{"id":1273,"date":"2018-12-12T10:04:55","date_gmt":"2018-12-12T10:04:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/?p=1273"},"modified":"2018-12-12T10:04:55","modified_gmt":"2018-12-12T10:04:55","slug":"what-is-your-greatest-weakness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/2018\/12\/12\/what-is-your-greatest-weakness\/","title":{"rendered":"What is your greatest weakness?"},"content":{"rendered":"<section class=\"post-headline-wrapper\">\n<h1 class=\"post-headline \">Does a job candidate&#8217;s answer to this simple interview question predicts success better than their entire resume?<\/h1>\n<\/section>\n<section class=\"byline-wrapper col-12\">\n<div class=\"byline \">\n<div class=\"byline-content\">\n<div class=\"byline-row\">\n<div>\n<div class=\"byline-author\"><span><a class=\"byline-link byline-author-name\" href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/author\/shana-lebowitz\">Shana Lebowitz<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"byline-timestamp\">Nov. 13, 2018, 8:37 AM<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<section class=\"share-wrapper share-wrapper-top\">\n<div class=\"group-clip\">\n<div class=\"group-icons\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<div class=\"col-12\">\n<figure id=\"img-572955\" class=\"figure image-figure-image   postload\"><img src=\"https:\/\/amp.businessinsider.com\/images\/5be9d718c9570143a979f979-750-563.jpg\" alt=\"Traci Wilk\" \/><figcaption class=\"image-caption\">&#8220;I&#8217;d much rather bring somebody into the organization that has taken risks and failed than [somebody who] has always taken the safe route,&#8221; says Traci Wilk (pictured).<\/figcaption><span class=\"image-source-caption \"><span class=\"image-source\">Courtesy of Traci Wilk<\/span><\/span><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<section id=\"l-content\" class=\"is-right-rail\"><\/section>\n<section class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col-12\">\n<article>\n<section class=\"post-content typography \">\n<div class=\"\">\n<ul class=\"summary-list \">\n<li><strong class=\"\">Asking\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/category\/interview-questions\">interview questions<\/a>\u00a0about challenging work experiences can help discern whether a candidate is willing to learn from their mistakes.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong class=\"\">That&#8217;s according to Traci Wilk, senior vice president of people at The Learning Experience and former HR exec at Starbucks.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong class=\"\">Wilk wants to see evidence of a &#8220;growth mindset,&#8221; or the belief that talents can be developed through hard work.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div>\n<p class=\"\">One of the hardest parts of a job interview is talking about your flaws and stumbles.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Sometimes the prompt is literally, &#8220;what&#8217;s your greatest weakness?&#8221; Other times it&#8217;s, &#8220;why were you let go from your last job?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">If you&#8217;re interviewing with Traci Wilk, there&#8217;s a good chance she&#8217;ll encourage you to &#8220;tell me about the most challenging work experience that you had and what you learned from it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Wilk is the senior vice president of people at\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thelearningexperience.com\/\">The Learning Experience<\/a>, an early education and childcare franchise. She has also led human resources departments at Starbucks, Coach, and rag &amp; bone. She told Business Insider that, when she asks candidates to share their most challenging work experiences, she&#8217;s not exactly trying to suss out their tendency to miss deadlines or talk back to their boss.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Instead, she&#8217;s looking for evidence of a &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/how-a-growth-mindset-leads-to-success-2014-8\">growth mindset<\/a>.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"><em class=\"\"><strong class=\"\">Read more:<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/interview-questions-show-vulnerability-admit-weaknesses-2018-11\">\u00a0An HR exec who&#8217;s worked at Starbucks and Coach was recently asked a surprising question by a job candidate that rocketed them to the top of the list<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Wilk said that if the candidate naturally talks about &#8220;things that they would have done differently,&#8221; that&#8217;s a good sign because it shows a &#8220;high degree of self-awareness.&#8221; She especially wants to see the candidate share some &#8220;reflection or a postmortem that they may have done after the situation, how they&#8217;ve taken that and applied it into future situations.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">In fact, Wilk added, she&#8217;s generally more interested in a candidate&#8217;s ability to learn than in their r\u00e9sum\u00e9. &#8220;Is this someone that&#8217;s going to come into the organization certainly with best practices, but also willing to be flexible, willing to be innovative? That&#8217;s really the main thing that I&#8217;m assessing when I&#8217;m meeting with a candidate.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"><em class=\"\"><strong class=\"\">Read more:<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/interview-questions-ask-about-professional-development-2018-9\">\u00a0An executive coach says practically everyone forgets to ask the job interview question that exposes a big red flag<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"\">Other HR leaders say a &#8216;growth mindset&#8217; is key to success<\/h2>\n<p class=\"\">The term &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/psychology-finding-passion-2018-7\">growth mindset<\/a>&#8221; was coined by psychologist Carol Dweck to describe the belief that your talents can be developed. (The opposite is a &#8220;fixed mindset,&#8221; which refers to the belief that your talents are innate and can&#8217;t change much.) Dweck&#8217;s research suggests that people with a growth mindset tend to be more successful.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/features\/2016-satya-nadella-interview-issue\/\">told Bloomberg<\/a>\u00a0that Dweck&#8217;s book, &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Mindset-The-New-Psychology-Success\/dp\/0345472322?tag=bisafetynet2-20\">Mindset: The New Psychology of Success<\/a>,&#8221; inspired him to emphasize the importance of a growth mindset among his employees. Microsoft&#8217;s chief people officer, Kathleen Hogan,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.geekwire.com\/2015\/interview-microsofts-hr-chief-on-the-companys-changing-culture-and-new-growth-mindset\/\">told Geekwire<\/a>\u00a0that\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/microsoft-ceo-satya-nadella-on-growth-mindset-2016-8\">Microsoft employees<\/a>\u00a0weren&#8217;t supposed to prove they&#8217;re the smartest people in the room, but they were instead supposed to &#8220;learn and bring out the best in people.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">As for talking about challenging career experiences in a job interview, if you&#8217;re worried about being too candid about your screwups, you probably shouldn&#8217;t be.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">&#8220;It really shows that this person is confident enough to be vulnerable. I&#8217;d much rather bring somebody into the organization that has taken risks and failed than [somebody who] has always taken the safe route,&#8221; Wilk said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<ul class=\"kent-social-links\"><li><a href='http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/2018\/12\/12\/what-is-your-greatest-weakness\/&amp;t=What is your greatest weakness?' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-facebook' title='Share via Facebook'><\/i><\/a><\/li><li><a href='http:\/\/twitter.com\/home?status=What is your greatest weakness?%20https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/2018\/12\/12\/what-is-your-greatest-weakness\/' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-twitter' title='Share via Twitter'><\/i><\/a><\/li><li><a href='https:\/\/plus.google.com\/share?url=https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/2018\/12\/12\/what-is-your-greatest-weakness\/' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-google-plus' title='Share via Google Plus'><\/i><\/a><\/li><li><a href='http:\/\/linkedin.com\/shareArticle?mini=true&amp;url=https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/2018\/12\/12\/what-is-your-greatest-weakness\/&amp;title=What is your greatest weakness?' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-linkedin' title='Share via Linked In'><\/i><\/a><\/li><li><a href='mailto:content=https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/2018\/12\/12\/what-is-your-greatest-weakness\/&amp;title=What is your greatest weakness?' target='_blank'><i class='ksocial-email' title='Share via Email'><\/i><\/a><\/li><\/ul>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Does a job candidate&#8217;s answer to this simple interview question predicts success better than their entire resume? Shana Lebowitz Nov. 13, 2018, 8:37 AM &#8220;I&#8217;d &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/2018\/12\/12\/what-is-your-greatest-weakness\/\">Read&nbsp;more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54698,"featured_media":1215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":[],"categories":[143073,9645,131578],"tags":[141095],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1273"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/54698"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1273"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1273\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1275,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1273\/revisions\/1275"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/aspirations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}