After one has submitted their best resume or perfect resume to a hiring manager, recruiter, or employer, they will be endorsed to the next step of the hiring or application process. Most application processes will let the person continue to the interview where the hiring manager or the HR will try to gauge the person’s personality, knowledge, and skills.
Many questions will come up during an interview. One of the most common questions is “What are your strengths and weakness?” which the interviewer will pose to the interviewee as a way to measure their self-awareness and whether or not the person is fit for both the work culture and the applied position.
The “What are your strengths and weakness?” question allows the interviewee to showcase one’s self-awareness and willingness to learn and improve. To answer this question, one must comfortably list out their various hard skills, soft skills, and flaws to the interviewer and illustrate how one can leverage these strengths and weaknesses in one’s work.
Begin by understanding the context, theme, and tone of the interview you will be in. This will help you navigate specific nuances and terms that are relevant to the position you are going to be applying for.
Body language plays a large role in a successful job interview. This means that you must practice proper body language and delivery when you are giving your strengths and weaknesses as these can be a great tell whether you are open to the idea of willingly sharing said answers.
Create an outline that you can use to structure your answer to this question. Using the outline, you can create a well-paced interview answer that can properly detail your strengths and weaknesses in an instant.
You can also create a small note that will list your strengths and weaknesses in bullet form, which will act as a guide during the interview. You can use your general resume or the position’s job description as a reference for what you can put on your list.
Hiring managers have a specific schema of people they will endorse into the next step in the application process. One factor in the schema includes the person’s ability to accept and take responsibility for their mistakes. Also, the person should be open to being trained or criticized for their shortcomings. The best way a person can present this characteristic to the HR manager is by showing a semblance of self-awareness in the interview.
SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, and Threat) analysis is a framework businesses use strategically to plan out the trajectory of their product, service, or commodity. Not only will the SWOT analysis provide the company or business with a salient direction, but it will also allow the said company or business the ability to see and evaluate one’s position amongst the competition. The SWOT analysis will try to take into account the various factors that have an overall impact on the overall performance of the company.
One of the best ways to provide feedback is through the feedback sandwich method. This method pads out the negative feedback by providing positive feedback before and after the criticism. You can use the feedback sandwich model to highlight the strength and weaknesses of the person’s performance during their review. Doing this feedback structure will increase the person’s reception and willingness to work on their weaknesses.
The strengths and weaknesses question is one of the most common types of interview questions one will face during a job interview. Knowing how to showcase one’s strengths and weaknesses will improve one’s chances of being endorsed into the next step of the application or hiring process.
