it has little to do with my role as a designer, I still feel that it is a necessary skill – especially to communicate ideas. To overcome this, I asked for help from my manager, and he advised me to talk for a few minutes at each team meeting about our project timeline,
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deadlines, and goals. That allowed me to relax and look forward to public speaking as an opportunity to help my team. I also bought a book about it to expand my comfort zone even more.”
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4) Talkative “I am talking a lot, especially when I am excited about something. I am the first person to build relationships with my colleagues, and this is a great team-building skill. However, I sometimes bring the conversation to a point where it can distract other colleagues. That’s why I found other ways to connect with my co-workers.
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I wanted everyone to feel at ease and took responsibility for all the team-building activities and annual events in my previous position.”
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5) Giving Advice “When someone asks for my opinion, I really want to offer valuable advice to them, but I tend to overdo it. I really listen, and that’s how I was promoted to Manager. But when I am giving advice, I speak too much, and I expect things to run instantly better. After reading a book on how to offer feedback (book name), I
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spoke with each of my team members, and we discussed how they would like to receive feedback. Now I know how to respond and give assistance while not overdoing it.
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6) Impatience “Sometimes, I don’t have enough patience. When we are working on a project, and it doesn’t go as planned, I get frustrated. I usually finish my tasks as soon as possible, but that’s not realistic for everyone. That weakness affected my relationship with my co-workers. In order to improve this aspect,
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I spoke with my colleagues to understand their point of view and offer my help.”
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7) Work-Life Balance “I have a hard time finding a balance between work and life, especially after going full remote. I had constant stress, and when I was in sight of the computer I thought about work. To improve my situation, I set up my computer in a different room that became my office. Now I have more structure in my day and more focus overall.”