Perhaps the most difficult 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 himself annoyed with you, and possibly distrust your other answers.

You require giving the interviewer an actual answer, and though you should never pick a negative that will drastically affect your employment (“I once stole ten million dollars”), even a small negative might harm your chances a little bit if supplied incorrectly. So when you’re inquired to say something negative about yourself, use the following three step procedure to answer the query and decrease the damage it does to your chances.

Step 1: Background

First you should set up the story for the employer without focusing 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 many of the open positions. While working on one of their projects, I was inquired to…”

Step 2: Brief Mistake

Next, mention the mistake briefly, without concentrating on your error 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 quickly hung up when they appeared to rude.”

Step 3: Minimize

The third step in any negative behavioral interview query is to make it appear as though the negative thing may not happen again if they give you employment. You do this by talking about what you’ve done since to ensure it does not 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 3 steps will ensure that the mistakes you made won’t seem as terrible to the employer, and since you explained what you’ve done since to minimize the damage, it is less likely the employer will hold these negative items against you.

Interview Tips

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