What’s your most dreaded job-interview question? There are plenty of solid picks. Perhaps “Can you describe a challenge you’ve experienced at work?” Maybe “Why did you decide to leave your current role?” But those are both reasonable things for a hiring manager to ask, even if answering them can feel like carefully stepping around land mines. For many of us who dread this whole process, sweating out every possible scenario in advance, the ultimate anxiety-inducing cliché is a different staple: “What’s your biggest weakness?”
There’s seemingly no great answer. If you’re totally honest (“I must admit that I’m really bad with technology!”), you could be shooting yourself in the foot. If you use a backdoor compliment (“I simply care too much about work!”), you sound disingenuous. So how are you supposed to thread this needle? There are tons of articles out there about this very topic, but it’s hard to know where to start. In an effort to crowdsource directly from the people who’ve asked this very question, I checked in with a number of business professionals—executives, recruiters, interview coaches—to look for trends. Some of their fascinating responses caused me to re-think the entire premise behind the “biggest weakness” query. Turns out there are some creative answers that don’t involve head games.
But before we get to that, what types of responses should you avoid? Lili Foggle, founder of Impressive Interviewing, says there are three clear “red-flag” ways to answer. The first: You can’t identify a weakness at all. “I see this answer with military folks,” she tells GOOD. “They are trained to show no weakness. But that sends an ‘I don’t think I have anything to learn’ message.” The second: the obvious tactic of spinning a strength as a weakness (like saying, “I’m a perfectionist”): “I see this a lot with new grads who ask AI to give them a weakness answer. It shows no self-awareness, no drive for growth.” The third: “disclosing a disqualifying fatal flaw.” While this shows desired self-awareness, it proves you aren’t the right candidate. “[If] the job requires organizational skills,” she says, “they are unlikely to hire someone who admits to being highly disorganized.”
Throughout the responses, “self-awareness” emerged as an obvious theme. According to many of these experts, it’s important to answer this question with specific, detailed information that shows your humanity—including the flaw that you’re clearly working to fix. “Let’s just start with the ‘why?’ behind the question,” says James Wilkson, Managing Partner & Board Member at AEC Global Search Consultants. “It will offload the loaded nature of this question. Think ‘Are you self-aware?’ It’s a great dating question too!”
Wilkson also echoes Foggle’s response, recommending to start with a “genuine personal growth area” while ensuring that your strengths in the desired role are not “derailed” by the weaknesses you’re attempting to improve upon. “For example, leaders, you probably don’t want to mention things like ‘I overanalyze things’ or ‘I’m working on delegating,’” he continues. “No, you are a leader; you can delegate. Sales Executives, ‘communication’ and ‘listening better’ are not your weaknesses, right? Engineers, pilots, CPAs, you don’t ‘miss details’ because, again, in your role, detailed attention is a major component.”
Renessa Boley Layne, a professional speaker, career coach, and author, stressed the importance of authenticity and relatability—which includes side-stepping the generic, canned responses you might be tempted to give. “To hit a home run on the weakness question, you must go all in and really ‘cop’ to the weakness,” she says. “The biggest mistake many people make is using a watered-down, ‘safe’ flaw—which has the undesired effect of making you instantly unlikable to a recruiter or hiring manager. The second mistake is leaving the weakness unqualified. Stating a weakness with no qualifying context will leave you at the mercy of the listener’s ego trip. In that case, the listener gets to determine how bad or how redeemable your deficiency is, and that puts you at a disadvantage.”
Boley Layne says your response should check three boxes. “1. Choose in advance a weakness that people can relate to,” she continues. “You want people nodding their heads (literally or figuratively) like, ‘I totally understand that.’ 2. Briefly share the negative impact of the weakness on your performance—but more importantly, focus on what you’ve done proactively to address the weakness and improve. 3. Lastly, explain what’s shifted. How has your performance improved? How have relationships with colleagues been transformed? How much easier, faster, or more skilled are you? How have other people’s work or lives been impacted by your turnaround? Basically, why is everybody involved better because of your ‘hero’s journey’?”
The next time you find yourself losing sleep the night before an interview, brainstorming clever ways to spin your “weakness” into a strength, just remember: Be crafty—but not at the expense of being real.
