Perhaps the most complex kind of behavioral query to answer are those that inquire you to say something negative about yourself, like a weakness or a mistake or a period of poor judgment. You can’t pretend that you’re perfect. If you do, the employer is going to find themself frustrated with you, and possibly distrust your other answers. You require giving the employer an actual answer, and though you should never opt a negative that will drastically impact your employment (“I once stole 10 million dollars”), even a small negative might ruin your chances a little bit if supplied wrongly. So when you’re inquired to say something negative about yourself, use the following 3 key step process to answer the negative behavioral queries and reduce the damage it does to your chances.

Step 1: Background

First you should set up the story for the employer without concentrating on the negative aspects of your decision. For instance “The Company had recently gone through some layoffs, so I was placed in charge of the responsibilities of several of the open positions. While working on one of their projects, I was asked to…”

Step 2: Brief Mistake

Next, highlight the mistake briefly, without concentrating on your mistake or trying to defend yourself. If you picked a non-egregious error like you should have, it should not be too hard to simply mention it briefly, like “I didn’t realize the person the phone was a client, so I rapidly hung up when they seemed to rude.”

Step 3: Minimize

The third step in any negative behavioral queries is to make it appear as though the negative thing might not happen again if they give you employment. You do this by talking about what you’ve done since to make sure that it doesn’t happen again, like “Since then, I’ve treated every unknown phone call like they may be a client, because you never know who is on the other end of the phone.”

Following these three key steps will ensure that the mistakes you made won’t seem as terrible to the employer, and since you described what you’ve done since to reduce the damage, it is less likely the employer will hold these negative behavioral queries against you.

Take Away Interview Tips for Answering Negative Behavioral Queries

• Provide non-negative background information.
• Briefly state the negative thing.
• Follow it up with information that reduces the damage.