What is your biggest failure example answers for freshers

Interview Question: "What is Your Biggest Failure?"

During a job interview, you may be asked challenging questions about your prior work experiences and how you handled different situations. While it’s not possible to prepare for every potential interview prompt, one the hiring manager may ask is, “What is your biggest failure?” Understanding how to answer this question can impress upon interviewers your resiliency and ability to turn failure into a learning opportunity.

What is failure?

Failure is the condition of not meeting a goal or intended outcome. While it can be viewed as the opposite of success, failures in the workplace present the greatest opportunities for employee growth. The best leaders encourage failure and out-of-the-box thinking because of the innovation and learning that comes from it.

Why employers ask questions about failure:

Interviewers understand that no one is perfect. What they want to understand is whether you are self-aware enough to acknowledge your shortcomings and whether you are someone who can learn from your missteps. Failures also tell a lot about who you are as an employee and whether you are comfortable taking smart risks and pushing beyond your comfort zone to achieve goals. This question also tells them how you view risk, failure and success in general. If you have never failed, you may have never taken risks or succeeded either.

How to answer “What is your biggest failure?”

Here are some steps you can take to prepare a strong answer to this interview question:

1. Choose a specific failure

Pick a real failure that happened in the workplace, specifically a failure related to the work you’re doing now. Look for a story where something didn’t go as planned. Choosing the right story is important, as you want to explain a situation where only one thing went wrong. This will help keep the story brief and make it easy to articulate what you learned and what you can do differently next time. A team failure can also be a great choice to share with your interviewer because you share responsibility with others. It’s just important to take responsibility for your role in why it was a failure.

2. Share your story

Share with the interviewer the story you chose. Keep in mind that the purpose of asking this question is to evaluate how you handle setbacks, so try to rapidly move to the part of the story where you talk about how you managed the failure. You may want to discuss what made the situation challenging and what you did to try to rectify it. Be open about the fact that the situation did not go as planned.

3. Focus on what you learned

Talk about what you believe went wrong and caused the failure, what you would have done differently and what changes you made moving forward. For example, let’s say your failure was the result of assuming what your customers wanted. Your takeaway from the experience could be that you will never make an assumption again, and in the future, you will perform more market research and survey your customer base—even testing the product with a small sample of people before fully investing in a new product or service.

Example answers for “What is your biggest failure?”

Example :

“I took a job where I was responsible for building a sales team that would fix the major revenue problems the company was having. I was overly confident in my abilities and certain I would be able to accomplish the goal. After arriving, though, I realized the problems were not just in revenue but in the way the company was organized. I knew within one month that I wouldn’t be able to make the impact I anticipated.

I briefly considered quitting when I knew I wouldn’t come close to the sales goals I promised, but instead, I decided to focus on the things I could control. I met with the company’s executives and altered our sales goals for the year. We also decided to scale back the size of my team and bring on a consultant to fix some of the company’s deeper problems. Being in this situation reminded me of the importance of focusing on what you can control and collaborating to find solutions to complex problems. I also learned a hard lesson in humility and of not jumping in and making promises before fully understanding the scope of the problem.”

Benefits of failure

o   While no one enjoys failing, there actually are several very powerful benefits associated with failing, which makes it all the more important to learn to cope with failure.

o   Failures can make you smarter. Research shows that your brain actually gets bigger when it’s compiling information about an experience. When you fail, your brain retains the new pathways by taking new information and compiling the takeaways from the trial and error. In other words, making mistakes fundamentally alters the brain and makes it more mature.

o   Failing means you’re taking risks. If you are successful in everything you do, you probably aren’t pushing yourself beyond your comfort zone. By leaning into risks and accepting the possibility of failure, you may find that you identify more creative solutions or greater successes.

o   Failing provides opportunities for rapid growth. Rapid growth is possible when you learn from the insights of others, test what you think might work and learn from what doesn’t.

How to cope with failure

Learning to cope with failure can give you an edge professionally, make you a stronger leader and more dynamic team player in the future. Here are some basic steps for coping with failure effectively:

·                 Separate failure from your identity.

·                 Learn from the failure.

·                 Find a new perspective.

·                 Get support from others.

·                 Move forward.

·                 Celebrate failures.

·                 Lean into discomfort.

·                 Share your failures.

1. Separate failure from your identity

Remember that a setback or failure isn’t a reflection of who you are as an individual. By understanding that failure is just part of the process and not part of your identity, you can maintain the confidence to continue pursuing your goal.

2. Learn from the failure

See your failure as constructive criticism. Identify why the failure occurred and whether it was beyond your control. After you have gathered all the facts, ask yourself what you can learn from the experience and what changes you could make to achieve a different result next time.

3. Find a new perspective

Start by understanding that failure is part of the learning process. Shift your perspective away from negative thoughts and focus on positive associations. For example, tell yourself that your failure brings you one step closer to reaching your goal. Most successful people will readily tell you that failure was a critical part of their path to success.

4. Get support from others

Talking to someone close to you is a great way to manage the many emotions that can accompany a failure. Getting support will help you accept the failure, gain perspective and find encouragement to try again.

Look for ways to learn from others who are where you want to be. Read books about setbacks business professionals have overcome and how they managed those low points. Use their stories as a way to garner enthusiasm or motivation to move beyond your failure.

5. Move forward

While it’s important to fully process what happened and gather any key takeaways, it’s also important to accept it and move forward. Acceptance means you understand that you encountered an obstacle or brief setback and now need to find a solution to resolve the problem.

Sit down and make a plan for how you can apply what you learned and move forward. Understand that challenge, growth and even failure are almost always required to achieve a goal.

6. Celebrate failures. If your team works hard, pushes beyond their comfort zone and fails anyway, celebrate the failure. Create a culture where you celebrate risk-taking, even if it doesn’t result in success.

7. Lean into discomfort. If you or a member of your team has a new idea, start by taking small steps to lean into the discomfort and uncertainty. For example, you could test interest in a product or service before risking enormous amounts of time and money. This allows you to fail quickly at a low cost if the market isn’t interested.

8. Share your failures. The easiest way to encourage a team to embrace risk is to share stories of your own failures and what you learned from them.

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