HOW TO
TALK ABOUT YOUR WEAKNESS?
Nobody is perfect, right? You , me and everybody else have some or the other flaws otherwise we all would have been perfectionists. Jokes apart. Talking about weakness doesn't make us weak or not capable enough. It just shows our honesty and the capability to accept the reality but just accepting the reality and not working on it would not really help.
According to interviewers, a perfect candidate is someone who can accept their flaws and promise to work on it and improve their skills as well. A person has both strengths and weaknesses. The percentage can be more of strengths and less of weakness or weakness levels can be more than the strengths, and to be honest it does not matter. It does not matter until we decide to accept our flaws and work on them. Defining a weakness is okay but letting it dominant over years is not really okay.
We all are not perfect but at the same time we should not let our weakness take over our mind. For example - a child is weak in maths but all other subjects are good. Does that mean that the child is not good in studies just because of his weakness in maths.
The parent and the child have to understand that it is not possible to score perfectly in each subject at the same time they need not pressurise their kid to score best like other subjects. They should encourage the kid to accept the situation and not give up on it rather work on it and slowly try to overcome the weakness.
Same way for a job candidate giving up on their weakness like “ Oh! I can’t do this!” “This is not my cup of tea!” is not the correct approach to go for. Accepting the weakness and having a mindset to overcome it is the correct thought to have. Come on! Who loves to be dependent on someone due to something, when you can do it yourself. Self dependence is the key to being on your own.
What is weakness?
Weakness is not a fault or a flaw. Let us just
define it correctly first and burst the myth that every weakness we have makes
us not capable enough like others who can do it. Weakness can be something
which does not have our interest, like we do not like doing that therefore we
end up not exploring it. In turn we end up losing more interest and forget
about overcoming that situation. What is the way out? Should we just keep it
the way it was? No! If that skill will make us independent then we should work
on improving that skill and slowly and steadily master it. This does not mean
that if we do not know how to sing , we still need to learn it, no! We need to
make the correct choice and work on the skills which we know are important for
us but still we ignored earlier. Sort things and work on them.
Statistics -
Around 85 percent of people tend to lie on
their resumes. Which means they want to add more of their skills and ignore the
weaknesses. Lying in a resume simply means that one is trying to portray
themselves as perfect , that they know everything. According to a study, a
candidate has only 7 seconds to make an impression on the interviewers,
otherwise they might end up getting roasted for their lies to show themselves
as perfectionists. It is said that only 20 percent people get the chance to
appear for an interview. People who get this chance end up messing up something
and letting others get hired.
How to talk about weakness in Job Interview ?
●
Know about your weakness - before
talking about your weakness , first know about it. Ask your mind, what is it
about then accept it and promise to work on it. The golden rule for this kind
of situation is to not lie to yourself. Lying to yourself would not help
because you know yourself very well. So first accept it yourself before coming
out in front of everyone.
●
Promise factor - promises are
meant to be broken right? But it would not help in this case. If you are
applying for a job and the job description mentions a skill you lack, then it
is your duty to work on it before appearing for the interview because it is
very unlikely that the interviewer will hire you for a position in which you
lack skills. It is better to apply for positions accordingly. For a content
writer , if they are not good with finance and accounts that is still
understandable but if that person says “ I cannot write articles but still I
want to interview for the position!” Does that make sense? I guess No!
●
Be honest - be honest in whatever
you say. Do not express your views like what if I don’t know this , it does not
matter. It is not your duty to think, you just need to express your answer,
that is it. That does not mean that you will put yourself down. If the skill
you lack is not related to the job position, you need not worry. Even if it is
related to the job position, just express that you are open to learn, improve
and upgrade your skills.
●
Talk with examples - talk about your personal experience where you
have overcome one such weakness or give examples from already existing people
who conquered their flaws and say that if they can, why can’t I ? make the
interviewer believe that you can do it too. Once they are impressed , no one
can stop you from getting hired.
●
Don’t sound like a parrot - every
job candidate or interviewee gets prepared for tricky questions like this. You
already know your weakness and must have framed your answer according to the
requirement of the question but while answering just be confident and don’t
sound like you are reciting an answer you already learnt the day before.
●
Sort your weaknesses - for a job
interview , it is not required for the interviewer to know whether you can
dance or not until and unless it is really required for the job position.
Discuss issues which are related to the work or concerning any of the
departments. Talk about any specific skill the interviewer mentions, sort it on
the spot whether it is your strength or weakness and talk about it accordingly.
●
Do not say you do not have any
weakness - saying that you are a perfectionist and you work very hard might
make you sound overconfident, avoid doing that.
“Build on your strengths , work on your
weaknesses” - Minh Tan
To conclude, I would like to say that, in an
interview, I didn’t know the answer to a few of their questions but instead of
pretending that I was thinking about the answer to that question, I accepted
that I didn’t know the answer. Saying this because honestly accepting
weaknesses is a sign of power and you might end up getting hired because of
this. Say no to pretending and yes to honesty.
REFERENCES -
How To Talk About Your Biggest Weaknesses In A Job
InterviewHow To Talk About Your Biggest
30
Mind-Blowing Interview Statistics to Get You Going in 2021