Are some weaknesses too weak? or not weak enough?

Graduate School Business School - MBA
1

<p>I sat down with a recommender and together we came up with this as an outline with which he can write about my weaknesses in his recommendation. You think these make me sound too unprofessional? or are they not weak enough as in I'm blowing off the question:</p>

<p>Weakness
There are a few areas that (would, may) be considered weaknesses
K*** was often overly eager. In one situation he was so eager to have our group adopt a newer presentation template that another division of the bank was using, that he neglected to realize that that division would actually have charged our group a fee for its usage. I don’t believe K*** realized that due to the size of our corporation, fee structure becomes quite complicated and can often result in situations such as this. </p>

<p>I would also say that another weakness of K<strong><em>’s is that he sometimes appears nonchalant in his attitude toward the work he is doing and would appear to be making light of it or crack a joke. After working with him, I realized that K</em></strong> actually does care about the work he was doing, and was actually quite enthusiastic about it. The problem really lay with other’s perception of his attitude. They thought he simply didn’t care about what he was doing, when in reality, he chose to focus his efforts on the actual work, and not in acting enthusiastic during the meeting to discuss what needed to be done. After discussing this with K<strong><em>, he realized that other’s perception of his attitude is often almost as important as the actual end product. I definitely saw a shift in this specific aspect of K</em></strong>s personality after it was pointed out to him and it is one area where I can say K*** has definitely improved.</p>

2

<p>Why are you going to paint a negative picture of yourself in the minds of admissions officers? Don’t let them know about any weaknesses.</p>

<p>If there are going to be any weaknesses it will be shown in your GPA, work experience (the positions you’ve held but not actual bad things that happened during work that are on record), and GMAT score. That’s it. And then you address any of those in your essays.</p>

<p>A recommendation shouldn’t have weaknesses. Recommendations should talk about strengths, that’s it. You think mentioning weaknesses and then putting them in a better light is productive but it really shows that you or the person that you recommend are negative and if you’re not negative, the person recommending you is making you look negative.</p>

<p>The great Confederate general Robert E. Lee picked generals based on their strengths and ignored their weaknesses. One example was Stonewall Jackson who unleashed crushing defeats on the North. The Union general Ulysses S. Grant picked his generals based on the ones who had the fewest weaknesses but was losing against the South despite this strategy. It wasn’t until he started concentrating on the strengths of individuals that he started picking successful leaders for the Union army and the North started winning the war.</p>

<p>Your recommendations should focus on your strengths.</p>