As the interviewee, dodging a question with a fake trite answer because you think it's dumb is a great way to signal that you're abnormally uncooperative and/or bad at communicating. And this is a question largely meant to determine your communication skills.
It boggles my mind that people think an interview is a great place to display smug, passive-aggressive hostility. But then again, this is why we have interviews…
> That is a carefully rehearsed answer making the weakness look fixable instead of being serious weakness.
First, there's absolutely nothing wrong with rehearsing your answers to common questions like this. If anything it allows you to present yourself in the best light, which every interviewer wants. Nothing is worse than turning down a good candidate who performed poorly because they didn't take the interview seriously.
Second, I literally thought of that answer off the top of my head in a few seconds. It wasn't actually rehearsed. I don't mean this to sound arrogant. There are many millions of others who can do the same -- think on their feet, take the interviewer's desires into account, and come up with a great answer. Some of these people will be interviewing at the same places as you. It's important to know that there is a wide range of communication abilities, just like there is a wide range of programming abilities.
> No, the question was "what's your biggest weakness", the "I haven't practiced doing this kind of work" is not a big weakness, everyone have bigger weaknesses than that due to their personality… such answers are so easy to come up with, and are guaranteed not to be their biggest weakness, so you are basically checking whether they are fine with lying or lack self awareness
This is splitting hairs. A reasonable person won't expect you riff through all your weaknesses to literally find the biggest one. They just want to hear something that's not too trivial.
I can confident assert that the best communicators would instantly be aware of this when posed the question in an interview. I know a lot of engineers (myself included) who have a higher-than-normal-or-useful tendency to take things as literally as possible, as if every sentence is a spec, which makes us (relatively) poor or at least awkward communicators.
> An honest answer would be "I am much slower learning technical things than my peers" or "I am competitive so I often come in conflict with my peers" or "I am afraid of conflict so I have a hard time making decisions" or "I get bored easily so I have a hard time finishing things" or "I constantly wear a mask so people never learn to know the real me" or "I don't like being proven wrong" or "I judge peoples competence by how much I like them rather than what they actually do" etc.
Sure, and you could totally go that route if you want to. And ideally you'd go a step further, demonstrate that whatever trait you list is actually innate in humans, and that it's taken you work to be aware of it and work on it.
I think it's confirmation bias. If you lack confidence but consider yourself nice and caring, then you'll be more on the look out for instances of women saying that's what they want. It's more comforting to hear that, because it means you're just fine, you don't have to change, and it's the world that's unfair.
But let's say you don't have that bias and instead you're taking in ALL the evidence from society, film, books, etc... Well, then it's pretty damn obvious that women tend to like confident men. Look at the hero of pretty much every movie ever. Look at the popular guys in high school and college. The evidence is overwhelming.
Men and women alike want partners who make them feel special. Part of that is how you're treated by that person, sure, but part of it is how "valuable" that person is themselves. My dog can worship the ground I walk on, but at the end of the day he's still just a dog so it doesn't mean much :)
The stereotypical rehearsed answer is the Michael Scott one, where you dodge the question by actually naming a strength and pretending it's a weakness.
In my experience working at places full of smart, talented, ambitious people looking to fill a role with a similar caliber of person: don't do that.
Ignore barry-cotter. People do expect you to be honest. It's not a trick question, and there is no clandestine cabal of hiring managers who only want to hire people who play a secret interview game well.
> It is actually a bit similar when girls say they want a "sweet, nice and caring" guy.
In my experience, many women really do want nice, sweet, caring guys. It's just easy for men to think those are the only traits that matter, and that it's also fine to be timid, boring, insecure, clingy, and passive.
In my experience they don't. They want to know if you're a reasonable, self-aware person who can communicate effectively.
Let's say you name a reasonable weakness that can easily be improved upon and that doesn't spell disaster for your ability to do your job. And let's say they reject you.
Either they're a terrible company to work for, or they have a huge mistake in their interview process. In the former case you don't want to work for a terrible company, so great, they just saved you years of pain. In the latter case, hey, mistakes happen. That's out of your control. Life is random sometimes. Besides, it's highly unlikely to be significant enough to tank your entire interview.
There's so much cynicism from a subset of the HN crowd every time something interview-related like this is posted. Some of that cynicism is warranted, sure, but not in this case.
I'll keep it real: These aren't trick questions. They're simple, fair, and easy questions, and as such they're a good way to filter out people who have atrocious communication skills, or who possess mediocre theory of mind abilities, i.e. you can't put yourself in someone else's shoes and empathize with what they're looking for. If you find these questions particularly difficult, consider the strong possibility that you're lacking here.
"What's your biggest weakness?" This one is so simple it hurts: sincerely and honestly state a reasonable weakness. For example, "I've spent lots of time working solo, so while I've learned how to wear many hats, I don't have much experience working as part of a team." If you have terrible weaknesses that can't be overcome and would seriously impair your ability to do the job, you probably shouldn't be hired anyway. If you're completely unable to list any of your own shortcomings, then you lack self awareness.
The desire to lie and talk about a fake shortcoming often comes from a scarcity mindset: "I need this job so badly that I'll say anything they want to hear. I need to be perfect!" No, in most cases you don't. And if your interviewer is so unreasonable as to expect you to be flawless, is that someone you really want to work for? There are other jobs in the sea, keep looking.
"Tell me about a project you worked on." I couldn't agree more with what the person in the article said. Talk about YOUR contributions. The company is trying to hire YOU. What did YOU do? How did you do it, and why did it matter? Again, this is about communication. If you have a halfway decent theory of mind, it should be obvious what an employer would want to hear from you when you answer this question. Demonstrate your technical depth. Show that you're aware of and care about the impact your role has on the company's higher-level goals. That you can take initiative, drive things to completion, lead, execute quickly, handle complexity, learn over time, and make good decisions.
"Why do you want to leave your company?" People leave jobs. It's a fact of life. If you can't explain why you left, you seem clueless or even dodgy. Obviously if the job was still amazing for you, you'd still be there, so I can't agree with the article's advice to never mention anything negative. Just tell the truth, communicate it effectively, and address potential concerns. For example, if there were interpersonal issues, don't just dwell on those -- compare to other jobs you've had in the past where you've been able to work well with others together, and stress how important it is to you to work in an environment where people can communicate well, have good intentions, and support each other.
These questions just aren't that hard, and unless you have a seriously flawed track record, you don't have to be dishonest to give great answers. More importantly, those answers should be a reflection of YOURSELF. If a company doesn't like you, chances are you wouldn't like them. It's like dating. The goal is not to be a match with 100% of people. Just be your best self.
Corollary: If there's a test that you find particularly hard to pass in life, your knee-jerk reaction will always be to criticize the test. But it's important to consider your own potential shortcomings and ask, "Why is this test so hard for me?" That way lies self improvement.
As the interviewee, dodging a question with a fake trite answer because you think it's dumb is a great way to signal that you're abnormally uncooperative and/or bad at communicating. And this is a question largely meant to determine your communication skills.
It boggles my mind that people think an interview is a great place to display smug, passive-aggressive hostility. But then again, this is why we have interviews…