How to Answer: What would you say your one or two biggest failures or mistakes have been? What did you learn from them?
Advice and answer examples written specifically for an Account Executive job interview.
3. What would you say your one or two biggest failures or mistakes have been? What did you learn from them?
Why the Interviewer Asks This Question
The interviewer is wanting to learn how self-aware you are and if you are able to ask for help when you need it. They want to know that you are finding ways to improve your sales techniques or scripts if you aren't yielding desired results.
Written by Judy Smith on March 13th, 2022
What to Avoid
Do not say that you have not had any failures or mistakes, this will make it seem like you are not open to feedback. Avoid discussing someone else's failures or mistakes by keeping the focus on you.
Written by Judy Smith on March 13th, 2022
How to Answer
Talk about failures or mistakes that you discovered or ones that a coworker or manager pointed out. Then discuss what you learned from those failures and how they made you better in your role. End with how these failures or mistakes will make you successful in the role that you are interviewing for.
Written by Judy Smith on March 13th, 2022
Answer Example
"A failure that stands out to me the most is at the beginning of my professional career. It was when I first started my career as an account executive. I was so new to the sales world and thought that if I followed the script word for word it would work. I realized quickly that I needed to make certain I also believed in what I was talking about because that showed through the phone. I quickly asked for some assistance from people who have been successful in their roles and asked if I could listen in on some of their calls. This helped me tremendously and I realized that I needed to put my personality, effort, and training in order to be good at any new role. I am now able to quickly learn my pain points in a new role which leads to a smaller learning curve which I hope to be able to prove to you in this role."
Written by Judy Smith on March 13th, 2022