English Job Interview #6-Your Strengths

These interview questions ask you to show pride and confidence.  It may seem a simple task for an English job interview, but many people have difficulty boasting about themselves. Here are a few tips that can help you to organise your ideas and keep your message targeted.

English Job Interview Questions about your Strengths:

• Why Should We Hire You?
• What Can You Bring to the Company?
• What Are Your Greatest Strengths?
• What Is Your Greatest Professional Achievement?
• Tell Me About a Time You Demonstrated Leadership Skills.
• What Makes You Unique?

Why Should We Hire You?

These words are very forward and you might feel a bit intimidated about answering, especially if you’re not the type to boast.  No matter your personality, this is the time to show confidence and sell yourself.  You need to make them believe that you can do the work, deliver results, and fit into their team and culture.

What Can You Bring to the Company?

Repeating your work history may not be the best strategy here.  Instead, tailor your answer to the company and their problems and challenges.  You might have uncovered hints of these issues in the job advert, or in your research.  Perhaps they mentioned some of these challenges in your earlier interviews.  Your goal is to connect your skills with their present needs.

What Are Your Greatest Strengths?

Don’t go for the machine gun approach here.  Quality beats quantity.  Choose 1 or 2 specific traits that the job requires and convince the recruiter using examples and stories.  Paint a picture to make the story more memorable.  If you have trouble boasting about yourself, think about what your supervisors have said to you personally and in your performance reviews.  Additionally, tell them about the compliments you have received from your colleagues or clients.

Tell Me About a Time You Demonstrated Leadership Skills.

Even if you have never been a manager or assistant manager, you still had experiences where you acted like a leader. Think about a time when you led a project, took initiative, or helped motivate your team. This is a good opportunity to use the STAR technique:  Situation, Task, Action, Result.  Breaking your answer into these 4 parts can organise the story help the interviewer follow you.

What Is Your Greatest Professional Achievement?

You have many moments in your career that you’re proud of, but how can you best impress your interviewer?  First, think again of the company and the position, and consider what they want you to bring. Next, be ready with quantifiable information: numbers.  What percentage did you increase sales?  By how much time did you reduce the process length?  This is another question that works well with the STAR approach. Explain the background situation, the task that you had to give the interviewer context (e.g., “In my job as a marketing assistant, it was my role to manage social media campaigns”), then describe the action you took and the result you achieved: “In one year, I increased online engagement and by 35%.”

What Makes You Unique?

Remember to keep it relevant to the position and the qualities the interviewer is seeking.  Think back on your research again and consider the type of candidate they are looking for.  Think about why your colleagues turn to you for help.  Think about the people you have worked with and how your work style and work attitude is different from theirs.