I hate this question...

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I have a couple interviews coming up and I need some advice. I think I interview pretty well (I've never not gotten a job I've interviewed for), but I always struggle with the "what's your greatest weakness?" question. What are some good answers to this that make it into a positive? It's the question I always find myself struggling through!!! I hate it so much and get so nervous about it that I don't even remember what some of my previous answers have been. I know that I'm a perfectionist... but that seems really generic. The positions I'm interview for are critical care and ER, if that helps. Thanks!

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I HATE that question too ...

I usually try to spin the question back on them. Like:

"I am a perfectionist, and sometimes its a downfall because I spend too much time checking and re-checking other people's as well as my own work"

It plays into the whole. Check twice ... Save a life motto.

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yeah that was my thought. "I'm a perfectionist and sometimes I feel like I'm constantly rechecking myself to make something better. Even if I know I've done the best I can do, I still try to find ways to make it better for the next time."

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you can either say kryptonite :D

or

you could pick a weakness from your last job that you had and that you overcame - and briefly (in 1 or 2 sentences) explain what you did to improve the weakness.

or

you could be honest and pick something in your personal life that is not related to the job.

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Specializes in Management, Emergency, Psych, Med Surg.

Tell them that you have a morbid fear of doing poorly on a job interview.

I used to just tell them straight up that sometimes I lose my temper. (It was true. Might as well get it out there). Never kept me from getting a job.

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The only acceptable answer is "I'm a workaholic". Do NOT, NOT, NOT go discussing your temper or your personal weaknesses, For God's sake!!! That is just nobody's business.

"Oh, I just can't stay away from work, even on my days off. I hate having holidays off, especially the major ones, like Thanksgiving and Christmas". "I don't like to eat at work. It makes me sluggish". "Well, I do tend to ignore nature's call at work". "I really hate straight shifts. I love to work all 3 shifts in a week - in reverse order -graves, then eve's, then days." "Weekends? Never heard of them." Some malarkey like that.

Come on, what would you as an employer want to hear? Do you really think that an employer will hire you if you admit to being human and having a temper or any other weakness that everyone has but that never should be named on an interview when you are supposed to be shining like gold? I always just feel like telling them, "Look, Jack, ypu're hiring and I need the money. Can we make beautiful music together or not?"

"Oh, I probably am too wiling to volunteer for OT and to cover my coworkers for lunch breaks". I should probably let someone else have some OT. "I"m too poetic. I believe in teamork and will bend over backwards to promote harmony."

"I love being called upon to translate for the six languages I speak and no, you don't have to pay me extra and I will still do all of my own assignment, even though I had to take about 2 hours to translate when you tally it all up, but I don't expect the staff for whom I translated to offer to help me with my own assignment."

I think whoever asks such questions is an idiot. Do you want to hire someone or not? Stop asking these insane, inane, ridiculous questions and just hire the person, for God's sake. Yeah, yeah, do the background checks, verify the license and experience, just stop being a priest and acting like the interview is a confessional.

"I keep my car and back-up car running too well. That leaves me with no transportation excuse to call off." "I keep a uniform in the car and you can always reach me by cell phone. So I never will miss a chance at OT. There's that old workaholic thing again."

Or you can say, "Can we come back to that?" and see if they do. I've had interviewers who did not!

Get real, people.

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^^^... HAHAHHAHAHA

The interview I have today is kind of a warm up to the one I have Thursday... of the 2 jobs, the Thursday one is the one I'd rather have.

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Specializes in Medical.

Having worked with a nurse who had OCD to such an extent that she had to leave - redoing dressings 14 times, rechecking meds more than 20 times before giving them then freaking out the patients by getting them to spit out the meds for one last check - I am cautious about overdoing the perfectionist angle.

My greatest flaws are that I am not always as approachable as I would like, particularly when work is frenetic, and that I have to work hard suffering fools :)

I think interviewers who ask this are looking for how well you know yourself and what mechanisms you use to overcoming your imperfections. So: recognising that these are problem areas for me, I make an extra effort to be approachable when things are insane, and I try to see dealing with idiots as a challenge to help me grow rather than a frustration. Though not always successful I continue to do better over time.

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Specializes in psych, addictions, hospice, education.

Try to find something about yourself that is both a curse AND a blessing. When I've been asked that question, I say I'm very organized and sometimes I feel stressed if I can't be as organized as I'd like. Being organized is good! So the negative could be a positive in the employer's eyes. See what I mean?

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Specializes in chemical dependency detox/psych.

I have a good response to this question (and it's completely truthful for me)--it works especially well if you know that they do their documentation on a computer:

"I think my greatest weakness is having to write out my documentation long-hand. I'm from the generation that grew up with computers, and my thoughts tend to flow much better on a computer, for some reason. When I try to write things out, I always seem to word things awkwardly or forget some point that I was trying to make. Then I have to cross it out, and it can look rather messy. There's no backspace key with writing things out! At my last employer that was using long-hand documentation, I was able to improve the quality by writing out a draft-copy--then I could get it right before I recorded it on their permanent record."

This response worked really well for me. I got my interview panel chuckling about the struggles of writing things out, and sparked a great discussion on how documentation has changed over the years.

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Specializes in Pedatrics, Child Protection.

i think interviewers who ask this are looking for how well you know yourself and what mechanisms you use to overcoming your imperfections. so: recognising that these are problem areas for me, i make an extra effort to be approachable when things are insane, and i try to see dealing with idiots as a challenge to help me grow rather than a frustration. though not always successful i continue to do better over time.

i've been on many interview panels. this is exactly what the question is asking (in red). if you're moving into a new care area, are you able to identify that there may be new meds/treatments/diagnoses that you will need to learn/re-learn? are you able to think critically and come up with solutions/processes for your own learning? do you know who your unit resources may be? was there a time when you had to learn something new? what did you do/how did you handle the change?

and be honest, if you can't come up with an example right away then ask to come back to that question. interviewers know when you're making things up, and if you go the "i work too hard; i'm a perfectionist" route they'll see through it. perhaps a better way to say it is: "i work too hard and sometimes miss my breaks....i need to work on delegating/asking for help".

good luck.

rnannjeh

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Specializes in Surgical, quality,management.

When I interviewed for my first job after graduating I could honestly say it was delegating. After 4 year of having tasks delegated to me (the education system is different in Ireland) I felt very concerned about what i could delegate and how to confirm that it was done without sounding like the bssy new nurse. 2 years later I interviewd again at the same hospital for a permant post and I was asked what had changed in the 2 years I had worked. Delegation was a big change. I was at that stage confident to delegate to HCA's depending on who the acutal person was I could safely know what had been done.

In my last interview when asked what i thought was my weakness I could honestly say handwriting. We still document on paper in most hospitals in Ireland and Australia and when i am under pressure to document and I have 100 thoughts flying around my head that I want to get down on paper my handwritting takes the brunt of it! It becomes terriable. I then told the interviewers that the best way I have found to overcome this is to write progressive notes through out the shift. This answer turned out to work in my favour as the ward I work on uses progressive documentation as it is a fast paced ED assessment unit.

Try and think of something related to job you are interviewing for and not the generic i am a perfectionist because if they ring your referers and get a bog standard reference rather than "she was a perfectionist who paid great attention to every little detail" you have painted yourself into a corner!!

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