Top Interview Question - “What are your weaknesses ?”

“What are your weaknesses ?” is a common question asked especially in HR round interviews. It is usually asked to know how truthful you are and how well you know yourself. Through this question interviewers also aim to know your willingness to learn new things to ameliorate your areas of improvements. 

Survey done by a leading job website reveals that over 71% of the candidates stutter while responding to questions related to their weaknesses. I too had similar experiences in numerous interviews I took for all levels. I realised that candidates often fumble because either they are genuinely not aware of their weaknesses or are not able to present in a way that don’t put them in a bad light and worsens success chances. Mostly they came unprepared without doing a grounded homework for its desired response. Hence, I found it appropriate to discuss some of its apt responses which may serve as a guide/ reference points for framing your own ‘most suited response’ and your chances of landing in the job you applied for becomes brighter. 

We all have one or the other weaknesses as a matter of fact nobody in this world is ‘perfect’ but all of us can be better than we are through our conscious efforts put in learning new things needed for our improvements in desired fields. So, at first don’t be afraid of it that you have a weakness. Your fear of weakness can be pernicious as it has the tendency to overshadow the level of confidence in your strengths. 

For preparing response to this question, the first thing you need to do is to realise your weak points through thorough introspection, feedbacks from people in office and near and dear ones in your personal life, taking psychometric tests, reviewing your appraisal forms etc. 

Once you are clear about your weaknesses, next is to decide which particular weakness you should share and which to evade. Keep in mind that it should be authentic but not self wrecking. Also don’t select a weakness that is related to desired job skill of the position you applied for. For example, if you are applying for MIS Executive job, don’t state that that you lack in analytic skills. You should share only those weaknesses that are common and admissible in the workplace.

After you decide which weakness to tell comes the way to present the same. Here you need to be very cautious and ensure that it’s not presented ‘as it is’. More importantly you need to showcase how and when you realised your weakness and steps you took to overcome the same. Give a detailed view of the way you took it as a challenge and dusted yourself to elude future falters. You can also exhibit the manner in which you leveraged your strengths to overshadow weaknesses. While doing these always emphasise on positive words, tone and facial expressions. Also end up the discussion by flowing it towards job requirements and evincing that you are the most suitable candidate for the given role. If you do so, interviewers will consider these as your strengths. 

Below are some of the examples of the way this question could be responded. 

1. I was not good in public speaking. This I realised when I moved to a new role where I needed to conduct marketing events at regular intervals. I took this weakness as a challenge. I saw a lot of public speaking videos on YouTube, consistently did rigorous practice till I reached desired level of competence in it. 

2. I was always lenient with my team. I realised that some team members were taking undue advantage of it and that was hampering overall productivity of the department. Realising that, I moulded myself into a strict manager atleast from outside. 

3. I was a bit unorganised in keeping hard copy of documents. That was causing problems. However now I learnt the Japanese technique of 5 S and implemented the same in file/ document maintenance. Now things are more organised both at my work station and at my home. 

4. I wanted to do everything on my own and was hesitant in delegating the task. This I realised when I found that life of some of my peers were much easier by virtue of delegation. Also as I grew up in hierarchy and underwent managerial/ leadership trainings, I understood the significance of delegation and started delegating task to team and now the life is much easier. Also I see enhanced competency level of my team. 

5. I was not good in networking. Seeing my colleagues and friends, joined many professional groups, started going to conferences and industrial gatherings. Today I have professional connects more than I ever thought. 

6. Labour laws is one of my weak points. Though I am in Talent Management profile, to meet my end goal of becoming CHRO, I need to have understanding of all vertices of HR including labour laws. I have enrolled in 6 months diploma course in labour laws. I have also subscribed labour law reporter. This is helping me in having better understanding on labour law matters. 

7. Due to my basic nature of not hurting anyone’s feelings, I was always afraid of giving real feedback to the team, peers and managers. One of my seniors pointed out this weakness of mine and nominated me for PMS workshop. There I learnt the art of giving constructive and productive feedback. Now I am better at it. 

8. I realised that I was not too good in excel. Though expertise in excel was not basic requirement of my job at times when needed, I had to put extra efforts in making data. One of my juniors was excellent at it. I took coaching from him and that enhanced my excel skills. 

9. Even after completing my task in the best possible way, I was never satisfied with my own performance. I always feel that it could have been better. At times that led to delay as I used to redo the task which I already did  by spending hours on it. I read a lot articles on ‘pros and cons of being a perfectionist’. Also attended workshops on it and realised that it is actually a psychological issue. Now I have understood that getting job done in the right way within given timeline is more important than missing timelines because of repeatedly doing and redoing the task in anticipation of ‘perfection’. 

10. I was a silent worker and never opted for highlighting my achievements. That was impacting my appraisals. 2 years back even after exceeding targets, I didn’t get desired appraisal rating. When I discussed the same with my reporting manager, I found that he was not aware of my achievements. That was a big setback to me. Post that I started focusing on my performance visibility. Now I ensure that my genuine outstanding contributions are known to the target audience. That produced positive results on my appraisals.

Please note that above examples are just for your awareness / guidance on how to tackle this question and you need not copy paste the same in interviews. Work-life and competence of one differs from others. Also, different things work in different situations. Hence you need to frame your response which is most suited to your situation by keeping pointers mentioned above as your reference point. 

All The Best !