"What are your weaknesses?"-The best answers to this interview question.

 

 What are your weaknesses?

One of the most common questions you will get during an interview when you are applying for a job. Now and over the years,

 This question has been asked to so many applicants and the answers they give are shocking. So today I am going to teach you how to answer that question properly.

First, let us talk about what you do not do. So when your employer, your interviewer is asking you, so what are your weaknesses?

Oh, I have none. Do not ever say that. It is a lie.

You know it is a lie, I know it is a lie. 

In addition, do not say, well, I never thought about it or no one ever asked me that. Maybe you think you are being smart with the ply. Do not do that. It just shows you are dishonest and it shows you lack self-awareness. Those are not good answers.

Here are the most given answers that are a big No.

I am kind of a workaholic and a bit too much of a perfectionist. I know that this is familiar to you too.

 Do not try to turn it and put a positive spin on it when you are being asked what your weaknesses are. Another one answered all the time, oh, I love people, I love working with people. Really, I do not like you that much right now. Okay, that is not good. 

That is not what you do. So here is how you answer, what are your weaknesses? The key is do not make that about your personality. If you are going to share something, make that about your skill set that you could work on. 

Here is what I mean by that. When you share something about your personality, to an employer it could feel like, well, I don't know if you could fix that, that maybe it's who you are.  But if you make it about a skill set,

Then it is something that you could work on. 

So I will give you an example, what are your weaknesses?

Well, you know, I am more of an introvert and sometimes I notice that I am shy to share my ideas when there is a room of people. Now, see that is a good reply if you are an introvert because here is what is going through my mind.

My mind is thinking, okay, this person is shy and introverted and that is okay. Therefore, it means that in certain scenario, maybe I need to ask this person more to speak up. I could say, hey, you know what? What do you think of this?

On the other hand, in my mind I am also thinking, well, maybe through time once this person becomes more comfortable with everybody else within a company, she could share more ideas.

See that is what is going through my mind. That is fixable. Alternatively, maybe this person could go take Toastmasters, develop more confidence, and work on her public speaking skills a bit.

See, in my mind, all that's fixable .That's fine that is perfectly fine. 

Here is another scenario.

If you share something about your weaknesses not in terms of your personality, but your skill, but also your plan. What have you been doing to work on it or what are you planning to fix this?

So let me give an example, okay.

So what are your weaknesses?

Well, you know what; I am a very creative person. I tend to come up with all kinds of ideas and when I get these ideas, I'm very excited and I want to share that  with everybody, all my managers, my co-workers and I love to just to share. 

In addition, what I realized over the years is sometimes these ideas, sometimes they are good and sometimes they are not so good. Therefore, it is something that I know I need to work on how to prioritize some of these ideas and work on filtering. Moreover, in fact, recently, I have been reading a few books. 

One Richard Koch, 80/20, calls it Principle and Getting Things Done by David Allen. And through the book, I have picked up a lot of techniques and tools. Now they are helping me to filter out some of these ideas and how do I prioritize if there is something that I am working on all the time. 

And of course, I am always open to any coaching from you that can help me to channel my creativity into higher productions for the company.

Boom, you see how that sounds?

You are not bragging, you are not lying. You are saying, hey, I know that I have this problem; I know it is something that I need to work on it,

It is something that I am working on, here is my plan, and at the end, you are asking for coaching.

From my perspective as a CEO, as an employer, I know, okay, first, you are reading books. Damn, that is a big and right there. In addition, you are learning you are self-aware and you know what you need to work on and you are coachable. To me, those are all like plus, plus, from that simply reply.

So what are your weaknesses?

Next time when you get this question, what are going to do?

How are you going to answer it?

Reply to the best of your ability.

 

 

So Tell Me About Yourself- The best answer to that interview question

 

So tell me about yourself.

 You submitted the resume and you waited patiently and finally, you got that phone call, and now you got the interview. You are sitting across the table and the hiring manager smiles and asks you the question...Tell me about yourself. 

In addition, you panic. Moreover, you do not know what to do. You do not know what to say. You start to stutter. And halfway through the conversation you say to yourself,"Ugh! I blew it! Why did I even say that?

  You never get a second chance to make a first impression. Usually that hiring manager makes up his or her mind in the first three minutes during the interview.

Do you make a good impression? So today I'm going to share with you from a CEO perspective, from a hiring manager perspective, from an employer perspective, what is the best response to the question

"Tell me about yourself."

 You see, we have interviewed thousands and thousands of potential applicants and I cannot tell you how many times I see people kind of struggle with this question but there are incidents that we are very impressed with the response.

This is not theory. We have taken some of the best replies, some of the best responses to this question. 

I am going to teach it to you, and by the end of this blog you are going to walk away with the exact formula exactly what do you need to say and how to say it.

I am also going to give you a little script, a little template, so next time when you are asked this question you know exactly what to say. 

Now let me give you a couple keys first. 

Key number one. 

When the hiring manager is asking you the question

"Tell me about yourself," they are not actually asking about your whole life story.

They are not asking about your parents, your background, and your dog's name, and what kind of cat do you have. It is not about that.

So when people hear that question, they think,” Oh, let me tell you my life story! “And twenty minutes into it, you have not talked about anything important. Therefore, what they are actually asking is what you are bringing to the table. 

So from now on, when you hear the question, “tell me about yourself “I want you to make the mental switch. That equals what value could you bring to the company?

What problems can you solve for the company?

That is what they are asking. Moreover, you should not go on and on and on

About all your background and all of that. No. Do not do that. 

Key number two.

Be yourself, but be your best self. See, one of the mistakes people make here is they believe in the interview, “well, I just want to be myself”. Yes, you want to be yourself,

however, you want to be your best self. 

You want to be authentic; you do not want to be fake. Nevertheless, it does not mean that you just share everything. This is the first time you just sitting across the table from a hiring manager, it is like a date. 

Right? You are just getting to know each other. This is like a coffee date. So make sure that you present your best self. Lead with your strong foot forward.

Therefore, when they are asking you the question, everything you share, any statement that you make, you always want to tie it back to what's in it for them. 

 What is in it for them? So let me give you an example. Let us say someone is hiring and you are applying for a social media manager position. In addition, the hiring manager is asking you, “well, so tell me about yourself." 

A typical response, someone might say, “well, you know, I um, I-I-I grew up with social media and, um, I've used social media for a long time my whole life actually. Therefore, I am very familiar with it. 

And just about three years ago, I thought to myself well, maybe I could actually make a living doing this. Therefore, I started playing around with it, and, um, take on a couple clients here and there and I've worked with a couple people, uh, and then, now, you know,

I am planning to get married and my fiancé told me, you know, I should get a stable job.

So here, I am, and, I am looking for a company that offers good growth potential, good growth opportunity.

Moreover, this place is not too far from my home. It’s good; it's only a ten minute drive."

You see the problem. Like this, all me me me me me .It's all about that person,

What they need and all of that stuff. Bad idea.

Now, how do you feel if you are the hiring manager?

When you ask that question? If that is the answer that you get. So, instead of rambling on about that, about my background and all this stuff, what I want, no. 

If you turn it into a benefit, what is in it for them, what is in it for the hiring manager?

What could you say? I am going to give you a simple formula.

Write this down. 

Three S. 

First step is success.

Now here is a script that you could use.

"I have been blank". Or, "my background is blank". So, let me demonstrate.

Let us say it is the same position, social media manager that you are applying.

First, success. I have been. I have been doing social media for the last three years Specializing in helping companies and entrepreneurs growing their Facebook fan page. In the last three years, alone I have helped dozens of clients in over ten different industries. In addition, on average I have been able to help my clients to really increase their engagement and grow their fan page by three to five hundred percent in less than six months.

That is what I am passionate about. In fact, I have listed some of those clients. That I have worked with on the reference letter. You see how that works.

You are talking about your success but without bragging. It is more to demonstrate and highlight your skillset. What are you good at? That is number one, success. 

 Step number two is strength. 

In addition, here is the script."My strength is" or "my real strength is" fill in the blank.

My real strength is my ability to truly understand what your audience wants. I pride myself on my reputation to creating engaging and compelling content that I know your audience loves and wants to share.

That is the second step.

My strength is blank. 

Third step situation. 

Meaning, how does that apply to the position that you are applying. How do you apply your background, your strength into the new company, the new opportunity?

Situation, "what I am looking for is", fill in the blank. 

What I am looking for is a company that I could add value to, that I could produce a positive return on investment for.

Where I could join a strong team. Is this what ABC Company is looking for? You see. At the end, you ask a question. 

Whoever asks a question controls the conversation. Therefore, you want to ask a question. And now the hiring manager will be like "okay, yeah, I guess that's what I'm looking for",

Alternatively, "no that's not what we're looking for". 

And you got from there Just because you are in an interview it does not mean that you do not need to sell.

The next question you might have is well; does that mean that I have to memorize a script of some sort? Moreover, the answer is yes. 

You do not want to go in unprepared. In fact, you want to write it out, practice it, and rehearse it many times.

Therefore, when you are in front of that potential hiring manager, you are ready to go. You need to memorize it and say it many times so it comes across very natural.

The last thing you want is to panic and stutter and you do not know what to say. You do not want to do that. 

If you want to equip yourself with practical business knowledge, if you want to learn how to communicate with conviction, so you can finally get the respect that you deserve

and attain your goals. 

I am glad that this blog has helped you with confidence to face the interviewer head on.

See you on the next blog.

 

The History of Cryptocurrency

 

This is a digital form of currency not regulated by Central Bank Authority.

The first cryptocurrency was bitcoin created by an anonymous computer programmer or a group of programmer known as Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009.

They were concerned about the traditional currency reliant, the trustworthiness of banks that was dependent on the government working properly.

Traditional currency was denominated in livestock lie cows, goats, camels and bags of maize and beans. It required intermediaries for distribution and regulation by the concerned authority.

Cryptocurrency is digital money built on a decentralized block chain networks to enable trustless transactions.

Cryptography

The study of securing process communication techniques. Used in encrypting and decrypting emails and general messages.

Types of cryptography

1. Secret key cryptography

It is also known as symmetric-key cryptography. The single key needed to encrypt and decrypt messages is shared secret between the communicating parties.

2. Public key cryptography

It is also known as asymmetric cryptography. I t uses pairs of related keys. Each key consist of a public and a corresponding private key.

3. Hash cryptography

This takes inputs of a variable length to return output of a fixed length. 

Types of Cryptocurrency

1. Payment cryptocurrency

2. Utility tokens

3. Stable coins

4. Central bank digital currencies 

In today’s world, the main cryptocurrencies include

Bitcoin

Etherium

Litecoin

XRP

Dogecoin

Steps in Purchasing Cryptocurrencies

1. Choose a cryptocurrency exchange:

2. Create an account

3. Set up a payment method

4.  Buy the cryptocurrency

5. Secure your investment

How to store cryptocurrency

Cryptocurrency relies on owner’s ability to store it.

The different ways of storage vary in accommodation, size and security of the currency

Safety measures to enhance security back up using the appropriate storage wallet.

Different forms of storage include

¡  Cold wallet

¡  Hot wallet

¡  Physical coins

¡  Custodial wallet

What cryptocurrency can buy

¡  Technology and E-commerce products

¡  Some car dealerships accept Bitcoin as payment.

¡  Insurance – to pay premiums

¡  Jewelry and expensive products like watches

¡  News Media

Reasons for the increased popularity of cryptocurrency

1)      Speed

2)      Low transaction cost

3)      Accessibility

4)      Security

5)      Privacy

6)      Transparency

Cryptocurrency Frauds and Scams

·       Ponzi Schemes

·       Promises of ridiculously high returns

·       Unregistered investment projects

·       Use of sophisticated investment strategies

Malware

Two types; ransomware and crypto logger

Fake Crypto Services.

Advance fee scam.

Fake ICO.

Money laundering. 

The Future of Cryptocurrency

The future is somewhat uncertain and difficult to predict because it is evolving rapidly with time.

Some developments may include

ü  Increased adoption.

ü  Government regulation due to regular changes on policies.

ü  Integration with traditional financial systems.

ü  Competition from other digital currencies.

ü  Increased use in developing countries.

 

 

 

 

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