How Perfectionism Really is Your Biggest Weakness

If you’ve ever been to an interview, on of the most dreaded questions you should anticipate is What is Your Biggest Weakness? Answering with your biggest strengths should be easy enough, but responding with your weakness takes some thought. The best way to respond should demonstrate awareness and prove you’ve worked to strengthen this weakness. If you’re going to a cliched response that’s sure to be unimpressive you could say you’re a perfectionist.

Perhaps the intent is to say you’re a really dedicated worker who’s sometimes so dedicated it prevents you from completing other tasks. Or maybe you’re trying to say you do your jobs so well that other coworkers were intimidated. Regardless of your intent, it’s unlikely the hiring manager will be blown away by your response. In fact, this will probably just look like a cop out that says you’re aware this question is coming, but not self-aware enough to put some real thought into your answer.

While saying you’re a perfectionist may appear to be a poor response, there may be some merit to the response. If you truly are a perfectionist it can be a hindrance to your work and a trait that inhibits efficiency. Certainly no one would advise you to say your perfectionism is one of your best traits, so it’s important to formulate an answer to this question that shows your ability to use this response to show personal growth.

Perhaps you feel you’re a perfectionist because you never feel truly done with an assignment despite the fact that you’ve met every requirement within this assignment. You keep editing this assignment and even when you pass your work in, you feel there’s more work to be done. To provide a fully formulated answer you could relate this to collaboration and using your coworkers to provide feedback to know that your work meets all of your objectives.

Another reason for feeling like a perfectionist could be a need to impress. While it’s definitely good to want to exceed expectations, true feedback should be valued. So long as the feedback you receive is related to work, being able to receive this feedback is important to improving your performance. In this instance you could use your perfectionism as an example of a time when you improved a project with feedback from others.

In all honesty, perfectionism can be a weakness, but not one you should be discussing during an interview. If you truly identify as a perfectionist and want to used that as a weakness during an interview, try to dig a little deeper. Ask yourself what makes you feel like a perfectionist and classify it a characteristic other than “perfectionism.” I guarantee this will lead to a better response.

Further, if you’re conducting the interview and a candidate states she’s a perfectionist, there may be some merit to the response. Try asking the candidate for an example of when their perfectionism was an issue. This can provide more insight into the candidate and how she’d be able to perform as an employee.

Remember, interviews can be tricky. This is a question you can prepare for, and I’d advise you to try and come up with a weakness that demonstrates your ability to improve your performance. This will be more impressive than stating an answer every interviewer has heard before.