What bad qualities can you put on your resume? What not to write

Not everyone requires your weaknesses to be listed on your resume. But if there is such a clause on the form, then putting a dash through would be a mistake. Better look at an example of character weaknesses in your resume.

What to write

Before filling out the box in which you need to indicate your shortcomings, think about your answer. Don't miss it under any circumstances, because ideal people does not exist. As a rule, managers want to see how adequately you evaluate yourself. If you don't know what to write, look at the suggested options and choose something that suits you best.

Universal formula: select character traits that are an advantage for performing this particular job, and in ordinary life may indeed be considered a human flaw.

The following weaknesses can be written:

excessive directness, the habit of telling the truth face to face;
difficulty establishing contact with strangers;
inability to show flexibility in labor matters;
reliability;
increased anxiety;
excessive emotionality, hot temper;
love of formalism;
restlessness;
slowness;
hyperactivity;
fear of air travel.

All of the weaknesses listed in your resume can become strengths if you look at them from a different angle. An example is restlessness. For a sales representative or active sales manager, this can even be a plus. The same goes for reliability. This is a signal to the manager that you may be the person who will do all the overtime work.

Linking weaknesses to the characteristics of professions

All applicants should think about how to write my weaknesses for a resume. For example, a future accountant or design engineer might write:

distrust;
excessive scrupulousness;
increased anxiety;
excessive demands on oneself;
straightforwardness;
pedantry;
modesty;
inability to lie;
difficulties in establishing contact with strangers;
self-esteem;
lack of flexibility in labor matters;
integrity;
inflated sense of responsibility;
lack of diplomacy.

hyperactivity;
self-confidence;
restlessness;
impulsiveness;
the need for external motivation;
distrust, desire to double-check and confirm all information.

Disadvantages for one profession can become advantages for another.

You can also indicate in your resume among your negative qualities:

straightforwardness;
workaholism;
excessive love of communication.

Applicants for the position of manager must prepare before filling out this column. It is better to think in advance about what weaknesses to include in your resume. You can write to them about the following character traits:

excessive emotionality;
pedantry;
love for little things;
thoughts about work and planning occupy most of your free time;
increased demands on others.

A good example would be the following:

inability to respond to rudeness with rudeness;
tendency to make decisions based on one’s own opinion;
distrust of people and love of confirmation of facts.

Some applicants prefer to indicate that they:

overly trusting;
can raise their voice to subordinates;
straightforward, express their opinions without veiled embellishments;
hot-tempered;
always looking for confirmation of words;
have a hypertrophied sense of responsibility;
prone to formalism and pay attention excessive attention little things;
irritated by clutter;
slow;
do not like to do something to please others.

For all occasions

Many are afraid to write about shortcomings, believing that the employer will immediately send their resume to trash can. Of course, you shouldn’t be too frank, but you shouldn’t completely skip this section of the questionnaire. In this case, you can write about some neutral qualities that will not affect the work in any way. For a person applying for any vacancy, among the inherent weaknesses one can indicate:

fear of airplanes;
arachnophobia (fear of spiders), vespertiliophobia (fear bats), ophidiophobia (fear of snakes);
excess weight;
lack of experience;
age (suitable for people over 40 years old);
love of shopping;
love for sweets.

This information does not characterize you in any way, it simply speaks about your fears or small weaknesses.

The following disadvantages can be mentioned:

I don’t always express my thoughts accurately;
I trust people too much;
prone to reflection;
I often analyze past mistakes, focusing too much attention on them;
I spend a lot of time evaluating my actions.

This negative qualities, but they should not affect the workflow.

Regardless of the position for which you are applying, you can write the following weaknesses in your resume:

I get so carried away with work that I forget to take breaks;
I can’t build relationships with colleagues because I don’t like gossip;
I can’t fight back in response to boorish treatment;
I constantly pass all situations through myself;
I let people get too close;
I don’t know how to swear;
I get noticeably worried when I have to lie.

Important nuances

Please note that there are items that are best left unindicated. You should not write, for example, that you:

love to be lazy;
afraid to take responsibility;
don't like making decisions;
unpunctual;
are often distracted;
you only think about your salary;
love office romances.

For example, if you write about your laziness in your resume, you run the risk that the employer will decide that you don’t want to work.

It so happens that some employers, when surveying, and sometimes in the job description, ask you to indicate your shortcomings and weaknesses in your resume. Thus, they want to simplify the selection of personnel, weed out unnecessary candidates, etc. In a word, HR managers solve their problems in a way that suits them.

Let's get to the point

Enough long time I help people write resumes and look for jobs, and I want to say that the topic of shortcomings in resumes rarely comes up. But if it comes up, I tell everyone the same thing.

Weaknesses do not need to be listed on your resume.. Not necessary at all. Under no circumstances. Even if a vacancy or a special questionnaire asks you to describe your shortcomings, it’s still not. No no and one more time no. Never write bad things about yourself!

There are several reasons for this.

Indicating character weaknesses in a resume increases the likelihood that your resume will be thrown into the trash. Someone will definitely understand your words “wrong” and decide that such a candidate is not needed. Let them first invite you to an interview, and there you will answer the employer’s questions and tell about yourself in all details.
Second point - don't judge yourself. You may be biased and most likely you will. Many people are demanding of themselves and self-critical, they make mountains out of molehills and scold themselves out of the blue. Let others evaluate you. Let the employer look at you, talk to you and draw his own conclusions. For him, your disadvantages can be advantages (and vice versa).
For example, shyness may be rated very highly. She may be seen as calm in nature and accommodating. Likewise, an active and energetic person may be called an upstart and a troublemaker.
If you indicate weaknesses and shortcomings in your resume, this will show your low self-esteem. Low self-esteem = low salary. Therefore, there is no need to be completely honest in your resume, show yourself from your advantage.

What if you still need to write something?

If you have a questionnaire or a form on a website where there is a special column “your shortcomings,” write a neutral phrase.

Examples of indicating weaknesses in a resume:

— “I am ready to answer your questions in personal communication”
- “I prefer to talk about it in person”
- Just put a dash

No disadvantages - only advantages

I want to say a few words about reverse side medals. If you don’t need to indicate your weaknesses in your resume, then you should include your strengths. This is really important. Focus on your strengths, on strong traits and skills. This will help the employer make the “right” choice.

Every person, sooner or later, is faced with the need to clearly identify all his strengths. Most often this happens when writing a resume. The employer wants to see a list of a person’s strengths before the interview. To ensure that this question does not take you by surprise, you should analyze yours in detail.

Talent

It is on talent that all strong character traits are based. Every person knows perfectly well what he can do best.
Developing talent will take effort. Few achieve perfection, but anyone can hone their skills.

To ensure that talent is not wasted, it is best to associate your profession with it. Life will be much more interesting if work brings pleasure. To do this, it is simply necessary that it suits the person’s character, temperament, and meets his interests.

Work on yourself

A person's strengths and weaknesses are closely intertwined with each other. No one can boast that he is perfect and has no weaknesses. A self-sufficient person always admits that he has shortcomings. There is nothing wrong. After all, a person’s shortcomings are traits that, with volitional influence, make it possible to develop further, not to stand still. If you engage in self-development, then over time a person can turn all weaknesses into strengths.

It is not always easy to identify a person’s strengths and weaknesses. Their people are not inclined to hide, they know very well what they can do best. However, sometimes people overestimate themselves and do not always correctly assess their capabilities.

If with positive features character is more or less clear, but with shortcomings everything is more complicated. Few people are able to honestly admit to themselves that they are excessively lazy, are constantly late, or cannot bring the work they have started to its logical conclusion.

What are human weaknesses? In most cases, people are characterized by laziness, excessive gentleness of character, shyness, problems with maintaining a daily routine, and lack of discipline.

Many human shortcomings can be easily corrected on their own, but others cannot be dealt with without the help of a psychologist. Some human flaws cannot be removed. According to them, experts advise adjusting your own lifestyle so that they do not cause inconvenience.

Objective assessment

My strengths, what are they? On the one hand, the question is not difficult, but many cannot accurately describe themselves. Assessing your capabilities is an important point. If self-improvement is important to you, you should not neglect it.

By making a list of your strengths, you can understand what you lack for career growth, which means starting the journey to eliminate gaps in knowledge and capabilities.

Strengths: list

The combination of strengths gives a strong-willed character. There are qualities by which one can judge the strength of a human personality.

To succeed in your career and life you must have:

Communication skills;
Confidence;
Professionalism;
Purposefulness;
Analytical thinking;
Patience;
Learning ability;
Hard work;
Responsibility.

Developing your strengths

Professionalism

One of the strengths of a person is the ability to improve in a chosen field. Experts recommend reading at least one book in your specialty every month.

Analytical thinking, learning ability

These personality strengths are entirely dependent on the level of intelligence. It, in turn, is determined by genetic data and the training that has been received.

Discipline

To increase your level of discipline, you need to learn how to motivate yourself.

Hard work

Few people can boast that they have this quality from birth. A person starts work not because he is tired of idleness, but only because there is such a thing as “necessary”. Each completed action brings a feeling of satisfaction, which works as an excellent motivator.

Patience

You can't get everything you want right away. Achieving a goal takes time. The ability to wait is a valuable character trait.

Confidence, determination

These strengths come with acquired experience and skills. The more knowledge you have, the easier it is to follow your chosen path.

These human strengths can be supplemented by the following:

Courage;
Honesty;
Responsiveness;
Reliability;

People who have all these qualities can control their actions and desires and manage their lives.

Exercises to determine your personal capabilities

Analyze your strengths and weaknesses. To do this, you need to remember which actions cause you the most positive emotions. Write them down in a notebook, starting from the most significant to those that are least pleasant.
The next step will be a reassessment of values. Rethink your life beliefs to understand which of them are advantages and which are disadvantages.
Remember the people whose opinions are valuable to you. Why do you respect them? What traits do they have? Do you have these virtues?
Remember when you were last time were you happy? What was happening at that moment? Why were you happy?
After studying your answers, try to find similarities in them. Those features that will be repeated in most answers are your ideals, what you strive for.
Determine if your beliefs match your real life.
Study what is an advantage and what is a disadvantage in the area in which you live and work.
Determine whether environment optimal for the development of your personality.
Conduct a survey in which you ask people who know you what characteristics you have.
Having received answers from loved ones, you should find all the common points in them. Make a list of character traits that most people find in you.
Make a self-portrait. You will end up with a deep characterization of personal qualities.
Make a list of actions you need to take to improve your strengths and minimize your weaknesses.

Self improvement

Human shortcomings can only be overcome through constant development. Not only shortcomings, but also character strengths and talents cannot be ignored. They require improvement, because even the most outstanding abilities without daily training weaken over time.

Every person knows what he can do best. Therefore, only rare individuals do not pay attention to them and do not engage in self-development.

There are usually rarely problems with advantages. After all, there are a huge number of methods of self-development. And if desired, everyone can improve their abilities, make them brighter and more outstanding.

The situation is different with disadvantages. Everyone tends to downplay them in themselves. If you don’t see the problem, you can get along with it perfectly, but life will lose something important from this. You can stubbornly ignore your weaknesses and accept them, but developing as an individual and as a professional will require difficult hard work.

Hello, dear blog readers! It doesn’t matter whether you are on its pages for the first time, or are regular visitors - in any case, you are welcome. Today, our topics related to earnings and employment will be supplemented with another interesting problem - how to indicate a person’s strengths and weaknesses in a resume. An example of how NOT to do this is quite simple.

Some applicants, having read Western literature, which encourages them to be extremely sincere with the employer, do not hesitate to dump all their ins and outs in front of him, and then naively wonder why they were “pushed forward” with the vacancy. Ideally, of course, you shouldn’t do this, but you shouldn’t describe yourself as an impeccable person and worker either - in any case, the truth will become clear as soon as you begin your immediate responsibilities.

From this article you will learn:

When a person writes a resume, he rarely puts himself in the employer’s shoes and in most cases does not understand that texts containing entirely positive characteristics, became pretty boring, and the understanding came that in 90 percent of cases they were not true. This is easy to understand, because the job of the applicant is to impress his potential superiors. good impression, and the strengths listed in the text help to do this in the best possible way.

However, there is little secret: when you write about weaknesses, it seems to involuntarily set the employer up to the fact that you are a sincere person, so they can do business with you.

Read below about how to find the “golden mean” between a resume that only lists the pros and one that will scare off the employer because of the cons.

Tell the truth

When writing a resume, do not try to exaggerate too much and make something up. Just tell the truth. There are numerous examples of how beautiful legend, invented when applying for a job, fell apart after a couple of clarifying questions or an inspection by the company’s security service, so it’s better to be sincere with the employer. Everything you want to write on your resume must be supported, otherwise it will greatly discredit you. Before, check again whether you have attributed to yourself, carried away by fantasies, the third higher education or experience working in a foreign corporation abroad.

Answer the questions asked

Often, many employers provide a ready-made resume form, offering to answer a question about their negative qualities. Leaving this field empty is, at a minimum, impolite, so write something there that can hardly be called a serious flaw. In doing so, it is best to focus on those personality traits and character traits that you can work on and improve.

For example, write that you are shy - for a person who works in the field of communication this is a critical, but surmountable disadvantage.

By the way, if you are thinking, it is better to use standard “template expressions” in it and do not write anything about your disadvantages! In order to describe them briefly, a small column in the resume is enough.

Don't forget to praise yourself

Each of us has achievements, and in a resume it is very important to highlight exactly what interests the employer. If you know how to make cool presentations or are a master of graphic editors, or speak fluent English, be sure to mention this, especially if the vacancy suggests something similar.

Make advantages out of disadvantages

Describing your negative traits, try to present them in a way that the employer perceives them as positive.

For example:

self-confidence can be presented as leadership qualities;

restless character– as readiness to perform new tasks;

straightforwardness– as the self-confidence necessary to conduct important negotiations.

Do not confuse personal with professional!

When deciding on your employment, do not forget: first of all, employers are interested in your work achievements, and that is what they should focus on. That is, if you still intend to indicate the negative aspects, let them not be personal traits, but something related exclusively to the work process (excessive meticulousness, difficulties with the team due to a dislike for “freeloaders”, inability to deceive, lack of experience work, etc.).

The same goes for your advantages - list only those that are directly related to the job, because it is unlikely that your excellent culinary skills can become a decisive argument in your favor if you apply for the position of purchasing manager.

The main thing is moderation

Try not to write a “sheet” that is not too easy to understand. The best option– indicate 4-5 of your characteristics, which are the main ones. By the way, if your resume successfully passed the first stage, and you were called for a personal interview, you shouldn’t get too carried away there either and lay out all your ins and outs to the personnel officer - answer strictly the questions posed, it’s unlikely that your interlocutor is interested in anything else.

So, we figured out how best to tell about your positive and negative sides in your resume, now you just have to try it in practice. If the material is of interest to you and is useful, share it on in social networks with your friends - let them also know how to make the employment process easier for themselves! Don't forget to subscribe to blog updates so you don't miss new publications. And now I say goodbye to you for a moment.

Getting a first job is a troublesome and incomprehensible matter. In college, they don’t teach you how to fill out forms, and if they talk about it, it’s only in a general sense, without specifics. That’s why young people get stupefied when they need to name a person’s weaknesses. What to write? How, in general, should we approach such points? How are the strengths and weaknesses of a person determined in the context of professional activity? Let's figure it out.

Self-knowledge

Let's start with the fact that a person, one way or another, evaluates his character, inclinations, and abilities. He knows more about this than anyone else. A person’s weaknesses are an obstacle that hinders his realization. We usually consider these to be laziness, absent-mindedness, gluttony, love of sleep, desire to have fun rather than work. But this has an indirect relation to the place of service. And is it worth telling your employer that you like to eat cakes three times a day? This is for execution labor responsibilities doesn't really affect it.

When you need to talk about yourself, you need to focus on the conditions in which you will have to work. That is, analyze your qualities, identify those that will help you work, and those that will hinder you. Special attention Pay attention to the “weaknesses of a person” item. Say too much and they will refuse to hire you. If you hide what is relevant, you will be fired in a few days. The moment is very subtle. It should be approached in a balanced, thoughtful, careful, but honest manner. Below we will try to fill out this item in practice in such a way as to avoid negative consequences. But first, take a piece of paper and write down what you consider to be your weaknesses. Don't think about work yet. Record everything that comes to mind. We'll sift out the excess later.

How to analyze your abilities

To describe a person’s weaknesses for a questionnaire, it is necessary to carefully understand the character, habits, and internal attitudes. Would you say that only a specialist can do this? You'll be wrong! Now you will see everything for yourself. Sit comfortably, armed with a pen, and make lists. Enter in the hotel columns the following:

works well;
likes to perform;
It doesn’t work out at all;
still needs to be mastered;
causes disgust;
it is done, but with a creak, without enthusiasm.

If you approach this process thoroughly, you will get the basis for identifying a person’s weaknesses for the questionnaire. This is, in principle, what specialists do. They extract this information during conversation, observation, and testing. But you know yourself, and therefore things will go faster. And to make your work easier, here is a list of what are considered weaknesses. Focus on this data, but try not to copy it. Use your own brains!

Human weaknesses: examples

The employer needs you to keep things moving and not stand still. A person is given a range of responsibilities that must be strictly fulfilled. His personality traits may interfere with his work. To identify such inconsistencies, a column is filled in that identifies a person’s weaknesses. Believe me, there is nothing shameful in this. We are all different, different from each other. One can command, the other is better at executing. Each individual will find a place for himself that will bring him satisfaction and profit, and benefit the common cause. Weaknesses can be as follows (for the employee):

lack of inclination to communicate, low sociability;
isolation;
little experience;
excessive emotionality;
lack of specialized education;
poor skills;
conflict;
lenient attitude towards lies.

The list is very approximate in order to guide those who are faced with the problem for the first time. Here you can add, for example, fear of public speaking (if necessary), inability to count money (if necessary), and so on. It should be based on job responsibilities, which you are applying for.

Strengths

By analogy, you can praise yourself in a questionnaire. Indicate all your talents, abilities, skills, experience. Eg:

strength of will;
endurance;
durability;
determination;
calm;
organization;
clarity of mind;
determination;
communication skills;
initiative;
patience;
love of truth;
justice;
thrift;
business abilities;
financial skills;
tolerance;
spirituality;
analytics;
ability to compromise;
artistry;
accuracy;
respectful attitude towards leaders.

The list is also very approximate. It will be easier to correct it if they explain to you what you will need to do at work. Be sure to inquire. And from the responsibilities, highlight the skills that are necessary for their successful implementation.

What is desirable to hide

It is not recommended to lie when filling out the questionnaire. But there are moments that are better not to talk about. For example, you lack willpower. That is, there were no moments in life when it needed to be demonstrated. So you think that it doesn’t exist. Then just don't include this item. There's nothing wrong with that. Believe me, this quality, called positive by society, is questionable for the employer. If a worker is stubborn, having all the inclinations to achieve the goal, it is difficult to deal with him. Such people complain to the courts and can write a statement to the authorities. Why do management need these problems?

When filling out the form, focus more on business characteristics. This is where you have to be extremely sincere. Each item indicated in the questionnaire will be checked in practice. It will be awkward and embarrassing if you are caught in a lie. If you don’t know how to talk to a client, point it out. This is a profitable business - they will teach you. And for honesty you will receive bonuses, albeit intangible ones.

You know, interviews are usually conducted by people who know how to identify a person’s strengths and weaknesses. Examples constantly pass before their eyes. Involuntarily, you will learn to notice the subtleties and nuances of behavior and project them onto characters. When you come across such a form, fill it out and read what you write twice. It is necessary to take a look at your data as if from the outside. You have two lists. Look at the list ratio. It is desirable that positive strong qualities there were three times more than the weak ones. Judge for yourself, who needs a worker who can’t do anything and doesn’t want to? It is foolish to give such an individual a chance to grow. And what do you think?