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How to Share Your Strengths and Weaknesses During A Job Interview

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How to Share Your Strengths and Weaknesses During A Job Interview

You’re sitting across from a hiring manager, or even worse, a group of people interviewing you for a role, and the dreaded question comes up…

“What are your weaknesses?”

You spend what seems like an eternity battling inside your own head, “Do I tell them I’m occasionally late or that I take things too personally?” before settling on a response that makes you groan: “I just care too much and I work too hard.”

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While that question isn’t likely to be left off the interview checklist anytime soon, you know it’s likely coming and can spend some time in self-reflection before your next interview, so you can answer it truthfully and respectfully. Its sister question, “What are your strengths” is coming as well, so it’s best to be prepared ahead of time.

What are strengths and weaknesses?

Strengths are a set of skills or character traits you possess that assist you in carrying out your duties in a productive and efficient manner and make you an excellent candidate for a job. Weaknesses are characteristics or shortcomings that when left unchecked, may hamper your ability to do your job well.

It can be difficult to toot your own horn during an interview. Even more challenging, is finding a balance between being honest about some of your shortcomings, without turning the hiring manager off to the idea of hiring you.

Take some time before each interview (and ideally before you apply) to determine what your strengths are and weaknesses are. This is best done in the beginning as self-reflection, however, you may at some point want to enlist the help of people close to you. This can be asking friends, family, or someone you’ve worked with in the past for feedback.

You can create a list of your strengths and weaknesses, and, when it’s time to apply for a job, tailor your responses to its specific qualifications. You can also spend some time researching the company itself, understanding its culture, and determining which of your strengths would be most highly valued.

Thankfully, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel when it comes to your strengths and weaknesses. There are a number of common (and relatable) characteristics that you can share with potential employers.

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Strengths and Weaknesses List

Don’t know where to start? Take a look at these strengths and weaknesses examples, and determine which best describes you. Keep in mind that this is a list of “soft skills” which can pertain to any industry and role. Depending on what position you’re applying for, you may also need to share your knowledge of specific software programs and on-the-job experience.

Strengths

  1. Accuracy
  2. Attentive
  3. Clarity
  4. Conciseness
  5. Creativity
  6. Determination
  7. Discipline
  8. Dedication
  9. Empathetic
  10. Enthusiasm
  11. Flexibility
  12. Great listener
  13. Honesty
  14. Hard-working
  15. Innovative
  16. Negotiation Skills
  17. Optimistic
  18. Organization Skills
  19. Patient
  20. Quick learner
  21. Respectful
  22. Trustworthy
  23. Time-management
  24. Team player
  25. Versatility

Strengths and weaknesses list

Weaknesses

  1. Blunt and brazen communicator which can turn some people off
  2. Extremely critical of self
  3. Need time to adjust to change
  4. Perfectionist (which sometimes make it hard to delegate responsibilities)
  5. Procrastinator
  6. Slow to develop rapport with coworkers or subordinates
  7. Shy in new situations
  8. Stressed under pressure
  9. Too sensitive to the needs of others which sometimes allows others to manipulate you

strengths and weaknesses examples

Leadership Strengths and Weaknesses

While there are many similarities, leadership strengths and weaknesses cover a wide range of skills. Consider the different responsibilities you will have as a leader, mainly motivating and managing employees on a daily basis, rather than being responsible for just your own work. Consider some of these common strengths and weaknesses examples for leaders and managers.

Leadership Strengths

  1. Passionate about their work.
  2. Able to understand the needs and emotions of others.
  3. Excellent self-management skills.
  4. Top-notch communication skills (including listening).
  5. Able to motivate and inspire others to do their best work.
  6. Comfortable making decisions quickly.
  7. Willing to be held accountable for their decisions and their actions.

Leadership Weakness

  1. Taking feedback personally.
  2. Too focused on the end goal that employees’ needs go unheard.
  3. Overly concerned with being liked.
  4. Unable to delegate responsibility which leads to burnout.
  5. Disrespectful attitude towards employees.
  6. Poor communication skills.
  7. Afraid of making the wrong decision, which leads to making no decisions at all.

If you see yourself in any of these weakness examples, it may be time to seek mentorship or training, and do some soul searching to determine why you lack in these areas.

How to Share Your Strengths and Weaknesses During a Job Interview

Now that you’ve reviewed many popular characteristics and decided which ones best reflect who you are, it’s time to dig deeper. Ask yourself a very important question… “Why?”

Potential employers don’t want a list of fancy words, they want to get to know you by understanding how these characteristics have served you in your previous work experience. For example, instead of saying, “I have excellent negotiation skills,” say, “I’ve used my excellent negotiation skills to work with new and existing vendors to cut our raw material costs by 52%.”

Paint them a picture of your skills in action and tell them a (true) story they’ll remember well past the last interviewee has left the building. When telling a story, remember to include:

  1. What “life” looked like before the inciting incident.
  2. The problem you faced.
  3. Different attempts you made to fix the problem.
  4. What eventually worked.
  5. How life looks after the incident.

This doesn’t have to be an epic novel, just a quick description of what was going on and how you had the strengths to persevere.

Of course for some, you may be reaching for a new role with new responsibilities. If you know you possess the strengths they are looking for, but haven’t had the opportunity to use them in your current job, be honest. You could say, “I haven’t been able to use this skill in my previous employment, however, I look forward to using it more if you decide to hire me.”

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You also have the option of sharing a story from your personal life in which you used this skill. Just make sure to keep it professional, appropriate, and relevant to your desired position.

When it comes to communicating your weaknesses, potential employers want to know that you recognize your shortcomings and are actively working to become a better version of yourself. You’ll want to be honest and forthcoming while creating context around your weaknesses and showing:

  1. How you are working to improve in this area.
  2. How this weakness will not impact your performance in the proposed job.

Like we discussed earlier, you’ll also want to avoid stating a humble brag rather than a weakness. “I’m just so fast at my job that it makes others feel intimidated around me and so it’s difficult for me to connect.” This is false modesty and you won’t be doing yourself any favors.

So there you are, face-to-face with an interviewer and being asked, “What are your strengths and weaknesses?” Rather than panic, know that you’ve taken the time necessary to provide a solid answer (with supporting evidence) to this question.

skill improvement template


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How To Combine PR and Content Marketing Superpowers To Achieve Business Goals

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A figure pulls open a dress shirt to reveal the term PR on a Superman-like costume, reflecting the superpower resulting from combining content and PR.

A transformative shift is happening, and it’s not AI.

The aisle between public relations and content marketing is rapidly narrowing. If you’re smart about the convergence, you can forever enhance your brand’s storytelling.

The goals and roles of content marketing and PR overlap more and more. The job descriptions look awfully similar. Shrinking budgets and a shrewd eye for efficiency mean you and your PR pals could face the chopping block if you don’t streamline operations and deliver on the company’s goals (because marketing communications is always first to be axed, right?).

Yikes. Let’s take a big, deep breath. This is not a threat. It’s an opportunity.

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Reach across the aisle to PR and streamline content creation, improve distribution strategies, and get back to the heart of what you both are meant to do: Build strong relationships and tell impactful stories.

So, before you panic-post that open-to-work banner on LinkedIn, consider these tips from content marketing, PR, and journalism pros who’ve figured out how to thrive in an increasingly narrowing content ecosystem.

1. See journalists as your audience

Savvy pros know the ability to tell an impactful story — and support it with publish-ready collateral — grounds successful media relationships. And as a content marketer, your skills in storytelling and connecting with audiences, including journalists, naturally support your PR pals’ media outreach.

Strategic storytelling creates content focused on what the audience needs and wants. Sharing content on your blog or social media builds relationships with journalists who source those channels for story ideas, event updates, and subject matter experts.

“Embedding PR strategies in your content marketing pieces informs your audience and can easily be picked up by media,” says Alex Sanchez, chief experience officer at BeWell, New Mexico’s Health Insurance Marketplace. “We have seen reporters do this many times, pulling stories from our blogs and putting them in the nightly news — most of the time without even reaching out to us.”

Acacia James, weekend producer/morning associate producer at WTOP radio in Washington, D.C., says blogs and social media posts are helpful to her work. “If I see a story idea, and I see that they’re willing to share information, it’s easier to contact them — and we can also backlink their content. It’s huge for us to be able to use every avenue.” 

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Kirby Winn, manager of PR at ImpactLife, says reporters and assignment editors are key consumers of their content. “And I don’t mean a news release that just hit their inbox. They’re going to our blog and consuming our stories, just like any other audience member,” he says. “Our organization has put more focus into content marketing in the past few years — it supports a media pitch so well and highlights the stories we have to tell.”

Storytelling attracts earned media that might not pick up the generic news topic. “It’s one thing to pitch a general story about how we help consumers sign up for low-cost health insurance,” Alex says. “Now, imagine a single mom who just got a plan after years of thinking it was too expensive. She had a terrible car accident, and the $60,000 ER bill that would have ruined her financially was covered. Now that’s a story journalists will want to cover, and that will be relatable to their audience and ours.” 

2. Learn the media outlet’s audience

Seventy-three percent of reporters say one-fourth or less of the stories pitched are relevant to their audiences, according to Cision’s 2023 State of the Media Report (registration required).

PR pros are known for building relationships with journalists, while content marketers thrive in building communities around content. Merge these best practices to build desirable content that works for your target audience and the media’s audiences simultaneously.

WTOP’s Acacia James says sources who show they’re ready to share helpful, relevant content often win pitches for coverage. “In radio, we do a lot of research on who is listening to us, and we’re focused on a prototype called ‘Mike and Jen’ — normal, everyday people in Generation X … So when we get press releases and pitches, we ask, ‘How interested will Mike and Jen be in this story?’” 

3. Deliver the full content package (and make journalists’ jobs easier)

Cranking out content to their media outlet’s standards has never been tougher for journalists. Newsrooms are significantly understaffed, and anything you can do to make their lives easier will be appreciated and potentially rewarded with coverage. Content marketers are built to think about all the elements to tell the story through multiple mediums and channels.

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“Today’s content marketing pretty much provides a package to the media outlet,” says So Young Pak, director of media relations at MedStar Washington Hospital Center. “PR is doing a lot of storytelling work in advance of media publication. We (and content marketing) work together to provide the elements to go with each story — photos, subject matter experts, patients, videos, and data points, if needed.”   

At WTOP, the successful content package includes audio. “As a radio station, we are focused on high-quality sound,” Acacia James says. “Savvy sources know to record and send us voice memos, and then we pull cuts from the audio … You will naturally want to do someone a favor if they did you one — like providing helpful soundbites, audio, and newsworthy stories.”  

While production value matters to some media, you shouldn’t stress about it. “In the past decade, how we work with reporters has changed. Back in the day, if they couldn’t be there in person, they weren’t going to interview your expert,” says Jason Carlton, an accredited PR professional and manager of marketing and communications at Intermountain Health. “During COVID, we had to switch to virtual interviewing. Now, many journalists are OK with running a Teams or Zoom interview they’ve done with an expert on the news.”

BeWell’s Alex Sanchez agrees. “I’ve heard old school PR folks cringe at the idea of putting up a Zoom video instead of getting traditional video interviews. It doesn’t really matter to consumers. Focus on the story, on the timeliness, and the relevance. Consumers want authenticity, not super stylized, stiff content.”

4. Unite great minds to maximize efficiency

Everyone needs to set aside the debate about which team — PR or content marketing — gets credit for the resulting media coverage.

At MedStar Washington Hospital Center, So Young and colleagues adopt a collaborative mindset on multichannel stories. “We can get the interview and gather information for all the different pieces — blog, audio, video, press release, internal newsletter, or magazine. That way, we’re not trying to figure things out individually, and the subject matter experts only have to have that conversation once,” she says.

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Regular, cross-team meetings are essential to understand the best channels for reaching key audiences, including the media. A story that began life as a press release might reap SEO and earned media gold if it’s strategized as a blog, video, and media pitch.

“At Intermountain Health, we have individual teams for media relations, marketing, social media, and hospital communications. That setup works well because it allows us to bring in the people who are the given experts in those areas,” says Intermountain’s Jason Carlton. “Together, we decide if a story is best for the blog, a media pitch, or a mix of channels — that way, we avoid duplicating work and the risk of diluting the story’s impact.”

5. Measure what matters

Cutting through the noise to earn media mentions requires keen attention to metrics. Since content marketing and PR metrics overlap, synthesizing the data in your team meetings can save time while streamlining your storytelling efforts.

“For content marketers, using analytical tools such as GA4 can help measure the effectiveness of their content campaigns and landing pages to determine meaningful KPIs such as organic traffic, keyword rankings, lead generation, and conversion rates,” says John Martino, director of digital marketing for Visiting Angels. “PR teams can use media coverage and social interactions to assess user engagement and brand awareness. A unified and omnichannel approach can help both teams demonstrate their value in enhancing brand visibility, engagement, and overall business success.”

To track your shared goals, launch a shared dashboard that helps tell the combined “story of your stories” to internal and executive teams. Among the metrics to monitor:

  • Page views: Obviously, this queen of metrics continues to be important across PR and content marketing. Take your analysis to the next level by evaluating which niche audiences are contributing to these views to further hone your storytelling targets, including media outlets.
  • Earned media mentions: Through a media tracker service or good old Google Alerts, you can tally the echo of your content marketing and PR. Look at your site’s referral traffic report to identify media outlets that send traffic to your blog or other web pages.
  • Organic search queries: Dive into your analytics platform to surface organic search queries that lead to visitors. Build from those questions to develop stories that further resonate with your audience and your targeted media.
  • On-page actions: When visitors show up on your content, what are they doing? What do they click? Where do they go next? Building next-step pathways is your bread and butter in content marketing — and PR can use them as a natural pipeline for media to pick up more stories, angles, and quotes.

But perhaps the biggest metric to track is team satisfaction. Who on the collaborative team had the most fun writing blogs, producing videos, or calling the news stations? Lean into the natural skills and passions of your team members to distribute work properly, maximize the team output, and improve relationships with the media, your audience, and internal teams.

“It’s really trying to understand the problem to solve — the needle to move — and determining a plan that will help them achieve their goal,” Jason says. “If you don’t have those measurable objectives, you’re not going to know whether you made a difference.”

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Don’t fear the merger

Whether you deliberately work together or not, content marketing and public relations are tied together. ImpactLife’s Kirby Winn explains, “As soon as we begin to talk about (ourselves) to a reporter who doesn’t know us, they are certainly going to check out our stories.”

But consciously uniting PR and content marketing will ease the challenges you both face. Working together allows you to save time, eliminate duplicate work, and gain free time to tell more stories and drive them into impactful media placements.

Register to attend Content Marketing World in San Diego. Use the code BLOG100 to save $100. Can’t attend in person this year? Check out the Digital Pass for access to on-demand session recordings from the live event through the end of the year.

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Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

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Trends in Content Localization – Moz

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Trends in Content Localization - Moz

Multinational fast food chains are one of the best-known examples of recognizing that product menus may sometimes have to change significantly to serve distinct audiences. The above video is just a short run-through of the same business selling smokehouse burgers, kofta, paneer, and rice bowls in an effort to appeal to people in a variety of places. I can’t personally judge the validity of these representations, but what I can see is that, in such cases, you don’t merely localize your content but the products on which your content is founded.

Sometimes, even the branding of businesses is different around the world; what we call Burger King in America is Hungry Jack’s in Australia, Lays potato chips here are Sabritas in Mexico, and DiGiorno frozen pizza is familiar in the US, but Canada knows it as Delissio.

Tales of product tailoring failures often become famous, likely because some of them may seem humorous from a distance, but cultural sensitivity should always be taken seriously. If a brand you are marketing is on its way to becoming a large global seller, the best insurance against reputation damage and revenue loss as a result of cultural insensitivity is to employ regional and cultural experts whose first-hand and lived experiences can steward the organization in acting with awareness and respect.

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How AI Is Redefining Startup GTM Strategy

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How AI Is Redefining Startup GTM Strategy

AI and startups? It just makes sense.

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