How should I answer questions about strengths, weaknesses, successes and failures?
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Karen James Chopra, LPC, MCC, NCC, has been counseling career clients since 1999 and has helped hundreds of clients change careers, find new jobs and deal more effectively with workplace challenges.
In addition to her private practice, she has worked for two national corporate outplacement firms: Lee Hecht Harrison and Resource Careers. These are the organizations that help people who have experienced a layoff or downsizing to find new jobs, and their programs are usually considered the gold-standard of job search technique.
Ms Chopra is a regular presenter on career issues, having taught career theory at the graduate level, designed and delivered numerous workshops, and served as a regular guest commentator on WMAL’s career radio show “Your Career Life.”
She is a career-changer herself. Before entering the counseling field, she worked for nearly a decade as a trade negotiator for the United States Government, first at the Department of Commerce and then at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.
Ms. Chopra holds a number of relevant licenses and certifications: licensed professional counselor (LPC) in the District of Columbia; Master Career Counselor (MCC), a designation of the National Career Development Association (NCDA); and National Certified Counselor (NCC), a designation of the National Board of Certified Counselors (NBCC). She belongs to all of the relevant national and local associations involved in career counseling, including the American Counseling Association (ACA), the National Employment Counselors Association (NECA), the National Career Development Association (NCDA) and the Washington Metropolitan Area Career-Life Planning Network (MAC-LPN).
Her B.A. is from the University of Virginia, and she received a masters of science in foreign service from Georgetown University, and a masters in community counseling from George Washington University.
How should I answer questions about strengths, weaknesses, successes and failures?
Host: How should I answer questions about strengths, weaknesses, successes and failures?
Karen James Chopra: What we are looking for here are things that are truthful and real about you, but not damaging in terms of the position. So please don't go to just the canned ones, "I am a perfectionist" or "I am a workaholic". Those aren't likely to feel very authentic to the person interviewing you and they really don't help move the interview forward.
Transcripts
Host: How should I answer questions about strengths, weaknesses, successes and failures?
Karen James Chopra: What we are looking for here are things that are truthful and real about you, but not damaging in terms of the position. So please don't go to just the canned ones, "I am a perfectionist" or "I am a workaholic". Those aren't likely to feel very authentic to the person interviewing you and they really don't help move the interview forward. What we are looking for is something that truthfully is a challenge for you. "I have always struggled with being done with an assignment, I'd like to work on it till it's perfect and so it has always been challenge for me to just finish it and get it out the door.
" What you say is, "I've learned over the years to address the situation. I give myself a firm deadline. I do my best by my internal deadline and then hand it off to other people.
" So that what they get is a sense of one, you are aware that you are not a perfect human being and two, but I have learned how to deal or address that and the same thing is true if you are addressing a failure. You want to talk about something that happened in the past, that really is a failure because if you sort of make up something that isn't a failure, they are going to ask, "Yes, well, that really wasn't about you.
" So make sure that this is something that really when you talk about it, they can see, "This wasn't my proudest moment.
" Talk about immediately what you've learnt from it and how you are different now because of that failure and that's what they are looking for in this, not just, "Can you acknowledge having made a mistake?
" That's part (A) of the question, but part (B) is can you describe what you've learnt from it and that's how you handle the weakness and failure type questions.
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